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Of Plymouth Plantation: Along with the Full Text of the Pilgrims' Journals for Their First Year at Plymouth.
From 1630 to 1651, William Bradford wrote a history of Plymouth, the very colony he helped to establish and govern. Never published in his lifetime, the handwritten manuscript was lost during the Revolutionary War, and was rediscovered and published for the first time in 1856. In this new edition, Caleb Johnson has added many valuable footnotes, and included many relevant photos and illustrations. Also included here with Bradford's History is the complete text of the Pilgrims' journals chronicling the first year at Plymouth. These exciting first-hand journals capture the day-by-day details of the explorations and adventures of the Pilgrims.
624 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1651
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About the author
William Bradford
280 books38 followersWilliam Bradford was an English leader of the settlers of the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts, and was elected thirty times to be the Governor after John Carver died. The manuscript of his journal (1620–1647), Of Plymouth Plantation, was not published until 1856. Bradford is credited as the first to proclaim what popular American culture now views as the first Thanksgiving.
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November 26, 2025
Of all the contrarian aspects of the personality of Pilgrim leader William Bradford, the one that stands out most to the modern reader of Bradford’s book Of Plymouth Plantation may be Bradford’s sheer strength of will, or stubbornness, or obstinacy – a disposition of mind that may have been exactly what was needed to help the Plymouth Colony beat the odds and survive that first deadly winter, in the wilds of what would one day be the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Of Plymouth Plantation is an interesting and important book – not just for Thanksgiving week, when I am posting this review, but for any time of year. Bradford, a vigorous and energetic writer, sees the events that befall the Plymouth Colony he leads as part of a Biblical conflict between good and evil, with the Pilgrims as lonely wanderers on a godly path.
Bradford’s godly path had a high cost; Bradford's first wife fell to her death from the deck of the Mayflower, and scholars still wonder if she actually committed suicide after seeing the bleak coast of New England. But the sheer force of will that fills these pages provides a glimpse of the leadership qualities that helped Bradford get the Pilgrims through that first cruel winter of 1620, so that they could celebrate the first Thanksgiving in 1621.
I suspect many readers turn to this book around Thanksgiving; I know that is my tendency. So if it's some future Thanksgiving Day, between the Macy's parade and the Detroit Lions football game, and you're looking for the relevant holiday-related passage while the turkey and stuffing send up sweet savors from the oven, here it is -- not Bradford's own words, but those of fellow Pilgrim Father Edward Winslow, in a letter from December of 1621:
"Our harvest being gotten in, our Governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a more special manner rejoice together, after we had gathered the fruit of our labours. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the Company almost a week. At which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king, Massasoit with some 90 men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted. And they went out and killed five deer which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our Governor and upon the Captain and others." (p. 90)
The staples of the modern Thanksgiving table are not specifically mentioned in Winslow's letter, but it is fun to speculate on how Winslow's words may have influenced the festival that Americans look forward to every November.
Bradford’s belief that he is establishing God’s Kingdom on Earth, right there in New England, influences the way he looks at those with whom he interacts throughout his quest. He has little good to say, for example, about Thomas Weston, the “merchant adventurer” (today, we might say “venture capitalist”) who was among the underwriters of the Pilgrims’ voyage. In January 1622, when Weston had sent a ship to Plymouth with more colonists, but without the food he had promised to send, Bradford dismisses Weston’s flowery cover letter as “tedious and impertinent” and adds that “All this was but cold comfort to fill their hungry bellies, and a slender performance of his former late promise….And well might it make them remember what the Psalmist saith, Psalm cxviii.8, ‘It is better to trust in the Lord than to have confidence in man’” (p. 101).
History-minded readers, especially those with ties to New England, should find this book fascinating. Rhode Islanders, for example, might take an interest in Bradford's 1633 description of Roger Williams, the founder of the Rhode Island colony, as "a man godly and zealous, having many precious parts but very unsettled in judgment", someone who "began to fall into some strange opinions, and from opinion to practice" (p. 257).
