Plymouth Colony (sometimes Plimouth) was an English colonial venture in America from 1620 to 1691 at a location that had previously been surveyed and named by Captain John Smith. The settlement served as the capital of the colony and developed as the town of Plymouth, Massachusetts. At its height, Plymouth Colony occupied most of the southeastern portion of Massachusetts. Plymouth Colony was founded by a group of Puritan Separatists initially known as the Brownist Emigration, who came to be known as the Pilgrims. It was the second successful colony to be founded by the English in America after Jamestown in Virginia, and it was the first permanent English settlement in the New England region.
Introduction
Plymouth Colony
Plymouth Colony | Introduction
Plymouth, Massachusetts Plymouth, Massachusetts America Massachusetts.
what year did the mayflower land on plymouth bay
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December 16, 1620
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where was this colony located?
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The Pilgrim settlers realized that they did not have a patent to settle in the region, so they signed the Mayflower Compact prior to disembarking. They explored various parts of Cape Cod and eventually sought a suitable location for a permanent settlement to the westward in Cape Cod Bay. They discovered the sheltered waters of Plymouth Harbor on December 17, and the protected bay led to a site for the new settlement after three days of surveying. The settlers officially disembarked on December 21, 1620. It is traditionally said that the Pilgrims first set foot in America at the site of Plymouth Rock, though no historical evidence can prove this claim.
Plymouth, Massachusetts | Colonial era
The "Mayflower" passengers sighted land on November 9, 1620 after enduring miserable conditions for about 65 days, and William Brewster led them in reading Psalm 100 as a prayer of thanksgiving. They confirmed that the area was Cape Cod within the New England territory recommended by Weston. They attempted to sail the ship around the cape towards the Hudson River, also within the New England grant area, but they encountered shoals and difficult currents around Cape Malabar (the old French name for Monomoy Island). They decided to turn around, and the ship was anchored in Provincetown Harbor by November 11/21.
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) | Arrival in America
Plymouth played a very important role in American colonial history. It was the final landing site of the first voyage of the "Mayflower" and the location of the original settlement of Plymouth Colony. Plymouth was established in December 1620 by English separatist Puritans who had broken away from the Church of England, believing that the Church had not completed the work of the Protestant Reformation. Today, these settlers are much better known as the "Pilgrims", a term coined by William Bradford. The Mayflower first anchored in the harbor of Provincetown, Massachusetts on November 11, 1620. The ship was headed for the mouth of the Hudson River near Manhattan, which was part of the Colony of Virginia at the time, but it did not go beyond Cape Cod.
Plymouth, Massachusetts | Colonial era
The "Mayflower" anchored at Provincetown Harbor on November 11, 1620. The Pilgrims did not have a patent to settle this area, and some passengers began to question their right to land, complaining that there was no legal authority to establish a colony. In response to this, a group of colonists drafted and signed the first governing document of the colony, the Mayflower Compact, while still aboard the ship as it lay off-shore. The intent of the compact was to establish a means of governing the colony, though it did little more than confirm that the colony would be governed like any English town.
Plymouth Colony | Landings at Provincetown and Plymouth
A third expedition along Cape Cod left on December 6; it resulted in a skirmish with Indians known as the "First Encounter" near Eastham, Massachusetts. The colonists decided to look elsewhere, having failed to secure a proper site for their settlement, and fearing that they had angered the Indians by taking their corn and firing upon them. The "Mayflower" left Provincetown Harbor and set sail for Plymouth Harbor. The "Mayflower" dropped anchor in Plymouth Harbor on December 16 and spent three days looking for a settlement site. They rejected several sites, including one on Clark's Island and another at the mouth of the Jones River, in favor of the site of a recently abandoned settlement which had been occupied by the Patuxet tribe.
Plymouth Colony | Landings at Provincetown and Plymouth
They named their settlement "Plimouth" (sometimes spelled "Plimoth") after the major port city in Devon, England from which the "Mayflower" ultimately sailed.
Plymouth, Massachusetts | Colonial era
Continuing westward, the shallop's mast and rudder were broken by storms and the sail was lost. They rowed for safety, encountering the harbor formed by Duxbury and Plymouth barrier beaches and stumbling on land in the darkness. They remained at this spot for two days to recuperate and repair equipment. They named it Clark's Island for a "Mayflower" mate who first set foot on it. They resumed exploration on Monday, December 11/21 when the party crossed over to the mainland and surveyed the area that ultimately became the settlement. The anniversary of this survey is observed in Massachusetts as Forefathers' Day and is traditionally associated with the Plymouth Rock landing tradition.
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) | Settlement
Founded by a group of Separatists and Anglicans, who together later came to be known as the Pilgrims, Plymouth Colony (in Massachusetts) was founded in 1620 by those who sailed aboard the Mayflower. The colony was one of the earliest successful colonies to be founded by the English in North America, and the first sizeable permanent English settlement in what is now the New England region. Soon other colonies were established in New England. A Puritan minister named John Davenport led his flock from exile in the Netherlands back to England and finally to America in the spring of 1637.
Thomas Powell (1641–1722) | Historical background
Two early areas of settlement were Plymouth (c 1620) and Nantasket (c 1621). The Plymouth Colony began with the Mayflower's landing and is a well-known story. The Nantasket settlement followed soon after that of Plymouth. Roger Conant was at these two settlements before going north to Cape Ann.
Old Planters (Massachusetts) | Plymouth
On May 31, 1607, about 100 men and boys left England for what is now Maine. Approximately three months later, the group landed on a wooded peninsula where the Kennebec River meets the Atlantic Ocean and began building Fort St. George. By the end of the year, due to limited resources, half of the colonists returned to England. Late the next year, the remaining 45 sailed home, and the Plymouth company fell dormant.
Colony of Virginia | Popham colony and Plymouth company
The Plymouth Colony originated as a land grant issued by the London Virginia Company to a group of English separatist Puritans who had fled to Holland to avoid religious persecution. Their migration to the New World in 1620 aboard the "Mayflower" was funded by the Merchant Adventurers, who sent additional settlers to engage in profit-making activities in the colony. The settlers had intended to establish a colony near the mouth of the Hudson River, within the bounds of the London Virginia Company's territory, but weather conditions on their arrival led them to establish it instead on the shores of Cape Cod Bay at Plymouth, Massachusetts.
List of colonial governors of Massachusetts | Plymouth Colony: 1620–86, 1689–92
On December 21, 1620, the first landing party arrived at the site of Plymouth. Plans to build houses, however, were delayed by bad weather until December 23. As the building progressed, 20 men always remained ashore for security purposes while the rest of the work crews returned each night to the "Mayflower". Women, children, and the infirm remained on board the "Mayflower", and many had not left the ship for six months. The first structure was a common house of wattle and daub, and it took two weeks to complete in the harsh New England winter. In the following weeks, the rest of the settlement slowly took shape.
