On November 7, 1637, Anne Hutchinson, a private member of the Puritan community of Massachusetts Bay, faced a tribunal led by Massachusetts governor John Winthrop. The issue cited in the record of the trial was whether Hutchinson had supported breakaway ministers John Cotton and John Wheelwright, who had recently been tried for their theological teachings. Hutchinson's response to Winthrop has become a landmark statement on freedom of worship and freedom of conscience in American history. Historians also see Hutchinson as a woman who challenged the male patriarchy of both colony and church.