Document: Sentence of William Hallet for allowing Baptist conventicles in his house

[ Whereas William Hallett, born in Dorsetshire, in England, about 40 years old, a resident of the village of Vlissingen, and now a prisoner, has had the audacity to call and allow to be ] called conventicles and gatherings at his house and to tolerate there, in contempt of published and several times renewed placards of the director general and councilors of New Netherland, the exegesis and interpretation of God’s Holy Word, as he confesses, the ministering of the sacraments by one William Wickendam, while the latter (which could not have been unknown to him) had neither by ecclesiastical nor secular authority been called or appointed thereto; and whereas he with several others has been present at and listened to this exegesis and interpretation, and after hearing it has with others from the hands of the said Wickendam received the bread in the form and manner in which the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper is usually celebrated and distributed; all of which is in direct contradiction with the general political and ecclesiastical rules of our fatherland and especially contrary to the said placard of the director general and councilors, which he as schout in the [aforesaid village was bound to uphold and strictly enforce, which, however, he has not only failed to do, but himself has transgressed and disobeyed.[i]

Therefore the director general and councilors of New Netherland in pursuance of the tenor of the said placards, first dismiss the said William] Hallett from his office of schout in the aforesaid village of Vlissingen and furthermore condemn him to a double fine, to wit, 50 pounds Flemish; because being schout and officer he should have obstructed and prevented these proceedings and enforced the placards of the director general and councilors; he is also banished from this province of New Netherland and shall be detained in prison until he has paid and satisfied the aforesaid fine with the costs and mises of law incurred in this case.

Thus decreed and sentenced in council of director general and councilors at Fort Amsterdam in New Netherland the 8th of November anno1656.