Mayflower

Mayflower in Plymouth Harbor by William Halsall (1882)

The Mayflower was the famous ship that transported the Pilgrims from Plymouth, England, to Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts (United States), in 1620. The Mayflower was not originally intended for passengers, it was used primarily as a cargo ship, involved in active trade of goods (often wine) between England and other European countries, (principally France, but also Norway, Germany, and Spain).

The vessel disembarked from England on September 6, and after a grueling journey marked by disease, the ship dropped anchor on November 11 inside the hook tip of Cape Cod (Provincetown Harbor).

Mayflower arrived inside tip of Cape Cod fishhook, November 11, 1620

Ship

The Mayflower was purchased by Christopher Jones and several of his business partners in 1607. The ship's first voyage under Captain Jones was to Norway, in 1609, to transport lumber, tar, and fish back to England. The return trip was nearly fatal for the crew of the Mayflower as it was caught in a winter storm on the way home. They survived and arrived back in England after several weeks of being veered off course. Not wanting to encounter another fierce winter storm The captain never sailed the North Sea again. The ship sailed to Franceand Spain for the next ten years until in May 1620, the Pilgrims met Captain Jones and hired him to transport them to America.

Details of the ship's dimensions are unknown; but estimates based on its load weight and the typical size of 180-ton merchant ships of its day suggest an estimated length of 90–110 feet (27.4–33.5 m) and a width of about 25 feet (7.6 m). The ship was manned by a crew of twenty five to thirty men.

Pilgrims' voyage

The Mayflower Memorial in Southampton.

The Mayflower originally was destined for the Hudson River, north of the Jamestown Settlement. However, the Mayflower went severely off-course as the winter approached and remained in Cape Cod Bay.

The voyage to the New World was a perilous undertaking for it's one hundred and two passengers and thirty crew members. It was reported that at times it seemed the ship with tip over with the strong gusts of wind. The Pilgrims ate the same food everyday, sea biscuits, salted meat, dried fish and cheese. Many of the passengers remained ill for weeks on end. There was only one death on the Mayflower voyage, twenty two year William Butten the servant of Deacon Samuel Fuller. Butten was buried at sea.

On March 21, 1621, the passengers, who had inhabited the ship during the winter, moved ashore at Plymouth Colony, and on April 5, the Mayflower returned to England.

The main record for the voyage of the Mayflower and the disposition of the Plymouth Colony comes from William Bradford who was a guiding force and later the governor of the colony.

Initially, the plan was for the voyage to be made in two vessels, the other being the smaller Speedwell. The first voyage of the ships departed Southampton, England, on August 5, 1620; but the Speedwell developed a leak, and had to be refitted at Dartmouth. On the second attempt, the ships reached the Atlantic Ocean but again were forced to return to Plymouth because of the Speedwell's leak. After reorganization, the final sixty-six day voyage was made by the Mayflower alone.

When the ship was forced far off-course by inclement weather and drifted well north of the intended Virginia settlement. As a result of the delay, the settlers did not arrive in Cape Cod until the onset of a harsh New England winter. The settlers ultimately failed to reach Virginia where they had already obtained permission from the London Company to settle.

To establish legal order and to quell increasing strife within the ranks, the settlers wrote and signed the Mayflower Compact after the ship dropped anchor at the tip of Cape Cod on November 11, in what is now Provincetown.

The settlers, upon initially setting anchor, explored the snow-covered area and discovered an empty Native American village. The curious settlers dug up some artificially-made mounds, some of which had stored corn while others were burial sites. The settlers stole the corn sparking friction with the locals. They explored the area of Cape Cod for several weeks and decided to relocate after a difficult encounter with the local native Americans, the Nausets.

During the winter the passengers remained on board the 'Mayflower', suffering an outbreak of a contagious disease described as a mixture of scurvy, pneumonia and tuberculosis. When it ended, there were only fifty three persons still alive, half of the passengers and half of the crew. In spring, they built huts ashore, and on March 21, 1621, the surviving passengers left the 'Mayflower'.

On April 5, 1621, the Mayflower set sail from Plymouth Colony to return to England, where she arrived on May 6, 1621.

Passengers

The 102 passengers on the Mayflower were the earliest permanent European settlers in New England; some of their descendants have taken great interest in tracing their ancestry back to one or more of these Pilgrims. Throughout the winter, the passengers spent time ashore preparing homesites and searching for food but partly remained based aboard the Mayflower. Only about half of the settlers would still be alive when the Mayflower left in the spring. Governor Bradford noted that about half the sailors died.

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Armentrout, David and Armentrout, Patricia The Mayflower Compact, Vero Beach, FL: Rourke Pub, 2004 ISBN 9781595152299 (for children)

• Beale, David The Mayflower Pilgrims : Roots of Puritan, Presbyterian, Congregationalist, and Baptist Heritage, Greenville, SC: Emerald House Group, 2000 ISBN 978-1889893518

• Drinan, Paul, Raftery, Erin, Redford, Sam, Layman, Chris K, Wolfinger, Lisa, Collins, Rocky, the Lone Wolf Documentary Group, A & E Home Video and the New Video Group, Desperate crossing the untold story of the Mayflower, NY: A & E Home Video (Distributed by New Video), 2007 ISBN 9780767093415 Ernest Gébler

• Gébler, Ernest The Plymouth adventure; a chronicle novel of the voyage of the Mayflower, Garden City, N.Y., Doubleday, 1950 (historical fiction)

• Hilton, Christopher Mayflower: The Voyage that Changed the World, Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing, 2005 ISBN 978-0750936545

• Lassieur, Allison and McDonnell, Peter The Voyage of the Mayflower, Mankato, Minn: Capstone Press, 2006 ISBN 9780736843713

• Philbrick, Nathaniel Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War, NY: Penguin, 2007 ISBN 978-0143111979

• Whitehurst, Susan The Mayflower, NY: PowerKids Press, 2002 ISBN 9780823958061 (for children)

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