How did Massachusettes go from Puritan colonists to having an Episcopalian elite?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

A few idle thoughts, strung loosely together:

1. The 'Puritan' label was a pretty loose one that applied to a significant element still within the Church of England and not only to Independents (Congregationalists in later parlance), Presbyterians and smaller radical groups. The traditional Low Church element in Anglicanism (which still exists) is a direct descendant. I'm more familiar with what happened in England after the end of the Commonwealth than with the new society built in the New England, but I would presume that a similar unwinding occurred, though presumably at a much slower pace.

2. Emigration from England to New England did not cease in the mid 17th century and the vast majority of immigrants will have been Anglican of one shade or another.

3. I don't believe that the historical WASP elite in New England was ever as thoroughly Episcopalian as in other states anyway? There was always a residual element in the older churches directly descended from the Independent tendency in Puritanism and then, of course, there was the famous interest in Unitarianism, which was very much an elite phenomenon.

4. This is a combination of 2) and 3) really: in cases of mixed marriages (which will have been more common in the 19th, especially later 19th, century than earlier), it would be the norm for all of the children to be raised in only one of the two parental denominations. Weight of numbers would tend to mean that a smaller group would thus become proportionately smaller.