Plymouth Colony | First winter
Bradford had yet to assume any significant leadership role in the colony by the time that he was 30. The "Mayflower" anchored in Provincetown Harbor and he volunteered to be a member of the exploration parties searching for a place for settlement. In November and December, these parties made three separate ventures from the "Mayflower" on foot and by boat, finally locating Plymouth Harbor in mid-December and selecting that site for settlement. During the first expedition on foot, Bradford got caught in a deer trap made by Indians and hauled nearly upside down. The third exploration departed from the "Mayflower" on December 6, 1620 when a group of men (including Bradford) located Plymouth Bay.
William Bradford (governor) | Anchored and first explorations at Plymouth Colony
In 1620 the Pilgrims attempted to sail to the Hudson River from England. However, "Mayflower" reached Cape Cod (now part of Massachusetts) on November 9, 1620, after a voyage of 64 days. For a variety of reasons, primarily a shortage of supplies, "Mayflower" could not proceed to the Hudson River, and the colonists decided to settle near Cape Cod, establishing the Plymouth Colony.
New Amsterdam | Pilgrims' attempt to settle in the Hudson River area
Plymouth Colony (sometimes Plimouth) was an English colonial venture in America from 1620 to 1691 at a location that had previously been surveyed and named by Captain John Smith. The settlement served as the capital of the colony and developed as the town of Plymouth, Massachusetts. At its height, Plymouth Colony occupied most of the southeastern portion of Massachusetts. Plymouth Colony was founded by a group of Puritan Separatists initially known as the Brownist Emigration, who came to be known as the Pilgrims. It was the second successful colony to be founded by the English in America after Jamestown in Virginia, and it was the first permanent English settlement in the New England region.
Plymouth Colony | Introduction
A winter storm nearly sank their boat as they approached the bay, but they managed to land on Clark's Island, suffering from severe exposure to the cold and waves. During the ensuing days, they explored the bay and found a suitable place for settlement, now the site of downtown Plymouth, Massachusetts. The location featured a prominent hill ideal for a defensive fort. There were numerous brooks providing fresh water, and it had been the location of an Indian village known as Patuxet; therefore, much of the area had already been cleared for planting crops. The Patuxet tribe had been wiped out by plagues between 1616 and 1619, possibly as a result of contact with English fishermen or from contact with the French to the north.
William Bradford (governor) | Anchored and first explorations at Plymouth Colony
Explorations resumed on December 6/16. The shallop party headed south along the cape, consisting of seven colonists from Leiden, three from London, and seven crew; they chose to land at the area inhabited by the Nauset people (the area around Brewster, Chatham, Eastham, Harwich, and Orleans) where they saw some people on the shore who fled when they approached. Inland they found more mounds, one containing acorns which they exhumed, and more graves, which they decided not to dig. They remained ashore overnight and heard cries near the encampment. The following morning, they were attacked by Indians who shot at them with arrows.
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) | First contact
The expedition sighted Cape Cod on November 9, 1620, and landed at what is now Provincetown, Massachusetts. Two days later, the men signed the "Mayflower" Compact, wherein all agreed to submit themselves to the will of the majority—one of the foundation documents of American democracy. Running short of provisions, they did not proceed to Virginia, but established a settlement at Plymouth Colony (today Plymouth, Massachusetts), although they had expected to settle further south and were ill-equipped for a Massachusetts winter. Half died before spring came. There had been few Native Americans in the area, but in 1621, the settlers were approached by a group, including two, Samoset and Squanto, who spoke some English.
Pilgrim Tercentenary half dollar | Background
The location was chosen largely for its defensive position. The settlement would be centered on two hills: Cole's Hill, where the village would be built, and Fort Hill, where a defensive cannon would be stationed. Also important in choosing the site was that the prior villagers had cleared much of the land making agriculture relatively easy. Fresh water for the colony was provided by Town Brook and Billington Sea. There are no contemporaneous accounts to verify the legend, but Plymouth Rock is often hailed as the point where the colonists first set foot on their new homeland. The area where the colonists settled had been identified as "New Plymouth" in maps which John Smith published in 1614.
Plymouth Colony | Landings at Provincetown and Plymouth
In December 1620, a group of Pilgrims established Plymouth Colony just to the south of Massachusetts Bay, seeking to preserve their cultural identity and attain religious freedom. Plymouth's colonists faced great hardships and earned few profits for their investors, who sold their interests to them in 1627. Edward Winslow and William Bradford were two of the colony's leaders and were likely the authors of a work published in England in 1622 called "Mourt's Relation". This book in some ways resembles a promotional tract intended to encourage further immigration. There were other short-lived colonial settlements in 1623 and 1624 at Weymouth, Massachusetts; Thomas Weston's Wessagusset Colony failed, as did an effort by Robert Gorges to establish an overarching colonial structure.
Massachusetts Bay Colony | Plymouth Colony
The Plymouth Company ships arrived at the mouth of the Kennebec River (then called the Sagadahoc River) in August 1607 where they established a settlement named Sagadahoc Colony, better known as Popham Colony (see symbol "Po" on map to right) to honor financial backer Sir John Popham. The colonists faced a harsh winter, the loss of supplies following a storehouse fire, and mixed relations with the local Native tribes. Colony leader Captain George Popham died, and Raleigh Gilbert decided to return to England to take up an inheritance left by an older brother—at which point, all of the colonists decided to return to England.
New England Colonies | Arriving in America
Because of this, they chose to relocate to the New World, with their voyage being financed by English investors. In September 1620, 102 passengers set sail aboard the "Mayflower", eventually settling at Plymouth Colony in November. Of the passengers on the Mayflower, 41 men signed the "Mayflower Compact" aboard ship on November 11, 1620, while anchored in Provincetown Harbor. Signers included Carver, Alden, Standish, Howland, Bradford, Allerton, and Fuller. This story has become a central theme in the United States cultural identity. A number of English colonies were established under a system of proprietary governors, who were appointed under mercantile charters to English joint stock companies to found and run settlements.
English Americans | Early settlement and colonization
After exploring the inner shoreline of Cape Cod, the colonists chose to settle in Plymouth. The site offered a good harbor, several fresh water springs, and a large hill overlooking the harbor (which they would later name Burial Hill) suitable for a fort. A tribe known as the Patuxet (part of the Wampanoag peoples) had settled the site and cleared a large area of land for planting corn. By the time the "Mayflower" arrived, the Patuxet tribe had been wiped out by plagues, likely as a result of contact with English fishermen. During their first winter in Plymouth, most of the settlers fell ill and half died of disease.
