Women of Early Plymouth

Governor William Bradford reported that the Pilgrims were worried that the "weak bodies of women" would not be able to withstand the rigors of a trans-Atlantic voyage and the construction of a colony. Prior to the Mayflower, very few English women had made the voyage across the ocean. Sir Walter Raleigh's Roanoke colony arrived in Virginia in 1587, and amongst those 120 colonists there were 17 women: a baby girl, Virginia Dare, was born after arrival.

When re-supply ships came from England, they could not relocate the people. The colony had mysteriously disappeared, and was never seen again. The Jamestown Colony was founded in 1607, but relatively few women had yet made the voyage and taken up residence there.

The Pilgrim husband, as head of the household, had an important and difficult decision to make. Building a colony would be hard on a woman's "weaker body." It might be safer and more healthy to leave her behind, and have her come later once the houses were built, and the general safety and successfulness of the colony were better established. But that could be several years. Could he live several years without his wife? How strong was his wife anyway, could she really handle it? Was it right to put your wife's life in danger in this manner?

Francis Cooke, Thomas Rogers, Samuel Fuller and Richard Warren felt it was better if their wives Hester, Alice,

Bridget and Elizabeth stayed behind, and came over later. Degory Priest also left behind his wife Sarah, despite the fact Sarah's brother Isaac Allerton came on the Mayflower with his pregnant wife and three young children. But most husbands, 18 in total, decided their wives should come with them. Was it the right decision?

As the Mayflower left England for America, there were 18 adult women on-board. Three of them, Elizabeth Hopkins,

Susanna White, and Mary Allerton, were actually in their last trimester of a pregnancy. All the adult women on the Mayflower were married, there were no single women--although there were a few teenage girls nearing marriageable age.

While no women would die during the Mayflower's voyage, life after arrival proved extremely difficult. In fact, 78% of the women would die the first winter, a far higher percentage than for men or children. Dorothy Bradford was the first woman to die, and the only woman who died in the month of December. While many of the men, including her husband, were out exploring on Cape Cod, she accidentally fell off the Mayflower into the bitter cold waters of

Provincetown Harbor. Most of the women's death dates were not recorded, but we do know that Rose Standish died on January 29, Mary Allerton died on February 25, and Elizabeth Winslow died on March 24. Most of the women died in February and March.

The extremely high mortality rate among women is probably explainable by the fact the men were out in the fresh air, felling trees, building structures and drinking fresh New England water; while the women were confined to the damp, filthy and crowded quarters offered by the Mayflower, where disease would have spread much more quickly. The two- month voyage was long enough; the women, however, remained living on the ship for an additional four months while the men built storehouses and living quarters on shore. Many of the sick were no doubt cared for on-board the ship by the women, increasing their exposure to colds and pneumonias. William Mullins died on February 21, apparently on-board theMayflower since his will was witnessed by the ship's captain and ship's surgeon. His wife Alice and son

Joseph had not yet died, but it wasn't too long before they did, orphaning their teenage daughter Priscilla in the New

World. Only five women survived the first winter. One of the five survivors, Mrs. Katherine Carver, died in May of a "broken heart," her husband John having died of sunstroke a month earlier. Weak bodies or not, by the time of the famous

"Thanksgiving," there were only four women left to care for the Colony's fifty surviving men and children. The four women were Eleanor Billington, Elizabeth Hopkins, Mary Brewster, and Susanna (White) Winslow. Susanna Winslow was the widow of William White who died the first winter; she remarried to Edward Winslow, whose wife Elizabeth had also died the first winter.

Incidentally, all the wives who had been left behind were still living. Four of them came on the ship Anne in 1623, had additional children, and raised their families at Plymouth

Church and Religion

The Pilgrims' psalmbook, the Amsterdam 1612 edition of 's Book of Psalmes.

The Pilgrims strongly believed that the Church of England, and the , had strayed beyond Christ's teachings, and established religious rituals, and church hierarchies, that went against the teachings of the Bible. This belief put them at odds with church officials, who in the early years of King James I tried to have them arrested and thrown in jail for refusing to participate in church rituals. For this reason, many of the Pilgrims fled to Leiden, Holland, where there was religious freedom. However, the Pilgrims had difficulty adjusting to the more permissive Dutch culture, and had difficulty supporting themselves financially.

In Leiden, the Pilgrims' church grew as additional people fled from England. The church pastor was .

Their church was created around the model of the "ancient church" described in the New Testament, so they had a

Church Elder (William Brewster), some deacons, and a deaconess. They strictly honored the Sabbath by not performing any labor on Sunday. They studied the writings of earlier Protestants and Separatists, such as Martin Luther and John Calvin, and they even established a printing press to illegally distribute new Separatist and Puritan books in England.

The Pilgrim church had a number of religious differences with the Church of England and the Catholic Church. Here were some of the main points and differences:

Predestination.