Nowadays, we might tend to look at Williams, in contrast to Bradford, as an American model, because of Williams's championing of pluralism and religious liberty. But it is interesting to see Bradford struggling to balance his disapproval for Williams's theology with his respect for Williams the man, as he praises Williams's "gifts" and "his teaching well approved, for the benefit whereof I still bless God and am thankful to him", but closes his discussion by saying that Williams "is to be pitied and prayed for; and so I shall leave the matter and desire the Lord to show him his errors and reduce him into the way of truth" (p. 257).
Other luminaries of the Plymouth colony are in evidence as well -- for example, the famed Native American Squanto ("a special instrument sent of God for their good beyond their expectation"), without whose help the Pilgrims might not have made it through that first bitter winter of 1620. Also making their appearances in these pages are the redoubtable soldier Miles Standish and the cooper John Alden, immortalized in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poetry as rivals for the hand of Priscilla Mullins. It is to Longfellow, not Bradford, that one must look for the moment when John Alden visits Priscilla to court her on Standish’s behalf, and the beautiful Priscilla Mullins looks at the handsome young John Alden and says, “Why don’t you speak for yourself, John?”
And one of the most interesting moments in the book occurs when Bradford's Pilgrims come into conflict with Thomas Morton of Merrymount, a curious character whom fans of Nathaniel Hawthorne will know from Hawthorne's story "The Maypole of Merry Mount." What is known from history is that Morton travelled to New England and set up for himself, leading a settlement whose liberal principles contravened the stern tenets of Separatist and Puritan New England. In Bradford's reading, Morton is a "Lord of Misrule, [who] maintained a School of Atheism" (205), and the eventual downfall of his relaxed and pleasure-oriented regime represents the triumph of God's principles. Morton, unsurprisingly, saw things differently.
Bradford's readiness to see the Native Americans of Massachusetts as cruel "savages" is disheartening in the extreme, and some parts of the book therefore make for difficult reading. Strangely enough, though, Bradford seems to have seen himself as having established fair and just relations between the Pilgrims and the Indians; he takes pains to note that in 1638, when three Englishmen murdered an Indian, the Englishmen were duly tried, convicted, and executed for the crime – “And some of the Narragansett Indians and of the party’s friends were present when it was done, which gave them and all the country good satisfaction” (p. 301).
My favorite edition of this book is the one edited by naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison for Alfred A. Knopf in 1952. Thorough as always (his edition includes 13 appendices of official documents, along with four wonderfully detailed maps), Morison conveys well the energy and determination that underlie Bradford's writings and his approach to life – even though a docent at the Leiden American Pilgrim Museum, in the Dutch city where the Pilgrims lived for 12 years after they left England but before they voyaged to America, once told me that he finds some of Morison's editing highly iffy. It is fascinating to see Morison apply the insights of Of Plymouth Plantation to the Cold War era in which he edited and published this book.
Clearly, for example, Morison is thinking of the Soviet Union, communist China, and the Korean conflict when he writes in the preface that "In the debates in the New England Confederation over the Narragansetts, we are confronted with the United Nations in miniature -- shall we start a 'preventive' war now and risk losing all, or wait yet a little while, hoping that we, not they, will grow stronger?" (p. xi). Perhaps it is for that reason that Morison describes Bradford's work as expressing a set of values "that exalts and heartens one in an age of uncertainty, when courage falters and faith grows dim" (p. xii).
The sources of uncertainty, for any society, may change over the years, but there are always likely to be threats that challenge one's courage and confront one's belief system. And I suspect that for many years to come, Of Plymouth Plantation, with its status as the first great book to come directly out of the American experience, will continue to provide comfort to future generations of Americans, facing future threats that we cannot now anticipate.
Of Plymouth Plantation is an interesting and important book – not just for Thanksgiving week, when I am posting this review, but for any time of year. Bradford, a vigorous and energetic writer, sees the events that befall the Plymouth Colony he leads as part of a Biblical conflict between good and evil, with the Pilgrims as lonely wanderers on a godly path.