John Alden | Establishing Plymouth Colony
Prior to the arrival of the Pilgrims, the location of Plymouth was a village of the Wampanoag tribe called Patuxet. The region was visited twice by European explorers prior to the establishment of Plymouth Colony. In 1605, Samuel de Champlain sailed to Plymouth Harbor, calling it Port St. Louis. Captain John Smith was a leader of the colony at Jamestown, Virginia, and he explored parts of Cape Cod Bay and is credited with naming the region "New Plimouth." Two plagues afflicted coastal New England in 1614 and 1617, killing between 90% and 95% of the local Wampanoag inhabitants. The near disappearance of the tribe from the site left their cornfields and cleared areas vacant for the Pilgrims to occupy.
Plymouth, Massachusetts | Pre-colonial era
The incident took place in Eastham, Massachusetts, and came to be known as the "First Encounter". After further exploration, the Pilgrims chose a location in Plymouth Bay in late December 1620 as the site for their settlement. Standish provided important counsel on the placement of a small fort in which cannon were mounted, and on the layout of the first houses for maximum defensibility. They had built only one single-room house when illness struck. Only 50 survived the first winter out of the 100 or so who arrived on the "Mayflower". Standish's wife Rose died in January. Standish was one of the very few who did not fall ill, and William Bradford credited him with comforting many and being a source of strength to those who suffered.
Myles Standish | Establishment of Plymouth Colony
The name "New England" was officially sanctioned on November 3, 1620 when the charter of the Plymouth Company was replaced by a royal charter for the Plymouth Council for New England, a joint stock company established to colonize and govern the region. In December 1620, the permanent settlement of Plymouth Colony was established by the Pilgrims, English Puritan separatists who arrived on the "Mayflower". They held a feast of gratitude which became part of the American tradition of Thanksgiving. Plymouth Colony had a small population and size, and it was absorbed into Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1691.
History of New England | Plymouth Colony (1620–1643)
In September 1623, another ship arrived carrying settlers destined to refound the failed colony at Weymouth, and they stayed temporarily in Plymouth. In March 1624, a ship arrived bearing a few additional settlers and the first cattle. A 1627 division of cattle lists 156 colonists divided into twelve lots of thirteen colonists each. Another ship arrived in August 1629, also named the "Mayflower", with 35 additional members of the Leiden congregation. Ships arrived throughout the period between 1629 and 1630 carrying new settlers, though the exact number is unknown; contemporaneous documents indicate that the colony had almost 300 people by January 1630.
Plymouth Colony | Growth of Plymouth
A group of Puritans known as the Pilgrims arrived on the "Mayflower" from England and the Netherlands to establish Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts, the second successful English colony in North America following Jamestown, Virginia. About half of the one hundred-plus passengers on the "Mayflower" died that first winter, mostly because of diseases contracted on the voyage followed by a harsh winter. In 1621, a Native American named Squanto taught the colonists how to grow corn and where to catch eels and fish. His assistance was invaluable and helped them to survive the early years of the colonization. The Pilgrims lived on the same site where Squanto's Patuxet tribe had established a village before they were wiped out from diseases.
New England Colonies | Establishing the New England Colonies
The rock was later covered by a solid-fill pier. In 1774, an attempt was made to excavate the rock, but it broke in two. The severed piece was placed in the Town Square at the center of Plymouth. In 1880, the intact half of the rock was excavated from the pier, and the broken piece was reattached to it. Over the years, souvenir hunters have removed chunks from the rock, but the remains are now protected as part of the complex of living museums. These include the "Mayflower II", a recreation of the original ship; Plimoth Plantation, a historical recreation of the original 1620 settlement; and the Wampanoag Homesite, which recreates a 17th-century Indian village.
Plymouth Colony | Plymouth Rock
They tried briefly to sail south, but strong seas forced them to retreat to Cape Cod to harbor near the hook of Provincetown Harbor. It became apparent that the weather would not permit the passage south, so they decided to settle near Cape Cod. Shortage of supplies (including wood and beer) and the roaring Atlantic made it too dangerous to press on for a Virginia landing. They anchored at the hook on November 11, and the leaders of the colony wrote the Mayflower Compact to ensure a degree of law and order in this place where they had not been granted a patent to settle.
Myles Standish | Voyage to New Plymouth
The museum originally consisted of the "Mayflower II" and a "First House" exhibit in Plymouth Center, but was expanded into a large fortified town and a Native American village by 1960.
Plymouth, Massachusetts | Plimoth Plantation
The Pilgrims were a small group of Puritan separatists who felt that they needed to distance themselves physically from the Church of England, which they perceived as corrupted. They initially moved to the Netherlands, but eventually sailed to America in 1620 on the "Mayflower". Upon their arrival, they drew up the Mayflower Compact, by which they bound themselves together as a united community, thus establishing the small Plymouth Colony. William Bradford was their main leader. After its founding, other settlers traveled from England to join the colony. More Puritans immigrated in 1629 and established the Massachusetts Bay Colony with 400 settlers.
Thirteen Colonies | New England
The "Mayflower" arrived in Plymouth Bay on December 20, 1620. The settlers began building the colony's first house on December 25 (Christmas). Their efforts were slowed, however, when a widespread sickness struck the settlers. The sickness had begun on the ship. On January 11, 1621, Bradford was helping to build houses when he was suddenly struck with great pain in his hipbone and collapsed. He was taken to the "common house" (the only finished house built then) and it was feared that he would not last the night. Bradford recovered, but many of the other settlers were not so fortunate.
William Bradford (governor) | Great sickness
It would remain with the Pilgrims when the "Mayflower" returned to England. On November 15, Captain Myles Standish led a party of 16 men on an exploratory mission, during which they disturbed an Indian grave and located a buried cache of Indian corn. The following week, Susanna White gave birth to son Peregrine White on the "Mayflower". He was the first child born to the Pilgrims in the New World. The shallop was finished on November 27, and a second expedition was undertaken using it, under the direction of "Mayflower" master Christopher Jones. Thirty-four men went, but the expedition was beset by bad weather; the only positive result was that they found an Indian burial ground and corn that had been intended for the dead, taking the corn for future planting.
Plymouth Colony | Landings at Provincetown and Plymouth
The London Company proceeded to establish Jamestown. The Plymouth Company under the guidance of Sir Ferdinando Gorges covered the more northern area, including New England, and established the Sagadahoc Colony in 1607 in Maine. The experience proved exceptionally difficult for the 120 settlers, however, and the surviving colonists abandoned the colony after only one year. Gorges noted that "there was no more speech of settling plantations in those parts" for a number of years. English ships continued to come to the New England area for fishing and trade with the Indigenous population.
