11/20/2017 Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) - Wikipedia Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) The Pilgrims or Pilgrim Fathers were early European settlers of the Plymouth Colony in present-day Plymouth, Massachusetts, United States. The Pilgrims' leadership came from the religious congregations of Brownist English Dissenters who had fled the volatile political environment in England for the relative calm and tolerance of 16th–17th century Holland in the Netherlands. The Pilgrims held Puritan Calvinist religious beliefs but, unlike other Puritans, they maintained that their congregations needed to be separated from the English state church. As a separatist group, they were also concerned that they might lose their English cultural identity if they remained The Embarkation of the Pilgrims (1857) by in the Netherlands, so they arranged with English investors to American painter Robert Walter Weir at the establish a new colony in North America. The colony was United States Capitol in Washington, DC established in 1620 and became the second successful English settlement in North America (after the founding of Jamestown, Virginia in 1607). The Pilgrims' story became a central theme of the history and culture of the United States.[1] By this time, non-English European colonization of the Americas was also underway in New Netherland, New France, Essequibo, Colonial Brazil, Barbados, the Viceroyalty of Peru, and New Spain. Contents 1 History 1.1 Separatists in Scrooby 1.2 Leiden 1.2.1 Decision to leave Holland 1.2.2 Negotiations 1.2.3 Brewster's diversion 1.2.4 Preparations 1.3 Voyage 1.3.1 Atlantic crossing 1.4 Arrival in America 1.4.1 The Mayflower Compact 1.4.2 First landings 1.4.3 First contact 1.4.4 Settlement 2 Etymology 2.1 Bradford's history 2.2 Popular use 3 See also 4 References 5 Notes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilgrims_(Plymouth_Colony) 1/13 11/20/2017 Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) - Wikipedia 6 External links History Separatists in Scrooby The core of the group that came to be known as the Pilgrims were brought together between 1586 and 1605 by shared theological beliefs, as expressed by Richard Clyfton, a Brownist parson at All Saints' Parish Church in Babworth, near East Retford, Nottinghamshire. This congregation held Puritan beliefs comparable to other non-conforming movements (i.e., groups not in communion with the Church of England) led by Robert Browne, John Greenwood, and Henry Barrowe. As Separatists, they also held that their differences with the Church of England were irreconcilable and that their worship should be independent of the trappings, traditions, and organization of a central church—unlike those Puritans who maintained their membership in and allegiance to the Church of England.[2] William Brewster, a former diplomatic assistant to the Netherlands, was living in the Scrooby manor house, serving as postmaster for the village and bailiff to the Archbishop of York. He had been impressed by Clyfton's services and had begun participating in services led by John Smyth in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire.[3] The Puritan Separatists had long been controversial. Under the 1559 Act of Uniformity, it was illegal not to attend official Church of England services unless the church had signed the allegiance to the Church of England, with a fine of one shilling (£0.05; about £17 today[4]) for each missed Sunday and holy day. The penalties for conducting unofficial services included imprisonment and larger fines. Under the policy of this time, Barrowe and Greenwood were executed for sedition in 1593. During much of Brewster's tenure (1595–1606), the Archbishop was Matthew Hutton. He displayed some sympathy to the Puritan cause, writing to Robert Cecil, Secretary of State to James I in 1604: The Puritans though they differ in Ceremonies and accidentes, yet they agree with us in substance of religion, and I thinke all or the moste parte of them love his Majestie, and the presente state, and I hope will yield to conformitie. But the Papistes are opposite and contrarie in very many substantiall pointes of religion, and cannot but wishe the Popes authoritie and popish religion to be established.[5] Many Puritans had hoped that a reconciliation would be possible when James came to power which allowed them independence, but the Hampton Court Conference of 1604 denied substantially all the concessions which they had requested—except for an English translation of the Bible. Following the Conference in 1605, Clyfton was declared a non- conformist and stripped of his position at Babworth. Brewster invited him to live at his home. Archbishop Hutton died in 1606 and Tobias Matthew was appointed as his replacement. He was one of James' chief supporters at the 1604 conference,[6] and he promptly began a campaign to purge the archdiocese of non-conforming influences, both Puritans and those wishing to return to the Catholic faith. Disobedient clergy were replaced, and prominent Separatists were confronted, fined, and imprisoned. He is credited with driving recusants out of the country, those who refused to attend Anglican services.