Bradford’s godly path had a high cost; Bradford's first wife fell to her death from the deck of the Mayflower, and scholars still wonder if she actually committed suicide after seeing the bleak coast of New England. But the sheer force of will that fills these pages provides a glimpse of the leadership qualities that helped Bradford get the Pilgrims through that first cruel winter of 1620, so that they could celebrate the first Thanksgiving in 1621.
I suspect many readers turn to this book around Thanksgiving; I know that is my tendency. So if it's some future Thanksgiving Day, between the Macy's parade and the Detroit Lions football game, and you're looking for the relevant holiday-related passage while the turkey and stuffing send up sweet savors from the oven, here it is -- not Bradford's own words, but those of fellow Pilgrim Father Edward Winslow, in a letter from December of 1621:
"Our harvest being gotten in, our Governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a more special manner rejoice together, after we had gathered the fruit of our labours. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the Company almost a week. At which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king, Massasoit with some 90 men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted. And they went out and killed five deer which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our Governor and upon the Captain and others." (p. 90)
The staples of the modern Thanksgiving table are not specifically mentioned in Winslow's letter, but it is fun to speculate on how Winslow's words may have influenced the festival that Americans look forward to every November.
Bradford’s belief that he is establishing God’s Kingdom on Earth, right there in New England, influences the way he looks at those with whom he interacts throughout his quest. He has little good to say, for example, about Thomas Weston, the “merchant adventurer” (today, we might say “venture capitalist”) who was among the underwriters of the Pilgrims’ voyage. In January 1622, when Weston had sent a ship to Plymouth with more colonists, but without the food he had promised to send, Bradford dismisses Weston’s flowery cover letter as “tedious and impertinent” and adds that “All this was but cold comfort to fill their hungry bellies, and a slender performance of his former late promise….And well might it make them remember what the Psalmist saith, Psalm cxviii.8, ‘It is better to trust in the Lord than to have confidence in man’” (p. 101).
History-minded readers, especially those with ties to New England, should find this book fascinating. Rhode Islanders, for example, might take an interest in Bradford's 1633 description of Roger Williams, the founder of the Rhode Island colony, as "a man godly and zealous, having many precious parts but very unsettled in judgment", someone who "began to fall into some strange opinions, and from opinion to practice" (p. 257).
Nowadays, we might tend to look at Williams, in contrast to Bradford, as an American model, because of Williams's championing of pluralism and religious liberty. But it is interesting to see Bradford struggling to balance his disapproval for Williams's theology with his respect for Williams the man, as he praises Williams's "gifts" and "his teaching well approved, for the benefit whereof I still bless God and am thankful to him", but closes his discussion by saying that Williams "is to be pitied and prayed for; and so I shall leave the matter and desire the Lord to show him his errors and reduce him into the way of truth" (p. 257).
Other luminaries of the Plymouth colony are in evidence as well -- for example, the famed Native American Squanto ("a special instrument sent of God for their good beyond their expectation"), without whose help the Pilgrims might not have made it through that first bitter winter of 1620. Also making their appearances in these pages are the redoubtable soldier Miles Standish and the cooper John Alden, immortalized in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poetry as rivals for the hand of Priscilla Mullins. It is to Longfellow, not Bradford, that one must look for the moment when John Alden visits Priscilla to court her on Standish’s behalf, and the beautiful Priscilla Mullins looks at the handsome young John Alden and says, “Why don’t you speak for yourself, John?”
And one of the most interesting moments in the book occurs when Bradford's Pilgrims come into conflict with Thomas Morton of Merrymount, a curious character whom fans of Nathaniel Hawthorne will know from Hawthorne's story "The Maypole of Merry Mount." What is known from history is that Morton travelled to New England and set up for himself, leading a settlement whose liberal principles contravened the stern tenets of Separatist and Puritan New England. In Bradford's reading, Morton is a "Lord of Misrule, [who] maintained a School of Atheism" (205), and the eventual downfall of his relaxed and pleasure-oriented regime represents the triumph of God's principles. Morton, unsurprisingly, saw things differently.