Massachusetts Bay Colony | History
The colonists elected to retain the name for their own settlement, in honor of their final point of departure from England: Plymouth, Devon.
Plymouth Colony | Landings at Provincetown and Plymouth
Meanwhile, the Plymouth Colony had settled outside the territory of the London company due to navigational difficulties. The Plymouth Company was reorganized as the Plymouth Council for New England, and given a new royal "sea-to-sea" charter for all North American territory from 40° North (just east between present-day Philadelphia and Trenton, New Jersey) and 48° N (thus including all of modern-day New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island). The Plymouth Colony was granted land patents between 1621 and 1630 from the Council to legitimize its settlement, though it maintained political independence under the Mayflower Compact. The Plymouth Council for New England made sub grants to various entities before it was surrendered to the crown in 1635 and ceased to operate as a corporate entity.
History of Massachusetts | Founding grants
Plymouth /ˈplɪməθ/ (historically known as Plimouth and Plimoth) is a town in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, United States. Plymouth holds a place of great prominence in American history and is typically the most well known of the Northern Settlements. Plymouth was the site of the colony founded in 1620 by the Pilgrims, passengers of the famous ship the Mayflower. Before the arrival of the Mayflower earlier explorations killed between 90 and 95% of the local native inhabitants due to disease. The near disappearance of the tribe from the site not only left their cornfields and other cleared areas for the Pilgrims to take over, but also meant that the Indians were in no condition to disrupt the arrival of the colonists.
Indian commerce with early English colonists and the early United States | Plymouth and Northern Settlers
A group of fur-trappers and traders established Wessagusset Colony near the Plymouth colony in Weymouth in 1622. They abandoned it in 1623, and it was replaced by another small colony led by Robert Gorges. This settlement also failed, and individuals from these colonies returned to England, joined the Plymouth colonists, or established individual outposts elsewhere on the shores of Massachusetts Bay. In 1624, the Dorchester Company established a settlement on Cape Ann. This colony only survived until 1626, although a few settlers remained.
History of Massachusetts | Pilgrims and Puritans: 1620–1629
The first settlers of Plymouth Colony (modern Plymouth, Massachusetts), sited their colony at the location of a former Patuxet village, named "Port St. Louis" (Samuel de Champlain, 1605) or "Accomack" (John Smith, 1614). By 1616, the site had been renamed New Plimoth in Smith's "A Description of New England" after a suggestion by Prince Charles of England. When the Pilgrim Settlers decided to make their settlement, the land that had been cleared and cultivated by the prior inhabitants (since dead through disease) was a primary reason for the location. Squanto was instrumental in the survival of the colony of English settlers at Plymouth.
Patuxet | The Pilgrims
They had declined the opportunity to settle south of Cape Cod in New Netherland because of their desire to avoid the Dutch influence. This land patent allowed them to settle at the mouth of the Hudson River. They sought to finance their venture through the Merchant Adventurers, a group of businessmen who principally viewed the colony as a means of making a profit. Upon arriving in America, the Pilgrims began working to repay their debts.
Plymouth Colony | Origin
The last official meeting of the Plymouth General Court occurred on June 8, 1692.
Plymouth Colony | Final years
They came upon an artificial mound near the dunes which they partially uncovered and found to be an Indian grave. Farther along, a similar mound was found, more recently made, and they discovered that some of the burial mounds also contained corn. The colonists took some of the corn, intending to use it as seed for planting, while they reburied the rest. William Bradford later recorded in his book "Of Plymouth Plantation" that, after the shallop had been repaired,
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) | First landings
The Puritans embraced an intensely emotional form of Calvinist Protestantism and sought independence from the Church of England. In 1620, the "Mayflower" transported the Pilgrims across the Atlantic, and the Pilgrims established Plymouth Colony in Cape Cod. The Pilgrims endured an extremely hard first winter, with roughly fifty of the one hundred colonists dying. In 1621, Plymouth Colony was able to establish an alliance with the nearby Wampanoag tribe, which helped the Plymouth Colony adopt effective agricultural practices and engaged in the trade of fur and other materials. Farther north, the English also established Newfoundland Colony in 1610, which primarily focused on cod fishing.
British colonization of the Americas | Early colonization, 1607–1630
"Mayflower II" is docked near Plymouth Rock and is also under the care of the museum. Colonial first-person interpreters represent the sailors and officers of the ship circa the 1620s. At some times, the "sailors" go on week-long trips to experience what it was like for the Pilgrims.
Plimoth Plantation | History
In Leiden, the congregation gained the freedom to worship as they chose, but Dutch society was unfamiliar to them. And so they made preparations to settle a new colony in America. The first settlement of the Plymouth Colony was at New Plymouth, a location previously surveyed and named by Captain John Smith. The settlement served as the capital of the colony and developed as the modern town of Plymouth, Massachusetts. At its height, Plymouth Colony occupied most of the southeastern portion of the modern state of Massachusetts. It was one of the earliest successful colonies to be founded by the English in North America, along with Jamestown and other settlements in Virginia, and was the first sizable permanent English settlement in the New England region.
History of the Puritans under King James I | The Pilgrims and the Planting of Plymouth Colony, 1620
Louis," and he made an extensive and detailed map of it and the surrounding lands. He showed the Patuxet village (where the town of Plymouth was later built) as a thriving settlement. However, an epidemic wiped out up to 90 percent of the Indians along the Massachusetts coast in 1617–1619, including the Patuxets, before the arrival of the "Mayflower". The epidemic has traditionally been thought to be smallpox, but a recent analysis has concluded that it may have been a lesser-known disease called leptospirosis. The absence of any serious Indian opposition to the Pilgrims' settlement may have been a pivotal event to their success and to English colonization in America.
Plymouth Colony | Prior exploration and settlements
Thorough exploration of the area was delayed for more than two weeks because the shallop or pinnace (a smaller sailing vessel) which they brought had been partially dismantled to fit aboard the "Mayflower" and was further damaged in transit. Small parties, however, waded to the beach to fetch firewood and attend to long-deferred personal hygiene. Exploratory parties were undertaken while awaiting the shallop, led by Myles Standish (an English soldier whom the colonists had met while in Leiden) and Christopher Jones. They encountered an old European-built house and iron kettle, left behind by some ship's crew, and a few recently cultivated fields, showing corn stubble.
