The
Departure of the Mayflower
After
you are finished reading, try the reading comprehension
exercise for this passage.
The
holiday of Thanksgiving was born from the Puritan
settlement of Plymouth, on the coast of present-day
Massachusetts.
Puritan
separatists, desperate for religious freedom, left
England in 1607 for the Netherlands under increasing
pressure from the crown to conform. Although they
were allowed religious freedom, they were not granted
citizenship in the Netherlands, and hence, could
not secure meaningful jobs and were restricted to
those that were low-paying and unskilled. Some Puritans,
disheartened by the drifting of their children from
the church, made arrangements with the Merchant
Adventurers (a London joint-stock company) to relocate
to America. Payment for their passage was made in
exchange for future repayment and a percentage of
future profits made by the settlement.
35
Pilgrims (as they would come to be known) boarded
the Mayflower with 67 other passengers and set sail
for Virginia on September 16, 1620. The treacherous
voyage across the stormy Atlantic Ocean lasted 10
weeks. When the Mayflower finally approached America,
it was no where near Jamestown or even Virginia.
On November 11, 1620, the Mayflower reached land
off present-day Cape Cod. Some historians believe
the Mayflower never intended to sail to Virginia,
but rather had secretly planned to sail to New England.
Many of the passengers threatened mutiny because
they were supposed to be brought to Virginia. As
a result, the Mayflower Compact was drafted which
guaranteed the equal treatment of all settlers in
the new colony. The Mayflower Compact further documented
the colony's continued allegiance to England, but
also called for the establishment of an independent,
civil government.
The
Compact was signed by 41 male passengers and the
decision to remain at Plymouth, rather than to spend
more time at sea was made. The settlers organized
themselves into a group known as the Council of
New England. The council promised one hundred acres
of land to those settlers who remained at Plymouth
for seven years. The Mayflower and its passengers
explored the coast of Massachusetts
for several weeks before finding the perfect spot
at Plymouth on December 21, 1620.
Life
in Massachusetts was difficult for the settlers.
Half of the original passengers on the Mayflower
died of disease , starvation, and the harsh Massachusetts
winter. Unlike Jamestown, however, Indian attacks
were not a constant threat. Rather, the local Wampanoag
Indians were responsible for the colonists survival.
Squanto, who was kidnapped and had experienced life
in Europe as a slave and later as an observer of
European culture in a monastery, had recently returned
to Massachusetts
only to find his former village ravaged by death
and disease. He assimilated into the Wampanoag village
located at Plymouth and later joined the Pilgrim
colony at Plymouth when they learned he could speak
English. Squanto taught the Pilgrims how to establish
friendly relations with the Indians and how to plant
crops, fish, and trap mammals for the fur trade.
If it wasn't for Squanto, the Wampanoags and their
sachem Massasoit, all of the settlers would have
surely perished. One year after the landing of the
Mayflower, the surviving Pilgrims celebrated their
first fall harvest with a prodigious feast. They
invited 91 of their Indian friends. The feast was
the first ever Thanksgiving.