Bradford's readiness to see the Native Americans of Massachusetts as cruel "savages" is disheartening in the extreme, and some parts of the book therefore make for difficult reading. Strangely enough, though, Bradford seems to have seen himself as having established fair and just relations between the Pilgrims and the Indians; he takes pains to note that in 1638, when three Englishmen murdered an Indian, the Englishmen were duly tried, convicted, and executed for the crime – “And some of the Narragansett Indians and of the party’s friends were present when it was done, which gave them and all the country good satisfaction” (p. 301).
My favorite edition of this book is the one edited by naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison for Alfred A. Knopf in 1952. Thorough as always (his edition includes 13 appendices of official documents, along with four wonderfully detailed maps), Morison conveys well the energy and determination that underlie Bradford's writings and his approach to life – even though a docent at the Leiden American Pilgrim Museum, in the Dutch city where the Pilgrims lived for 12 years after they left England but before they voyaged to America, once told me that he finds some of Morison's editing highly iffy. It is fascinating to see Morison apply the insights of Of Plymouth Plantation to the Cold War era in which he edited and published this book.
Clearly, for example, Morison is thinking of the Soviet Union, communist China, and the Korean conflict when he writes in the preface that "In the debates in the New England Confederation over the Narragansetts, we are confronted with the United Nations in miniature -- shall we start a 'preventive' war now and risk losing all, or wait yet a little while, hoping that we, not they, will grow stronger?" (p. xi). Perhaps it is for that reason that Morison describes Bradford's work as expressing a set of values "that exalts and heartens one in an age of uncertainty, when courage falters and faith grows dim" (p. xii).
The sources of uncertainty, for any society, may change over the years, but there are always likely to be threats that challenge one's courage and confront one's belief system. And I suspect that for many years to come, Of Plymouth Plantation, with its status as the first great book to come directly out of the American experience, will continue to provide comfort to future generations of Americans, facing future threats that we cannot now anticipate.
February 22, 2014
I am giving this book 5 stars to balance out the multitudes of uncharitable ratings found here. Sure, this book was not always the most entertaining or smooth going read and yes Bradford was a flaming calvinist, so his perspective on God's providence is highly disagreeable. But still the book doesn't deserve to be dished like it is here, William Bradford did shared many aspects of a fascinating journey that we don't learn in modern history books. I imagine many who had to read "Of Plymouth Plantation" likely pride themselves as being "tolerant" and ironically to be tolerant, means one has a moral obligation to be extremely intolerant towards Christians, especially the Puritan sort. It seems these reviewer didn't realize that Bradford was NOT a puritan.
The first part of the book, Bradford shares the complex and confusing tale of how the separatist (later known as the Pilgrims) fled to Holland due to religious persecution from the state church and the puritans. Eventually a small handful of separatist made it to America after being hoodwinked, taken advantage of, screwed over and repeatedly stumbling in one unlucky situation after another. One sees the strength of character and resolve in these early pioneers, they were willing to persevere all manners of hard-ship for the freedom to live according to their conscience. It is interesting how the Separatist going to Holland seemed to result in their becoming more liberal and tolerant. It is important to note that it was primarily the Pilgrims who promoted religious freedom, not the strict Puritans.
It's in this book that we read about the Mayflower compact, which is incredibly important in the story of America. They understood how earlier settlements had failed due to lack of government, and they formed a covenant and consented to it, drawing up equal laws for the good of the settlement. Some think this may be the first time in history something like this was done and if I recall right, according to John Adams, it was influential in the formation of the American constitution.
After the pilgrims got off the ship, it was like they stepped from the frying pan into the fire and had to survive a fierce weather. Of the few that arrived in the new world, some 50 people died the first winter, at one time everyone was ill except for 7 men who took care of all of them. The Pioneering there was simply a nightmare. The Pilgrims did by chance meet two English speaking Indians and through them they were able to form a peace contract (which they kept) with the Indians. The Indians showed them how to plant corn and the English demonstrated to the Indians a work ethic that could result in huge harvest.