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) | First landings
Some of the passengers who arrived on the "Anne" were either unprepared for frontier life or undesirable additions to the colony, and they returned to England the next year. According to Gleason Archer, "those who remained were not willing to join the colony under the terms of the agreement with the Merchant Adventurers. They had embarked for America upon an understanding with the Adventurers that they might settle in a community of their own, or at least be free from the bonds by which the Plymouth colonists were enslaved. A letter addressed to the colonists and signed by thirteen of the merchants recited these facts and urged acceptance of the new comers on the specified terms." The new arrivals were allotted land in the area of the Eel River known as Hobs Hole, which became Wellingsley, a mile south of Plymouth Rock.
Plymouth Colony | Growth of Plymouth
The Mayflower was anchored off Cape Cod when Standish urged the colony's leaders to allow him to take a party ashore to find a suitable place for settlement. On November 15, 1620, he led 16 men on foot in exploration of the northern portion of the Cape. On December 11, he led a group of 18 and made an extended exploration of the shore of Cape Cod by boat, spending their nights ashore surrounded by makeshift barricades of tree branches. They were attacked one night by a group of about 30 Indians. They panicked, but Standish calmed them, urging them not to fire their matchlock muskets unnecessarily.
Myles Standish | Establishment of Plymouth Colony
"Speedwell" was re-rigged with larger masts before leaving Holland and setting out to meet "Mayflower" in Southampton, England, around the end of July 1620. The Mayflower was purchased in London. The original captains were Captain Reynolds for "Speedwell" and Captain Christopher Jones for "Mayflower". Other passengers joined the group in Southampton, including William Brewster, who had been in hiding for the better part of a year, and a group of people known to the Leiden congregation as "The Strangers." This group was largely made up of people recruited by the Merchant Adventurers to provide practical assistance to the colony and additional hands to work for the colony's ventures.
Plymouth Colony | "Mayflower" voyage
The Plymouth Company was permitted to establish settlements between the 38th and 45th parallels, roughly between the upper reaches of the Chesapeake Bay and the U.S.-Canada border. On August 13, 1607, the Plymouth Company established the Popham Colony along the Kennebec River in Maine. However, it was abandoned after about a year and the Plymouth Company became inactive. A successor company eventually established a permanent settlement in 1620 when the Pilgrims arrived in Plymouth, Massachusetts, aboard the Mayflower.
Virginia Company | The Plymouth Company
New England was initially settled primarily by Puritans fleeing religious persecution. The Pilgrims sailed for Virginia on the Mayflower in 1620, but were knocked off course by a storm and landed at Plymouth, where they agreed to a social contract of rules in the Mayflower Compact. Like Jamestown, Plymouth suffered from disease and starvation, but local Wampanoag Indians taught the colonists how to farm maize. Plymouth was followed by the Puritans and Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630. They maintained a charter for self-government separate from England, and elected founder John Winthrop as the governor for most of its early years.
History of the United States | New England
Popham Colony, also known as Fort St. George, was organized by the Plymouth Company (unrelated to Plymouth Colony) and founded in 1607. It was settled on the coast of Maine and was beset by internal political struggles, sickness, and weather problems. It was abandoned in 1608.
Plymouth Colony | Prior exploration and settlements
Of Plymouth Plantation is a journal that was written over a period of years by William Bradford, the leader of the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts. It is regarded as the most authoritative account of the Pilgrims and the early years of the colony which they founded. The journal was written between 1630 and 1651 and describes the story of the Pilgrims from 1608, when they settled in the Dutch Republic on the European mainland through the 1620 "Mayflower" voyage to the New World, until the year 1647. The book ends with a list of "Mayflower" passengers and what happened to them which was written in 1651.
Of Plymouth Plantation | Introduction
Pilgrim separatists landed at Plymouth Rock and formed the Plymouth Colony. Aided by Squanto, a Native American of the Patuxet people, the colony was able to establish a treaty with Chief Massasoit which helped to ensure the colony's success. The colony played a central role in King Philip's War, one of the earliest and bloodiest of the Indian Wars. Ultimately, the colony was annexed by the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1691.
Territorial evolution of North America prior to 1763 | 1620
A fully recovered Dermer left Jamestown in May 1620 heading to New England to "accomplish what his last discovery had omitted". He met with the Dutch at Manhattan and warned them that they were trespassers on English claims, afterwards he went on to New England. Extracts from this letter, which appears in New England's Memorial, makes a prescient statement, "...I will first begin with that place whence Squanto, or Tisquantum was taken away, which in Captain's Smith's map is called Plimouth...I would that the first plantation might here be seated, if there come to the number of fifty persons or upwards..." Five months later, in November 1620, the Mayflower will arrive at the tip of Cape Cod, and then six weeks later, deliver 102 Pilgrims, who also possess of a copy of Captain Smith's map, to this very place where they will found the colony of Plimoth Plantation, at the abandoned village of Patuxet.
Thomas Dermer | Dermer's Letter of June 30, 1620
The Popham Colony—also known as the Sagadahoc Colony—was a short-lived English colonial settlement in North America. It was established in 1607 by the proprietary Virginia Company of Plymouth and was located in the present-day town of Phippsburg, Maine, near the mouth of the Kennebec River. It was founded a few months after its more successful rival, the colony at Jamestown. That colony was established on May 4, 1607 by the Virginia Company of London in present-day James City County, Virginia. The Popham Colony was the second colony in the region that would eventually become known as New England, coming five years after a short French encampment on Cuttyhunk.
Popham Colony | Introduction
In 1616, English explorer John Smith named the region "New England". The name was officially sanctioned on November 3, 1620, when the charter of the Virginia Company of Plymouth was replaced by a royal charter for the Plymouth Council for New England, a joint-stock company established to colonize and govern the region. The Pilgrims wrote and signed the Mayflower Compact before leaving the ship, and it became their first governing document. The Massachusetts Bay Colony came to dominate the area and was established by royal charter in 1629 with its major town and port of Boston established in 1630.
New England | Colonial period
Plymouth was the first colony in the region, but it was much smaller than Massachusetts Bay Colony by the time they merged.
Plymouth Colony | Growth of Plymouth
After the departure of Massasoit and his men, Squanto remained in Plymouth to teach the Pilgrims how to survive in New England, such as using dead fish to fertilize the soil. For the first few years of colonial life, the fur trade was the dominant source of income beyond subsistence farming, buying furs from Natives and selling to Europeans. Governor Carver suddenly died shortly after the "Mayflower" returned to England. William Bradford was elected to replace him and went on to lead the colony through much of its formative years. As promised by Massasoit, numerous indigenous arrived at Plymouth throughout the middle of 1621 with pledges of peace.