The Pilgrims believed that before the foundation of the world, God predestined to make the world, man, and all things. He also predestined, at that time, who would be saved, and who would be damned. Only those God elected would receive God's grace, and would have faith. There was nothing an individual could do during their life that would cause them to be saved (or damned), since God had already decided who was going to be saved before the creation of the world. However, God would not have chosen blatant sinners to be his elect; and therefore those who were godly were likely to be the ones God had elected to be saved.

Sacraments and Popery.

To the Pilgrims, there were only two sacraments: baptism and the Lord's Supper. The other sacraments of the

Church of England and Roman Catholic church (Confession, Penance, Confirmation, Ordination, Marriage,

Confession, Last Rites) were inventions of man, had no scriptural basis, and were therefore superstitions--even to the point of being heretical or idolatrous. The Pilgrims opposed mass, and considered marriage a civil affair to be handled by the State (not a religious sacrament). Icons and religious symbols such as crosses, statues, stain-glass windows, fancy architecture, and other worldly manifestations of religion were rejected as a form of idolatry. They also rejected the Catholic and Anglican Book of Common Prayer, believing that prayer should be spontaneous and not scripted. The Pilgrims' views against scripted prayer are laid out in church-member Sabine Staresmore's book The

Unlawfulness of Reading in Prayer(Amsterdam, 1619).

Church Hierarchy.

The legitimacy of the Pope, the Saints, and the church hierarchy were rejected, as was the veneration of relics. The church of the Pilgrims was organized around five officers: pastor, teacher, elder, deacon, and deaconess (sometimes called the "church widow"). However, none of the five offices was considered essential to the church. The Pastor was an ordained minister whose responsibility was to see to the religious life of the congregation. John Robinson was the pastor of the Pilgrims, but was never able to get to America before his death in 1625. The Teacher was also an ordained minister who was responsible for the instruction of the congregation. The Pilgrims apparently never had anyone to fill that position. The Elder was a lay-person responsible for church government, and he was also the church's eyes and ears, assisting the Pastor and Teacher in admonishing the congregation. William Brewster was the

Elder for the Plymouth church. The Deacons collected offerings, and attended to the needs of the poor and elderly. John Carver and Samuel Fuller both were deacons during their life. The Deaconess attended the sick and poor, and often played the role of midwife for the congregation. The Deaconess of the early Plymouth church is not named, but may have been Bridget Fuller.

Reproduction of the Pilgrims' fort, which also functioned as the colony's church.

The Church Building.

The church building itself had no significance to the Pilgrims, and was kept intentionally drab and plain, with no religious depictions, crosses, windows, fancy architecture, or icons, to avoid the sin of idolatry. At Plymouth, the

Pilgrim's church was the bottom floor of the town's fort--the top floor held six cannons and a watchtower to defend the colony. The church room was also the town's meetinghouse, where court sessions and town meetings took place.

Isaac de Rasieres, who visited Plymouth in 1627, reported how the Pilgrim's began their church on Sunday: "They assemble by beat of drum, each with his musket or firelock, in front of the captain's door; they have their cloaks on, and place themselves in order, three abreast, and are led by a sergeant without beat of drum. Behind comes the governor, in a long robe; beside him on the right hand, comes the preacher with his cloak on, and on the left hand, the captain with his side-arms and cloak on, and with a small cane in his hand; and so they march in good order, and each sets his arms down near him." During the early years of Plymouth, failing to bring your gun to church was an offense for which you could be fined 12 pence.

Infant Baptism.

The Pilgrims believed baptism was the sacrament that wiped away Original Sin, and was a covenant with Christ and his chosen people (as circumcision had been to God and the Israelites), and therefore children should be baptized as infants. This was in opposition to the Anabaptists, who believed that baptism was essentially an initiation ceremony into the church-hood of believers, and therefore could only be administered to believing adults who understood the meaning of the ceremony. The Pilgrims, on the other hand, believed that "baptism now, as circumcision of old, is the seal of the covenant of God," and they felt that groups like the Anabaptists who did not baptize their infants were depriving Christ's flock of all its young lambs. , one of the founders of the Pilgrims' church, even published a book on the topic, A Plea For Infants (Amsterdam, 1610). They further believed that at least one parent must be of the faith for the child to be baptized into the church.

Holy Days and Religious Holidays.

The Pilgrims faithfully observed the Sabbath, and did not work on Sunday. Even when the Pilgrims were exploring

Cape Cod, they stopped everything and stayed in camp on Sunday to keep the Sabbath. The Pilgrims did not celebrate Christmas and Easter. They believed that these holidays were invented by man to memorialize Jesus, and are not prescribed by the Bible or celebrated by the early Christian churches, and therefore cannot be considered

Holy days. "It seems too much for any mortal man to appoint, or make an anniversary memorial [for Christ]," taught the Pilgrims' pastor John Robinson. The book Perth Assembly (Leiden, 1618)--the book that got Elder William

Brewster into such hot water with the King of England and ultimately resulted in the confiscation of his printing press-- was largely about the rejection of Christmas and other appointed "Holy Days."

Marriage.