But yeah, it is very interesting that the Plymouth plantation started out with a communistic system, where everyone had everything in common, they worked and brought the food and resources to a central location. This almost resulted in their starvation, despite their integrity and work ethic. Finally, governor Bradford (Reflecting on how Plato was wrong in the Republic) gave everyone their own plot of land and the ability to work for themselves and this resulted in prosperity. So yes, how fascinating, socialism and free Market capitalism were tried early on and one failed miserably and the other worked triumphantly.
Finally, it's good to consider the lowly Pilgrims influenced other colonies, one gets a glimpse of this in the book. But yeah, I read elsewhere that Massachusetts was led by a social and religious aristocracy, acting under the King's charter, and the Puritans there,felt greatly superior over the lowly, humble and more liberal Separatist in Plymouth. But after two months of rivalry, the more genial spirit and tolerance of the Pilgrims started to supplant the bigoted sternness of the Puritans. Plymouth had an influence on the colonies of Connecticut as well, which was to form the fundamental orders of Connecticut.
The first part of the book, Bradford shares the complex and confusing tale of how the separatist (later known as the Pilgrims) fled to Holland due to religious persecution from the state church and the puritans. Eventually a small handful of separatist made it to America after being hoodwinked, taken advantage of, screwed over and repeatedly stumbling in one unlucky situation after another. One sees the strength of character and resolve in these early pioneers, they were willing to persevere all manners of hard-ship for the freedom to live according to their conscience. It is interesting how the Separatist going to Holland seemed to result in their becoming more liberal and tolerant. It is important to note that it was primarily the Pilgrims who promoted religious freedom, not the strict Puritans.
It's in this book that we read about the Mayflower compact, which is incredibly important in the story of America. They understood how earlier settlements had failed due to lack of government, and they formed a covenant and consented to it, drawing up equal laws for the good of the settlement. Some think this may be the first time in history something like this was done and if I recall right, according to John Adams, it was influential in the formation of the American constitution.
After the pilgrims got off the ship, it was like they stepped from the frying pan into the fire and had to survive a fierce weather. Of the few that arrived in the new world, some 50 people died the first winter, at one time everyone was ill except for 7 men who took care of all of them. The Pioneering there was simply a nightmare. The Pilgrims did by chance meet two English speaking Indians and through them they were able to form a peace contract (which they kept) with the Indians. The Indians showed them how to plant corn and the English demonstrated to the Indians a work ethic that could result in huge harvest.
But yeah, it is very interesting that the Plymouth plantation started out with a communistic system, where everyone had everything in common, they worked and brought the food and resources to a central location. This almost resulted in their starvation, despite their integrity and work ethic. Finally, governor Bradford (Reflecting on how Plato was wrong in the Republic) gave everyone their own plot of land and the ability to work for themselves and this resulted in prosperity. So yes, how fascinating, socialism and free Market capitalism were tried early on and one failed miserably and the other worked triumphantly.
Finally, it's good to consider the lowly Pilgrims influenced other colonies, one gets a glimpse of this in the book. But yeah, I read elsewhere that Massachusetts was led by a social and religious aristocracy, acting under the King's charter, and the Puritans there,felt greatly superior over the lowly, humble and more liberal Separatist in Plymouth. But after two months of rivalry, the more genial spirit and tolerance of the Pilgrims started to supplant the bigoted sternness of the Puritans. Plymouth had an influence on the colonies of Connecticut as well, which was to form the fundamental orders of Connecticut.
September 4, 2015
William Bradford was the governor of Plymouth Plantation almost every year from 1621 to 1657 when he died. He relates first hand our legends of Squanto, the first Thanksgiving, the Mayflower compact, etc.
Some much beloved words come from his pen:
The term Pilgrim coined:
"So they left that goodly and pleasant city which had been their resting pace near twelve years; but they knew they were pilgrims, and looked not much on those things, but lift up their eyes to the heavens, their dearest country, and quieted their spirits" (50).
