What About the Pilgrims?

"It's all very exciting to imagine that," Speth said, standing on the dock at Founders Pier as the crew worked to prepare the vessel for a week-long celebration. Alexandria is one of six port cities the ship will visit this summer during a promotional tour to kick off a year-long commemoration of the 1607 Jamestown settlement.

There will also be stops in Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, Newport, R.I., and Boston. Numerous other celebrations are planned throughout the year, and a Web site devoted to teaching young students about the ship's first journey offers free lesson plans to educators.

The Godspeed -- a re-creation of one of the three ships that carried the country's first permanent English-speaking colonists from England to the commonwealth, where they landed May 14, 1607 -- replaces a replica built in the 1980s. It will also serve as an exhibit at Jamestown Settlement, a living-history museum of 17th-century Virginia.  Washpost

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1607 - Jamestown.

1620 - Plymouth

1630 - Massachusetts Bay colony

Get it?

1607 is 13 years before 1620.

1607 is 23 years before 1630.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jamestown_Settlement_(1607%E2%80%931699)

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Pilgrims?

In 1622, the Jamestown colony had a population of around 1200.  In that year "strategic warning" failed yet again and an unexpected Indian attack on outlying farms and settlements killed 400.  20 women were carried away into slavery (Indian Slavery).

Yes.  It is true.  People in the Virginia Colony were just trying to make a living in a New World.  They were not ideologically motivated exclusivist religious fanatics.  Deplorable..

Pat Lang

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/26/AR2006052601936.html

Comments

[C1Byrd]

What's also true is that they couldn't make a go of it until they found an export that the world wanted. Tobacco.
It's also true that, it wasn't making a living, it was making a bundle that was a motivation for the founding of the Colony. Consider the Virginia Company's advertising for settlers and the importation of slaves in 1619. Whether religious or economic motiviation leads to better results, who knows. Consider the Quakers and Pennsylvania.

[W. Patrick Lang]

C1Byrd

Baloney. On the general subject of "baloney," you seem to think that export activity from an overseas colony was not a good thing. As you may know the economic activities of people in the Virginia colony soon outran those of the "Virginia company" in London. Should we understand that you believe that New Englanders were not interested in business or making money? I did not understand that the Puritan grandees of New England were not interested in commece. I seem to recall that New England commercial interests were heavily engaged in the 'triangular trade" in which African slaves were a major feature of the system.

As for Africans, yes the first Africans were brought to Virginia in 1619, but you probably know that they were not slaves. They were treated as "indentured" (like white people) until the 1660s when some clever person decided that it would be advantageous to keep them in servitude. As a result there are black Virginians whose ancestors were never slaves. With the exception of Rhode Island how many of the Northern colonies never allowed slavery as a legal institution?

When did "whaling" become a widespread activity in Puritan new England? It suffered a major "setback" as an industry in the 1860s but persisted into the 1920s. In some sense I suppose that the activities of the Confederate high seas raiders cold be considered the first "Save the Whales" movement. They sure did burn and sink a lot of New England "whalers" in every ocean and sea, including the North Pacific. pl

[The Twisted Genius]

As I recall, the intended destination of the Mayflower was the colony of Virginia. I wonder how the Puritans of the Mayflower would have interacted with the existing "Cavaliers" in Virginia? Perhaps our continuation of the English Civil War would have come to a head long before 1860.

[bth]

The Mayflower hosted Pilgrims. The Mass Bay Colony was composed largely of Puritans. There are differences.

[turcopolier]

bth

My ancestors infested both colonies. pl

[Clifford Kiracofe]

At one time back in that era, "Virginia " was thought of as more or less the entire coastline from south to north into what came to be New England.

There were Puritans in Virginia and also in Maryland. In Virginia, in 1649, a number moved northward into Maryland owing to political pressure from C of E types.

A close analysis of 17th century politics in Virginia indicates divisions similar to those in England between the country party folks and the prerogative men.

Alexander Brown, of Nelson Co. VA and CSA vet, wrote on this during the 19th century. For example,
English Politics in Early Virginia History (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1901) and his other books which are important.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Brown_(author)

This is an extremely interesting topic on which much more could and should be done. I have collected some on this over the years and hope to write on it when I retire fully.

[Clifford Kiracofe]

The Mayflower Society recently published a very important book on Plymouth which is a focus of my own particular interest.

Jeremy Dupertuis Bangs, Strangers and Pilgrims, Travelers and Sojourners. Leiden and the Foundations of Plymouth Plantation (2009). Available through the Mayflower Society. At almost 900 pages, the work reflects a lifetime of study and reflection.

[Clifford Kiracofe]

Yes, the status of Africans in Virginia severely declined from the 1660s. I have discussed this with colleagues and my own theory is that this decline relates to the creation of the Royal African Company in 1660, led by the Duke of York brother of Chs II. For which see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_African_Company

[Clifford Kiracofe]

A colleague of my brother wrote an interesting piece theorizing on medical issues and the epidemic in New England of this era among Native Americans.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2957993/

John Marr and my brother published a study on epidemic disease in Mexico in the 16th century. Often the outbreaks in Mexico are ascribed to Europeans but the authors argue that an indigenous cause was involved in two episodes.

http://usmex.ucsd.edu/assets/022/10129.pdf

[turcopolier]

Clifford

I suppose I should join the Mayflower Society. I don't know if the effort would be worth it. I could do the Sons of the American Revolution as well. What I would really like would be the Cincinnati, but we have been unable to find a commissioned officer of the Continental Army back there. We have several enlisted soldiers in Connecticut units and a clutch of militia officers but that doesn't do it. My favorite thing in the Plymouth story is the way that a couple of Indians wandered in speaking English because they had been working for English cod drying "factories" in what is now Maine. pl