Plymouth Colony | Early relations with the Native Americans
The first Europeans to settle New England were Pilgrims from England, who landed in present-day Massachusetts in 1620. The Pilgrims arrived on the ship "Mayflower" and founded Plymouth Colony so they could practice religion freely. Ten years later, a larger group of Puritans settled north of Plymouth Colony in Boston to form Massachusetts Bay Colony. In 1636, colonists established Connecticut Colony and Providence Plantations. Providence was founded by Roger Williams, who was banished by Massachusetts for his beliefs in freedom of religion, and it was the first colony to guarantee all citizens freedom of worship. Anne Hutchinson, who was also banished by Massachusetts, formed the town of Portsmouth.
Northeastern United States | New England
Colonial settlement of the shores of Massachusetts Bay began in 1620 with the founding of the Plymouth Colony. Other attempts at colonization took place throughout the 1620s, but expansion of English settlements only began on a large scale with the founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1628 and the arrival of the first large group of Puritan settlers in 1630. Over the next ten years, there was a major migration of Puritans to the area, leading to the founding of a number of new colonies in New England. By the 1680s, the number of New England colonies had stabilized at five; the Connecticut Colony, the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, and the Province of New Hampshire all bordered the area surrounding Massachusetts Bay and Plymouth.
Province of Massachusetts Bay | Background
The colonists retrieved their firearms and shot back, then chased them into the woods but did not find them. There was no more contact with Indians for several months. The local Indians were already familiar with the English, who had intermittently visited the area for fishing and trade before "Mayflower" arrived. In the Cape Cod area, relations were poor following a visit several years earlier by Thomas Hunt. Hunt kidnapped 20 people from Patuxet (the site of Plymouth Colony) and another seven from Nausett, and he attempted to sell them as slaves in Europe. One of the Patuxet abductees was Squanto, who became an ally of the Plymouth Colony.
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) | First contact
They established Plymouth Colony in 1620, which became the second successful English settlement in America, following the founding of Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607. The Pilgrims' story became a central theme in the history and culture of the United States.
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) | Introduction
As part of the colony's fur trading operations, a trading post was established at Matianuck, now Windsor, Connecticut, in the early 1630s. This was done over objections by the Dutch of New Netherland, who had established their own trading post at present-day Hartford not long before. Discontented colonists from the neighboring Massachusetts Bay Colony settled in the same area 1634, seeking to escape what they perceived as the harsh rule of "King [John] Winthrop". Although Jonathan Brewster, head of the Matianuck post, gave some assistance to the needy Massachusetts colonists, the Plymouth government protested that the settlers were occupying land that they had rightly acquired from the local natives.
Thomas Prence | Colonial leadership
The first successful religious colonization of the New World occurred in 1620 with the establishment of the Plymouth Colony on the shores of Cape Cod Bay. Pastor John White led a short-lived effort to establish a colony at Cape Ann in 1624, also on the Massachusetts coast. In 1628, some of the investors in that effort joined with new investors to acquire a land grant for the territory roughly between the Charles and Merrimack Rivers. It was first styled the New England Company, then renamed the Massachusetts Bay Company in 1629 after it acquired a royal charter granting it permission to govern the territory.
John Winthrop | Decision to begin voyage and settlement in the American colonies
Plymouth Bay is a small, well-protected bay of the Atlantic Ocean on the western shore of larger Cape Cod Bay along the coastline of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Plymouth Bay retains historical significance for the landing at Plymouth Rock in 1620 by the Pilgrims aboard the "Mayflower" who proceeded to establish the first permanent Northern European settlement in North America at Plymouth Colony.
Plymouth Bay | Introduction
Without a clear land patent for the area, the settlers settled without a charter to form a government and, as a result, it was often unclear in the early years what land was under the colony's jurisdiction. In 1644, "The Old Colony Line"—which had been surveyed in 1639—was formally accepted as the boundary between Massachusetts Bay and Plymouth. The situation was more complicated along the border with Rhode Island. Roger Williams settled in the area of Rehoboth in 1636, near modern Pawtucket. He was forcibly evicted in order to maintain Plymouth's claim to the area. Williams moved to the west side of the Pawtucket River to found the settlement of Providence, the nucleus for the colony of Rhode Island, which was formally established with the "Providence Plantations Patent" of 1644.
Plymouth Colony | Boundaries
And though deceased, in the 1623 Division of Land, White received five acres (akers) "lyeth behind the forte to the little ponde." (lying behind the fort to the little pond). Edward Winslow, his wife Susanna's husband since May 12, 1621, received four acres in the same section. White's sons Resolved and Peregrine were both listed with their step-father Edward Winslow and mother Susanna in the 1627 Division of Cattle, and moved with their parents to Marshfield in 1632.
William White (Mayflower passenger) | In Plymouth Colony
In 1623, the Plymouth Council for New England (successor to the Plymouth Company) established a small fishing village at Cape Ann under the supervision of the Dorchester Company. The first group of Puritans moved to a new town at nearby Naumkeag after the Dorchester Company dropped support, and fresh financial support was found by Rev. John White. Other settlements were started in nearby areas; however, the overall Puritan population remained small through the 1620s.
New England Colonies | Establishing the New England Colonies
The first settlers in Massachusetts were the Pilgrims who established Plymouth Colony in 1620 and developed friendly relations with the Wampanoag people. This was the second permanent English colony in America following Jamestown Colony. The Pilgrims had migrated from England to Holland to escape religious persecution for rejecting England's official church. They were allowed religious liberty in Holland, but they gradually became concerned that the next generation would lose their distinct English heritage. They approached the Virginia Company and asked to settle "as a distinct body of themselves" in America. In the fall of 1620, they sailed to America on the "Mayflower", first landing near Provincetown at the tip of Cape Cod.
History of Massachusetts | Pilgrims and Puritans: 1620–1629
The colonists acquired a land grant from the Plymouth Council for New England in 1621, but its early governance took place under the terms of the Mayflower Compact, a document which the colonists drafted and signed aboard the "Mayflower" before they landed. In 1630, the colony acquired a formal charter with authority to govern from the Plymouth Council, but it was unsuccessful in attempts to acquire a royal charter that would guarantee its territory against other claimants. The colony held annual elections for its offices. Between 1620 and 1680, it was ruled by a governor who appointed a temporary replacement if he left the colony.
List of colonial governors of Massachusetts | Plymouth Colony: 1620–86, 1689–92
The English Plymouth Colony was established at present-day Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620 by religious dissidents and English adventurers. In order to repay the investors in the colonization effort, the colonists engaged in a number of ventures, one of which was trading with the local Native American population for furs. Pursuant to this business, the colonists in 1628 established a trading post on the Kennebec River at the site of what is now Augusta, Maine, which the Plymouth colonists called "Cushnoc". The Plymouth colonists were not the only colonists trading on that river, and the Plymouth colonists are known to have operated at at least one other site in the area.