Private Property established:
He also undoes the socialist set-up of the group's charter, going to private property instead. "... assigned to every family a parcel of land.... made all hands very industrious" (133).
But there were many surprises in the book for me, too.
1. The Arminian theological controversy broke out in the Netherlands while the Pilgrims sojourned there. A couple of them got involved, trying to refute Jacobus Arminius.
2. Bradford says the Indian women are much more modest than English women (pg. 99). I'm sure this evaluation is prejudiced by his greater familiarity with English culture, and the fear or natural shyness Indian women would have encountering white men. But still, an intriguing comment. Immodesty was a big problem in Elizabethan England.
3. As separatists, the group rejected the Church calendar, including the celebration of Christmas. The governor sent everyone out to work on Christmas, and when some less persuaded of the separatist view stayed home or played in the streets, he took away their tools and told them to stay inside.
4. Squanto seems to have gotten greedy, playing English off Indian groups, and vice versa, or at least that's what Bradford thought: "Squanto sought his own ends and played his own game, by putting the Indians in fear and drawing gifts from them to enrich himself, making them believe he could stir up war against whom he would, and make peace for whom he would..." (109).
5. Much of the book is taken up with the colony's financial troubles. Those funding them back in England expected gold and goods to flow back home and enrich them. When this didn't happen, some backed out and those that stayed were less than helpful in supplying the colony. One agent in particular just ripped the Pilgrims off badly. Clarifying accounts across the ocean was tedious and time-consuming. The Dutch and French both pressed in, claiming lands and trapping rights, etc.
6. The group had to deal with radical sects that came their way in later years from England. Roger Williams passed through. Groups that rejected the church altogether, "sowing the seeds of Familism and Anabaptistry, to the infection of some and danger of others; so that we are not willing to join with them in any league or confederacy at all" (353).
7. They also had to deal with gross sin. Not every one of them was a dyed-in-the-wool pious separatist. Many servants were at a dead end in England due to their poor moral character, and saw a chance to start over, or exploit new ground in America. Sodomy, rape and bestiality, besides adultery came up, and their adjudicating of these according to Scripture was fascinating, some being executed and others not, depending. (354ff).
8. They wanted a minister, but made do with Elder Brewster for several years. Steve Wilkins in his review of the book, in Veritas Press' Omnibus III, says this focus on the state to the detriment of the church set America on the path of looking to the state to fix our problems while giving much less respect to the church, comparatively. This may be overstated, but Wilkins is on to something. To their credit, they gave several a try, but they were either incompetent, poor preachers, too weak-willed for the hard country, or had crazy views (or just incompatible with the particular Pilgrims).
9. The Mather family (Increase, John, Cotton, etc.) lived nearby in the Massachusetts Bay Colony that would become Boston and Salem. There was a fair bit of correspondence back and forth between the governors and the Pilgrims sought theological advice on a few matters, besides working together against Indian threats. Yale College was being formed in the later years of Bradford's writing and governing.
The Pilgrims sought to establish a new world, flee persecution, find greater opportunity to provide for their families, and expand the knowledge and kingdom of Christ to new lands. We should laud their fortitude and faith, and learn all we can from their experience.
Have your high schoolers read this book!
Some much beloved words come from his pen:
The term Pilgrim coined:
"So they left that goodly and pleasant city which had been their resting pace near twelve years; but they knew they were pilgrims, and looked not much on those things, but lift up their eyes to the heavens, their dearest country, and quieted their spirits" (50).
Private Property established:
He also undoes the socialist set-up of the group's charter, going to private property instead. "... assigned to every family a parcel of land.... made all hands very industrious" (133).
But there were many surprises in the book for me, too.
1. The Arminian theological controversy broke out in the Netherlands while the Pilgrims sojourned there. A couple of them got involved, trying to refute Jacobus Arminius.
2. Bradford says the Indian women are much more modest than English women (pg. 99). I'm sure this evaluation is prejudiced by his greater familiarity with English culture, and the fear or natural shyness Indian women would have encountering white men. But still, an intriguing comment. Immodesty was a big problem in Elizabethan England.
