Every Child Should Know Their History The Mayflower Journey
When Mayflower sailed from Plymouth alone on September 16, 1620, with what Bradford called “a prosperous wind” she carried 102 passengers plus a crew of 25 to 30 officers and men, bringing the total aboard to approximately 130. She was considered a smaller cargo ship. She was a high-built craft forward and aft, measuring approximately 100 feet in length and about 25 feet at her widest point. The living quarters for the 102 passengers were cramped, with the living area about 20 by 80 feet or 1,600 square feet and the ceiling about five feet high. Couples and children were packed closely together for a trip lasting two months, a great deal of trust and confidence was required among everyone aboard. English Protestants living in exile in Holland, were dissatisfied with the failure of the Church of England to reform what they felt were many excesses and abuses. But rather than work for change in England they chose to live as separatists in religiously tolerant Holland in 1608. As separatists, they were considered illegal radicals by their home country of England.
The government of Leiden was recognized for offering financial aid to reformed churches, whether English, French or German, which made it a sought-after destination for Protestant intellectuals. Many of the separatists were illegal members of a church in Nottinghamshire, England, secretly practicing their Puritan form of Protestantism. When they learned that the authorities were aware of their congregation, church members fled in the night with little more than the clothes they were wearing, and clandestinely made it to Holland.,
Life in Holland became increasingly difficult for the congregation. They were forced into menial and backbreaking jobs, such as cleaning wool, which led to a variety of health afflictions. In addition, a number of the country’s leading theologians began engaging open in instilling the fear that Spain might again place Holland’s population under siege, as it had done years earlier.Pilgrims chose to separate themselves from the Church of England, which forced them to pray in private. They believed that its resistance to reform and Roman Catholic past left it beyond redemption. Starting in 1608, a group of English families left England for the Netherlands, where they could worship freely. By 1620, the community determined to cross the Atlantic for America, which they considered a “new Promised Land”, where they would establish Plymouth Colony.
The Pilgrims had originally hoped to reach America by early October using two ships, but delays and complications meant they could use only one, Mayflower. Arriving in November, they had to survive unprepared through a harsh winter. As a result, only half of the original Pilgrims survived the first winter at Plymouth. If not for the help of local indigenous peoples to teach them food gathering and other survival skills, all of the colonists might have perished. The following year, those 53 who survived celebrated the colony’s first fall harvest along with 90 Wampanoag Native American people,an occasion declared in centuries later the first American Thanksgiving. Before disembarking on the Mayflower, the Pilgrims wrote and signed the Mayflower Compact, an agreement that established a rudimentary government, in which each member would contribute to the safety and welfare of the planned settlement. As one of the earliest colonial vessels, the ship has become a cultural icon in the history of the United States.
Noel Ison
Walterboro, SC 29488