Cushnoc Archeological Site | Description and history
The colony was able to establish a treaty with Chief Massasoit which helped to ensure its success; in this, they were aided by Squanto, a member of the Patuxet tribe. By 1691 Plymouth Colony and the Pilgrim colonists, eventually merged with the Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony under John Winthrop (established in 1628), and other territories to form the Province of Massachusetts Bay.
History of the Puritans under King James I | The Pilgrims and the Planting of Plymouth Colony, 1620
A second ship arrived in November 1621 named the "Fortune", sent by the Merchant Adventurers one year after the Pilgrims first set foot in New England. It arrived with 37 new settlers for Plymouth. However, the ship had arrived unexpectedly and also without many supplies, so the additional settlers put a strain on the resources of the colony. Among the passengers of the "Fortune" were several of the original Leiden congregation, including William Brewster's son Jonathan, Edward Winslow's brother John, and Philip Delano (the family name was earlier "de la Noye") whose descendants include President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The "Fortune" also carried a letter from the Merchant Adventurers chastising the colony for failure to return goods with the "Mayflower" that had been promised in return for their support.
Plymouth Colony | Growth of Plymouth
The Pilgrims were the English settlers who came to North America on the "Mayflower" and established the Plymouth Colony in what is today Plymouth, Massachusetts, named after the final departure port of Plymouth, Devon. Their leadership came from the religious congregations of Brownists, or Separatist Puritans, who had fled religious persecution in England for the tolerance of 17th-century Holland in the Netherlands. They held Puritan Calvinist religious beliefs but, unlike most other Puritans, they maintained that their congregations should separate from the English state church. They eventually determined to establish a new settlement in the New World and arranged with investors to fund them.
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) | Introduction
On April 10, 1606, King James I of England issued a charter for the Virginia Company, which comprised the London Company and the Plymouth Company. These two privately funded ventures were intended to claim land for England, to conduct trade, and to return a profit. In 1620, the Pilgrims arrived on the "Mayflower" and established Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts, beginning the history of permanent European colonization in New England. With the arrival of colonists, many Native Americans were kidnapped for enslavement. English sailors— like George Waymouth in 1605 and Harlow in 1611—captured and enslaved Native peoples. Up until 1700, Native American servitude comprised a majority of the nonwhite labor present in New England.
New England | Colonial period
The Plymouth Colony was established in 1620 by a sect of the English Dissenters which had fled first to the Netherlands following persecution by the English monarchy before ultimately deciding to move to North America by boat. The migration, settlement and interaction with the Native peoples of Massachusetts would be celebrated in the present-day United States as Thanksgiving and a watershed moment for religious liberty in the continent.
Religion and human migration | Plymouth Colony
In 1686, the entire region was reorganized under a single government known as the Dominion of New England; this included the colonies of Plymouth, Rhode Island, Massachusetts Bay, Connecticut, and New Hampshire. In 1688, New York, West Jersey, and East Jersey were added. The President of the Dominion Edmund Andros was highly unpopular, and the union did not last. The union was dissolved after news of the Glorious Revolution reached Boston in April 1689, and the citizens of Boston rose up and arrested Andros. When news of these events reached Plymouth, its magistrates reclaimed power. The return of self-rule for Plymouth Colony was short-lived, however.
Plymouth Colony | Final years
The two most significant primary sources on the founding of Plymouth Colony are Edward Winslow's 1622 "Mourt's Relation" and Bradford's 1630–1651 history "Of Plymouth Plantation", and neither refers to Plymouth Rock. The rock first attracted public attention in 1741 when the residents of Plymouth began plans to build a wharf which would bury it. Before construction began, a 94-year-old church elder named Thomas Faunce declared that the boulder was the landing place of the "Mayflower" Pilgrims. He asked to be brought to the rock to say a farewell. According to Plymouth historian James Thacher: Faunce's father had arrived in the colony aboard the ship "Anne" in 1623, just two years after the "Mayflower" landing, and Elder Faunce was born in 1647 when many of the "Mayflower" Pilgrims were still living, so his assertion made a strong impression on the people of Plymouth.
Plymouth Rock | Early history and identification
In 1912, the Massachusetts Historical Society published a final authorized version of the text.
Of Plymouth Plantation | History of the manuscript
Plymouth (; historically known as Plimouth and Plimoth) is a town in Plymouth County, Massachusetts. The town holds a place of great prominence in American history, folklore, and culture, and is known as "America's Hometown." Plymouth was the site of the colony founded in 1620 by the "Mayflower" Pilgrims, where New England was first established. It is the oldest municipality in New England and one of the oldest in the United States. The town has served as the location of several prominent events, one of the more notable being the First Thanksgiving feast. Plymouth served as the capital of Plymouth Colony from its founding in 1620 until the colony's merger with the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1691.
Plymouth, Massachusetts | Introduction
In 1620, a group of Puritan separatists, known today as the Pilgrims, made their famous sea voyage on the Mayflower across the Atlantic to settle Plymouth Colony. They were led by governor William Bradford and church elder William Brewster. The Pilgrims were originally a part of the Puritan separatist movement in England. They began to feel the pressures of religious persecution while still in the English village of Scrooby, near East Retford, Nottinghamshire. In 1607, Archbishop Tobias Matthew raided homes and imprisoned several members of the congregation. The congregation therefore left England in 1609 and emigrated to the Netherlands, settling first in Amsterdam and then in Leiden.
History of the Puritans under King James I | The Pilgrims and the Planting of Plymouth Colony, 1620
The border itself continued to be contested by Massachusetts, first as a colony and later as a state, until as late as 1898, when the boundary was settled and ratified by both states.
Plymouth Colony | Boundaries
On November 9, 1620, after about three months at sea, including a month of delays in England, they spotted land, which was the Cape Cod Hook, now called Provincetown Harbor. After several days of trying to get south to their planned destination of the Colony of Virginia, strong winter seas forced them to return to the harbor at Cape Cod Hook, where they anchored on November 11. The Mayflower Compact was signed that day.
Resolved White | "Mayflower" voyage
Plymouth Harbor is a harbor located in Plymouth, a town in the South Shore region of the U.S. state of Massachusetts. It is part of the larger Plymouth Bay. Historically, Plymouth Harbor was the site of anchorage of the "Mayflower" where the Plymouth Colony pilgrims disembarked in 1620 to establish a permanent settlement at Plymouth.
Plymouth Harbor | Introduction
https://vc.bridgew.edu/bmas/64/ Heath, Dwight B. “A Journal of the Pilgrims at Plymouth: Mourt’s Relation”, A relation or journal of the English Plantation settled at Plymouth in New England, by certain English adventurers both merchants and others. Edited from the original printing of 1622. p. 7.