3. As separatists, the group rejected the Church calendar, including the celebration of Christmas. The governor sent everyone out to work on Christmas, and when some less persuaded of the separatist view stayed home or played in the streets, he took away their tools and told them to stay inside.
4. Squanto seems to have gotten greedy, playing English off Indian groups, and vice versa, or at least that's what Bradford thought: "Squanto sought his own ends and played his own game, by putting the Indians in fear and drawing gifts from them to enrich himself, making them believe he could stir up war against whom he would, and make peace for whom he would..." (109).
5. Much of the book is taken up with the colony's financial troubles. Those funding them back in England expected gold and goods to flow back home and enrich them. When this didn't happen, some backed out and those that stayed were less than helpful in supplying the colony. One agent in particular just ripped the Pilgrims off badly. Clarifying accounts across the ocean was tedious and time-consuming. The Dutch and French both pressed in, claiming lands and trapping rights, etc.
6. The group had to deal with radical sects that came their way in later years from England. Roger Williams passed through. Groups that rejected the church altogether, "sowing the seeds of Familism and Anabaptistry, to the infection of some and danger of others; so that we are not willing to join with them in any league or confederacy at all" (353).
7. They also had to deal with gross sin. Not every one of them was a dyed-in-the-wool pious separatist. Many servants were at a dead end in England due to their poor moral character, and saw a chance to start over, or exploit new ground in America. Sodomy, rape and bestiality, besides adultery came up, and their adjudicating of these according to Scripture was fascinating, some being executed and others not, depending. (354ff).
8. They wanted a minister, but made do with Elder Brewster for several years. Steve Wilkins in his review of the book, in Veritas Press' Omnibus III, says this focus on the state to the detriment of the church set America on the path of looking to the state to fix our problems while giving much less respect to the church, comparatively. This may be overstated, but Wilkins is on to something. To their credit, they gave several a try, but they were either incompetent, poor preachers, too weak-willed for the hard country, or had crazy views (or just incompatible with the particular Pilgrims).
9. The Mather family (Increase, John, Cotton, etc.) lived nearby in the Massachusetts Bay Colony that would become Boston and Salem. There was a fair bit of correspondence back and forth between the governors and the Pilgrims sought theological advice on a few matters, besides working together against Indian threats. Yale College was being formed in the later years of Bradford's writing and governing.
The Pilgrims sought to establish a new world, flee persecution, find greater opportunity to provide for their families, and expand the knowledge and kingdom of Christ to new lands. We should laud their fortitude and faith, and learn all we can from their experience.
Have your high schoolers read this book!
August 3, 2016
Of Plymouth Plantation is a chronicle of an early religious colony written by a true believer. Keep that in mind.
It was interesting reading some of the critical reviews. I won't comment on them except to point out that there was more criticism about the personality and belief system of the author than of the book itself. Bradford gives us his personal account of people trying to carve out a living in a far from unspoiled wilderness. If one reads the other things that were being written about America at the time, Bradford's efforts might be better appreciated. For contrast, read Magnalia Christi Americana by Cotton Mather. I almost guarantee that you will prefer Bradford's prose and his story.
I enjoyed the book as a period piece, and I felt no need to either approve or disapprove of the auhtor's world view. It was a harsh time and people were frequently at extremity. Rather than wring one's hands at the ethnocentrism of a people who thought they were chosen by Providence, read Bradford's account and try to immerse yourself in the life of the time unlike anything that most of us in the present west have experienced.
Perhaps Bradford wasn't "telling it like it is," but he was certainly telling it like he saw it. His motivation is as clear as his faith. No doubt, the native Americans would tell the story differently.
Their view of the Puritans was certainly not that they were "the Camp of the Saints." We can consider Bradford's followers cruel exploiters, and they were. It was the times. I doubt that you will find a more well-written and honest account of what the various colonists of the Americas thought about themselves and their struggles.