The Pilgrims considered marriage a civil affair, not to be handled by the church ministers, but instead by civil magistrates. Marriage was a contract, mutually agreed upon by a man and a woman. Marriage was created by God for the benefit of man's natural and spiritual life. Marriages were considered important for two main reasons: procreation of children to increase Christ's flock; and to avoid the sin of adultery. Pastor John Robinson taught that the important characteristics to find in a spouse are (1) godliness, and (2) similarity--in age, beliefs, estate, disposition, inclinations, and affections. In the marriage, "the wife is specially required a reverend subjection in all lawful things to her husband," and the husband is "to give honor to the wife," as the Lord requires "the love of the husband to his wife must be like Christ's to his church." The Pilgrims refused to include religious symbolism in a marriage ceremony, including the exchange of wedding rings, which they considered a "relic of popery" ... and "a diabolical circle for the Devil to dance in."

Religious Texts.

The Pilgrims used the Geneva edition of the Bible, first published in English in 1560. The translation and footnotes of the Geneva Bible were made by early Calvinists more trustworthy to the Pilgrims than the later King James Bible (first published in 1611) whose translation and footnotes were written by the Anglican church hierarchy. The Pilgrims only sang actual Biblical , they did not believe in singing hymns that were not direct Biblical texts. Henry Ainsworth, of an English separatist church in Amsterdam, wrote the psalm book used by the Pilgrims. They believed it more accurately translated the Biblical Psalms into verse than other psalm books. The Pilgrims believed the Apocrypha was worth studying as religious texts, but were non-Canonical. For religious interpretation, the Pilgrims read a lot of books, and thankfully the early probate records of Plymouth Colony often give us the actual book titles owned by the deceased at the time of their death. Elder William Brewster had several hundred books on various religious topics in his library. The two most popular books in early Plymouth were John Dod'sExposition Upon the Ten Commandments, and their own pastor John Robinson's book Observations Divine and Moral. Also popular were the works of Henry

Ainsworth, William Perkins, and John Calvin; as well as John Foxe's Acts and Monuments of the Martyrs, and

Thomas Wilson's Christian Dictionary. Lesser known works that were popular in early Plymouth include Thomas

Brightman's The Revelation of Saint John, and Richard Rogers' Seven Treatises Containing Such Direction as is

Gathered Out of the Holie Scriptures, Leading and Guiding to True Happines, Both in this Life and in the Life to Come Houses in Early Plymouth Colony

The Pilgrims started constructing their living houses and storehouses in late December 1620, but only managed to get a couple built before and during the first winter. They were hindered not only by the weather, but by occasional fires usually caused by a spark or ember from the fire making it onto the roof (which was constructed of dried thatch.) On 28 December 1620, the Pilgrims assigned out house-plots to the 19 family groups--each family was responsible for building their own house, as well as supplying labor to build community storehouses, a defensive fort, fences and sheds. They were assigned land plots that were 50 feet deep. The width of the lot was about 8 feet multiplied by the number of members in the family--so a family of six would have received a plot of land approximately 50 feet by 48 feet. But without the time, good weather, and enough manpower to quickly build a house, many of the Pilgrims continued to live onboard the Mayflower throughout the winter. A year later (in December

1621), Mayflower passenger Edward Winslow wrote a letter in which he said "we have built seven dwelling-houses, and four for the use of the plantation." In 1622, the Pilgrims built a fence around the colony for their better defense-- the perimeter was nearly half a mile, and the fence was about 8 to 9 feet high.

In late 1623, Emmanual Altham wrote a letter from Plymouth to his brother back in England, and reported that there were about twenty houses, but only about five of them were "very fair and pleasant." By that time, several additional ships carrying passengers, including the Fortune in 1621, and the Anne in 1623, had arrived. The Fortune brought mostly young, undisciplined men, whom the company hoped would contribute labor. The Anne brought many of the wives and children to the colony--many of the men had left behind their wives and children in England until the colony was better established. In 1624, Captain John Smith recorded that Plymouth had about 32 houses, "whereof 7 were burnt the last winter."

In 1628, Plymouth was visited by the Dutchman named Isaac de Rasieres, and he wrote a more detailed description of what he saw:

New Plymouth lies on the slope of a hill stretching east towards the sea-coast, with a broad street about a cannon shot of

800 feet long, leading down the hill; with a crossing in the middle, ... The houses are constructed of clapboards, with gardens also enclosed behind and at the sides with clapboards, so that their houses and courtyards are arranged in very good order, with a stockade against sudden attack; and at the ends of the streets there are three wooden gates. ... Upon the hill they have a large square house, with a flat roof, built of thick sawn planks stayed with oak beams, upon the top of which they have six cannon.

The earliest houses in Plymouth had thatched roofs, but because they were more likely to catch on fire, the colony eventually passed a law that required new homes be built with plank instead. Most houses had dirt floors, not wooden floors, and each had a prominent fire and chimney area, since this was the only source of heat as well as the only way to cook. Each house would have had its own garden, where vegetables and herbs could be grown. Each family was also assigned a field plot just outside of town, where they could grow corn, beans, peas, wheat, and other crops that required more space to grow, as well as to raise larger livestock