The May flower arrives in the New World
Early on 9 November 1620, as the sun’s first rays reflected on the ocean, the passengers and crew of the Mayflower – those awake at sunrise, at least – finally caught a tantalising glimpse of land. “The appearance of it much comforted us, especially seeing so goodly a land, and wooded to the brink of the sea. It caused us to rejoice together, and praise God that had given us once again to see land,” reads Mourt’s Relation, an account of the settlement of Plymouth by the passengers Edward Winslow and William Bradford.
Reaching the New World had been a perilous undertaking. The ship had been at sea for over two months, battling through ferocious storms and its passengers confined to cramped quarters, but their salvation had finally arrived in a jut of land extending out into the Atlantic Ocean in modern-day Massachusetts: Cape Cod.
SAINTS AND STRANGERS
Typically, the passengers can be split into two groups: the ‘Saints’ (or ‘Pilgrims’, as they’re known today) who were sailing to escape religious persecution; and the ‘Strangers’, chasing adventure and economic opportunities in new lands. In reality, these distinctions were less clear-cut as many Saints would have been proficient in various trades, while a number