Wamsutta | References
On 12 January 1621, while the Pilgrims were building their settlement of Plymouth, Peter Browne, John Goodman and others had entered the forest some distance from the Pilgrim plantation in order to find material for roofing thatch. Sometime around noon, Browne and Goodman wandered further into the forest while the other men stayed behind to make up the thatch into bundles. After these men had done that work, they tried to locate Browne and Goodman in the forest, but they could not be found. These men went to the settlement and informed others that the men could not be located.
Peter Browne (Mayflower passenger) | In Plymouth Colony
The site of Alden's first house in Plymouth was marked in 1930 with a boulder and bronze plaque placed by the Alden Kindred of America. A recreation of this house stands today at Plimoth Plantation, a living history museum which replicates the original Pilgrim settlement.
John Alden | Establishing Plymouth Colony
The Massachusett Indians were north of Plymouth Colony, led by Chief Massasoit, and the Pokanoket tribe were north, east, and south. Squanto was living with the Pokanokets, as his native tribe of the Patuxets had been effectively wiped out prior to the arrival of the "Mayflower"; indeed, the Pilgrims had established their former habitation as the site of Plymouth Colony. The Narragansett tribe inhabited Rhode Island. Massasoit was faced with the dilemma whether to form an alliance with the Plymouth colonists, who might protect him from the Narragansetts, or try to put together a tribal coalition to drive out the colonists.
Squanto | Plymouth Colony
Many of the Massachusetts Bay Colony's original settlers arrived from England in the 1630s through the ports of Lynn and Salem. In 1639 some citizens of Lynn petitioned the government of the colony for a "place for an inland plantation". They were initially granted six square miles, followed by an additional four. The first settlement in this grant was at first called "Lynn Village" and was located on the south shore of the "Great Pond", now known as Lake Quannapowitt. On June 10, 1644 the settlement was incorporated as the town of Reading, taking its name from the town of Reading in England.
Reading, Massachusetts | Settlement and American independence
Plymouth Colony was founded by a group of English Puritans who came to be known as the "Pilgrims". The core group (roughly 40% of the adults and 56% of the family groupings) were part of a congregation led by William Bradford. They began to feel the pressures of religious persecution while still in the English village of Scrooby, near East Retford, Nottinghamshire. In 1607, Archbishop Tobias Matthew raided homes and imprisoned several members of the congregation. The congregation left England in 1608 and emigrated to the Netherlands, settling first in Amsterdam and then in Leiden. In Leiden, the congregation gained the freedom to worship as they chose, but Dutch society was unfamiliar to them.
Plymouth Colony | Origin
The colony established a treaty with Wampanoag Chief Massasoit which helped to ensure its success; in this, they were aided by Squanto, a member of the Patuxet tribe. Plymouth played a central role in King Philip's War (1675–1678), one of several Indian Wars, but the colony was ultimately merged with the Massachusetts Bay Colony and other territories in 1691 to form the Province of Massachusetts Bay. Despite the colony's relatively short existence, Plymouth holds a special role in American history. Most of the citizens of Plymouth were fleeing religious persecution and searching for a place to worship as they saw fit, rather than being entrepreneurs like many of the settlers of Jamestown in Virginia.
Plymouth Colony | Introduction
Plymouth was the home port for successful maritime traders, among them Sir John Hawkins, who led England's first foray into the Atlantic slave trade, as well as Sir Francis Drake, Mayor of Plymouth in 1581–2. Crews for the first English failed settlement attempt at Roanoke Colony in North America departed in 1587 under Sir Walter Raleigh's and Drake's leadership; returning bearing maize, tobacco and potatoes. In 1588, according to legend, Drake insisted on completing his game of bowls on the Hoe before engaging the Spanish Armada. In 1620 the Pilgrims set sail for the New World from Plymouth, establishing Plymouth Colony – the second English colony in what is now the United States of America.
Plymouth | Early defence and Renaissance
Myles Standish was selected to make sure the rules were obeyed, as there was a consensus that discipline would need to be enforced to ensure the survival of the planned colony. Once they agreed to settle and build a self-governing community, they came ashore. The moment the Pilgrims stepped ashore was described by William Bradford, the second Governor of the Plymouth Colony:
Mayflower | Arrival in America
The living and working structures were built on the relatively flat top of Cole's Hill, and a wooden platform was constructed atop nearby Fort Hill to support the cannon that would defend the settlement. During the winter, the "Mayflower" colonists suffered greatly from lack of shelter, diseases such as scurvy, and general conditions on board ship. Many of the men were too infirm to work; 45 out of 102 pilgrims died and were buried on Cole's Hill. Thus, only seven residences and four common houses were constructed during the first winter out of a planned 19. By the end of January, enough of the settlement had been built to begin unloading provisions from the "Mayflower".
Plymouth Colony | First winter
They consisted primarily of settlers from New England, "Yankees" descended from the English Puritans who settled New England in the colonial era. They were mainly members of the Congregational church, although due to the Second Great Awakening many of them had converted to Methodism and some had become Baptists before coming to what is now Marshall County. As a result of this heritage, some place names in Marshall County are named after places in New England, such as Plymouth, which is named after Plymouth, Massachusetts, the site where the "Mayflower" landed in 1620. When these settlers arrived, there was nothing but a dense virgin forest and wild marshland, which would need to be cleared and drained before it could be farmed.
Plymouth, Indiana | First settlements
An advance team of 60 settlers arrived at the Plymouth Colony in May 1622. They had voyaged to the New World on board the "Sparrow", an English fishing vessel which was sailing to the coast of Maine. The team traveled the final down the New England coast in a shallop with three members of the "Sparrow"'s crew. These colonists stayed only briefly in Plymouth before scouting the coast in their shallop to find a site for their colony. After finding one, they negotiated for the land with Chief Aberdecest and returned to Plymouth, sending the shallop back to the "Sparrow" and awaiting the remainder of the colonists.
Wessagusset Colony | First Wessagusset colony
The Mayflower Steps are close to the site in the Barbican area of Plymouth, south-west England, from which the Pilgrim Fathers are believed to have finally left England aboard the "Mayflower" on 6 September 1620, before crossing the Atlantic Ocean to settle in North America. The traditional site of their disembarkation in North America is Plymouth Rock. The passengers who came predominantly from East Anglia sought religious and other freedoms. They had no links with Plymouth, but because of bad weather in the English Channel they were forced to put in at Plymouth seeking shelter and essential repairs. Several surviving local buildings including what is now the Plymouth Gin Distillery in Southside Street and the Island House on the Quay are claimed to have accommodated some of them for one or more nights.
Mayflower Steps | Introduction