When Longfellow imagined the John Alden-Priscilla Mullins-Miles Standish love triangle, he depicted Priscilla spinning as Alden arrived to offer Standish’s marriage proposal. The image of a spinning maiden is an old one, and both in the time of the Pilgrims (early 1600s) and in Longfellow’s day (mid-1800s) this image was shorthand for female industry and piety as well as domestic tranquility. Longfellow was undoubtedly invoking that symbolism when he chose spinning as Priscilla’s activity, but do the historical facts support that choice?

he Pilgrim story is known the world over as one of America’s founding narratives. The traditional account—the flight from religious persecution, exile in Holland, the 1620 voyage and the Compact, landing on Plymouth Rock, the fatal first winter, and the First Thanksgiving—has achieved canonical status. However, this narrative did not spring forth from history fully formed; rather it has evolved over time and is still being shaped by changing social and political circumstances.

The 1627 Plimoth Plantation presented a recreation of a Pilgrim wedding ceremony on August 14, 2010. They chose to go back to the year 1623 when Governor William Bradford, whose wife Dorothy May had drowned shortly after the arrival of the Mayflower in 1620, married Elizabeth Carpenter, the widow Southworth.

At last! Jeremy Bangs’ long awaited comprehensive history of the Pilgrims, Strangers and Pilgrims, Travellers and Sojourners - Leiden and the Foundations of Plymouth Plantation has finally been published. When one reads some of the previously published Pilgrim history, it is something like looking at paintings in a museum, especially “history paintings,” where you get the viewpoint of the artist based on his or her biases and knowledge. What Dr. Bangs has provided is a step further; not presenting the “Hogwarts” framed images where the subjects move as they had in life, but rather he lets us step through the frame into the past.

The following paper is by the 2009 recipient of the Katharine Fox Little Distinguished Mayflower Scholarship Award. Jane Fiske was honored at the 2009 Annual Meeting of the SMDPA in Essington, PA for her “Discovering, Recording, Compiling, Preserving, Publishing, And Facilitating the Same by Others, of Genealogy and History of the Pilgrims.” Her paper was not presented verbatim, although all issues were covered. It is posted here for those who could not attend the meeting.

That New England's Calvinist Puritans created theocratic governments is a stereotype that owes much to the nineteenth-century myth that Calvin established theocratic government in Geneva. In his Institutes, Calvin distinguishes between the jurisdiction of civil and ecclesiastical governments, stating that the magistrate in a Christian society has general authority over the entire society, including the obligation to protect and enforce religion and morality. Clergy have authority within the congregation only, including excommunication. While laws should conform with biblical precept, Calvin believes that many Old Testament regulations were abrogated by the New Testament.

1. Introduction
Pilgrim families arrived in Holland in the spring of 1608 and in Plymouth in December 1620. In May 1607, 105 men arrived in Jamestown to establish the first permanent English settlement in North America. While the individuals in both settlements were English, the they were different in many important ways. To fully appreciate our Pilgrim heritage, it is important to understand the differences between Plymouth and Jamestown. This essay identifies major differences and explains how these differences affected the settlements during the first few decades of their arrival.

New publications still have some errors in fact.

"A Thanksgiving for plenty. O Most merciful Father, which of thy gracious goodness hast heard the devout prayers of thy church, and turned our dearth and scarcity into cheapnesse and plenty: we giue thee humble thankes for this thy special bounty, beseeching thee to continue this thy louing kindnes unto vs, that our land may yeild vs her fruits of increase, to thy glory and our comfort, through Iesus Christ our Lord, Amen"

Our Mayflower ancestors were not of “royal blood.” For the most part, they were what we now would call “middle class” people who had to work for a living. Of the 58 male passengers, both men and boys, the trades or occupations of only 32 are known. This is one more than what was known in January 1999 because the Pilgrim John Howland Society has discovered an Indenture dated 1623 that reveals John Howland’s trade: salter. The women and girls are not included because about two hundred years would pass before females would be allowed to be any more than what we now call “Housewives.”

The Algonquin Nation inhabited New England and the mid-Atlantic states. The Wampanoag federation at its peak contained 20,000 to 30,000 individuals in two dozen tribes who occupied southeastern Massachusetts and eastern Rhode Island. The Wampanoag was ruled by a Sachem, Massasoit, and a council of young men who had proven themselves in battle and older men chosen for their wisdom. Europeans explored, and in some cases planted settlements along the coast of New England since at least 1498.

Why do Pilgrims occupy such an enduring part in the American imagination? Jamestown was settled earlier than Plymouth, was larger and its settlers suffered physical conditions as grim as the Pilgrims experienced. The answer is that the Jamestown settlers were quite different than the Pilgrims and the political conditions under which Jamestown was settled were quite different than for Plymouth.

William and Mary Brewster arrived on the Mayflower, their daughter Patience arrived on the Anne in 1623. Thomas Prence arrived on the Fortune in 1621. Prence was elected Governor in 1634, Assistant Governor in 1635 and after Bradford died in 1657 Prence served as Governor until the end of his life. Rebecca Prence, daughter of Thomas Prence, was the first wife of Edmond Freeman III. After Rebecca died, Edmond married Margaret Perry. Their son, Edmond Freeman IV, was the ancestor of the Wright brothers. Thus the Wright brothers are related to William Brewster, but not descendants of Brewster.

The Ship Mayflower, with 102 Pilgrims aboard, plowed through the waves of the North Atlantic in the fall of 1620. On all sailing ships, the bow bangs against, and slices through, the large oncoming waves, as the sails driver her forward, The shape of her bow is like a plowshare tilling the earth except, instead of earth churning away, a bow spray develops and sprays up high and over the deck of the ship, even in sunny weather. This particular spray was chilled by the fall temperatures in the open ocean and as it fell on the huddled passengers, it felt like a constant rain. People traveling by sea in those days felt it was the very worst place on earth to be, for they became prisoners on the ship until it made landfall. To keep dry they huddled under oilcloths, which were cloth blankets mostly cut from old sails, coated with an oil or grease and draped over the body. Some slept in these.

There were one hundred and two passengers (plus the crew) on the Mayflower. Only forty-one males who were free agents, including Christopher Martin, the agent and treasurer of the London merchants, signed the Compact on November 11 (=21), 1620, in Provincetown Harbor. The intent of the Compact was to assure that all would band together and submit to majority rule.