[7][8] At about the same time, Brewster arranged for a congregation to meet privately at the Scrooby manor house. Services were held beginning in 1606, with Clyfton as pastor, John Robinson as teacher, and Brewster as the presiding elder. Shortly thereafter, Smyth and members of the Gainsborough group moved on to Amsterdam.[9] Brewster is known to have been https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilgrims_(Plymouth_Colony) 2/13 11/20/2017 Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) - Wikipedia fined £20 (about £3.96 thousand today[4]) in absentia for his non-compliance with the church.[10] This followed his September 1607 resignation from the postmaster position,[11] about the time that the congregation had decided to follow the Smyth party to Amsterdam.[2][12] Scrooby member William Bradford of Austerfield kept a journal of the congregation's events that later was published as Of Plymouth Plantation. Of this time, he wrote: But after these things they could not long continue in any peaceable condition, but were hunted & persecuted on every side, so as their former afflictions were but as flea-bitings in comparison of these which now came upon them. For some were taken & clapt up in prison, others had their houses besett & watcht night and day, & hardly escaped their hands; and ye most were faine to flie & leave their howses & habitations, and the means of their livelehood.[2] Leiden They lived in Leiden, Holland, a city of 100,000 inhabitants,[13] residing in small houses behind the "Kloksteeg" opposite the Pieterskerk. The success of the congregation in Leiden was mixed. Leiden was a thriving industrial center,[14] and many members were well able to support themselves working at Leiden University or in the textile, printing, and brewing trades. Others were less able to bring in sufficient income, hampered by their rural backgrounds and the language barrier; for those, accommodations were made on an estate bought by Robinson and three partners.[15] Bradford wrote of their years in Leiden: For these & other reasons they removed to Leyden, a fair & bewtifull citie, and of a sweete situation, but made more famous by ye universitie wherwith it is adorned, in which of late had been so many learned man. But wanting that traffike by sea which Amerstdam injoyes, it was not so beneficiall for Title page of a pamphlet published their outward means of living & estats. But being now hear by William Brewster in Leiden pitchet they fell to such trads & imployments as they best could; valewing peace & their spirituall comforte above any other riches whatsoever. And at length they came to raise a competente & comforteable living, but with hard and continuall labor.[16] Brewster had been teaching English at the university, and Robinson enrolled in 1615 to pursue his doctorate. There he participated in a series of debates, particularly regarding the contentious issue of Calvinism versus Arminianism (siding with the Calvinists against the Remonstrants).[17] Brewster acquired typesetting equipment about 1616 in a venture financed by Thomas Brewer, and began publishing the debates through a local press.[18] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilgrims_(Plymouth_Colony) 3/13 11/20/2017 Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) - Wikipedia The Netherlands, however, was a land whose culture and language were strange and difficult for the English congregation to understand or learn. They found the Dutch morals much too libertine, and their children were becoming more and more Dutch as the years passed. The congregation came to believe that they faced eventual extinction if they remained there.[19] Decision to leave Holland By 1617, the congregation was stable and relatively secure, but there were ongoing issues that needed to be resolved. Bradford noted that many members of the congregation were showing signs of early aging, compounding the difficulties which some had in supporting themselves. A few had spent their savings and so gave up and returned to England. It was feared that more would follow and that the congregation would become unsustainable. The employment issues made it unattractive for others to come to Leiden, and younger members had begun leaving to find employment and adventure elsewhere. Also compelling was the possibility of missionary work, an opportunity that rarely arose in a Protestant stronghold.[20] Reasons for departure are suggested by Bradford when he notes the "discouragements" of the hard life which they had in the Netherlands, and the hope of attracting others by finding "a better, and easier place of living"; the children of the group being "drawn away by evil examples into extravagance and dangerous courses"; the "great hope, for the propagating and advancing the gospel of the kingdom of Christ in those remote parts of the world."[20] Edward Winslow's list was similar.