The colony in 1639 established a government modeled on that drafted by the leaders of the Connecticut Colony, which called for annual elections of its governor. Eaton was elected governor until his death in 1658. Following the restoration of King Charles II to the English throne in 1660, the colony became a subject of his ire when it harbored two fugitive regicides of Charles I, Edward Whalley and William Goffe. In 1662 Charles II issued a royal charter for the Connecticut Colony that merged the two colonies. The process of merger was not completed until 1665. The colony's last governor, William Leete, also later served as governor of Connecticut. Connecticut Colony, 1639–1776 The Connecticut Colony was formed from the towns of Hartford, Windsor and Wethersfield. Between 1639 and 1655, consecutive terms were not allowed, so the governorship rotated between John Haynes and Edward Hopkins each year, except for 1642 when George Wyllys served. Thomas Welles and John Winthrop the Younger also served non-consecutive terms. John Winthrop the Younger was the governor of the combined Connecticut Colony in 1662, the year it received its royal charter. However, the regime change did not include an election for governor; Winthrop was merely retained in his position. The merger took three years to complete, during which time William Leete remained in New Haven. A similar situation happened to Jonathan Trumbull in 1776; the royal government was discarded for state government without a gubernatorial election, making Trumbull the independent state's first governor. Sir Edmund Andros attempted to merge Connecticut into the Dominion of New England in 1687. As governor of the Province of New York in the 1670s, he had attempted to enforce the Duke of York's claims to territories as far east as the Connecticut River, and his assumption of Dominion control in October 1687 was marked by a failed attempt to seize the colonial charter. Andros is pointedly excluded from numbered lists of Connecticut governors; however, his portrait hangs, along with those of other governors, in Memorial Hall in the Connecticut State Supreme Court/State Library/State Museum building across from the State Capitol in Hartford. As Andros failed to take the Connecticut Charter, Connecticut was never absorbed into the Dominion of New England. References Connecticut Colonial Governors