It was interesting reading some of the critical reviews. I won't comment on them except to point out that there was more criticism about the personality and belief system of the author than of the book itself. Bradford gives us his personal account of people trying to carve out a living in a far from unspoiled wilderness. If one reads the other things that were being written about America at the time, Bradford's efforts might be better appreciated. For contrast, read Magnalia Christi Americana by Cotton Mather. I almost guarantee that you will prefer Bradford's prose and his story.
I enjoyed the book as a period piece, and I felt no need to either approve or disapprove of the auhtor's world view. It was a harsh time and people were frequently at extremity. Rather than wring one's hands at the ethnocentrism of a people who thought they were chosen by Providence, read Bradford's account and try to immerse yourself in the life of the time unlike anything that most of us in the present west have experienced.
Perhaps Bradford wasn't "telling it like it is," but he was certainly telling it like he saw it. His motivation is as clear as his faith. No doubt, the native Americans would tell the story differently.
Their view of the Puritans was certainly not that they were "the Camp of the Saints." We can consider Bradford's followers cruel exploiters, and they were. It was the times. I doubt that you will find a more well-written and honest account of what the various colonists of the Americas thought about themselves and their struggles.
August 11, 2015
He sure didn’t put the “Pure” in “Puritan”
So, today my classes started back and my first assignment in my American Lit class was to read parts of William Bradford’s Of Plymouth Plantation, 1620-1647. The whole thing is dry as hell and written in 17th century English, so my eyes were pretty heavy there at the end. Then we get to the last few pages and we learn about Thomas Grainger. (NGL, I thought he was Hermione’s dad at first, but, no.) This guy was the first person hanged in the US. Which, whatever. But why was he hanged? Well, 16/17-year-old Thomas, who like every 16/17 year old thought it was rad to stick his dick in things, thought it would be super-rad to stick his dick in a mare, a cow, two goats, divers sheepe, two calves, and a turkey. Yes, a turkey. As in “gobble-gobble”. The Wikipedia article doesn’t mention it, but in the book, they go on to say that per the law, his victims were to be present for his execution, so they gathered up all these animals to watch this guy get hanged. And not only that, they made Thomas identify all his victims before he was hanged, but he couldn’t be sure about some of them. Let that sink in for a second.
Why was this in the last part of this story. If this had been the first part, I might have actually read it in a timely manner.
4 stars because turkey sex should have led the book, not ended it.
So, today my classes started back and my first assignment in my American Lit class was to read parts of William Bradford’s Of Plymouth Plantation, 1620-1647. The whole thing is dry as hell and written in 17th century English, so my eyes were pretty heavy there at the end. Then we get to the last few pages and we learn about Thomas Grainger. (NGL, I thought he was Hermione’s dad at first, but, no.) This guy was the first person hanged in the US. Which, whatever. But why was he hanged? Well, 16/17-year-old Thomas, who like every 16/17 year old thought it was rad to stick his dick in things, thought it would be super-rad to stick his dick in a mare, a cow, two goats, divers sheepe, two calves, and a turkey. Yes, a turkey. As in “gobble-gobble”. The Wikipedia article doesn’t mention it, but in the book, they go on to say that per the law, his victims were to be present for his execution, so they gathered up all these animals to watch this guy get hanged. And not only that, they made Thomas identify all his victims before he was hanged, but he couldn’t be sure about some of them. Let that sink in for a second.
Why was this in the last part of this story. If this had been the first part, I might have actually read it in a timely manner.
4 stars because turkey sex should have led the book, not ended it.
November 23, 2012
This was a huge eye opener for me. I was raised with families that thought the pilgrims were some of the most perfect people ever. This proves them very much wrong. It was hard to read (Because of the old English) but there is no better book to understand what the pilgrims really believed. I found my respect for what they went through rise, but there beliefs fall. It made me realize how legalistic they were, as well as how important small things were to them. Although I disagree with much of their theology, nothing can take away from the impact they made on our culture, or the bravery they had to face the great unknown.
October 12, 2017
The story that is being described is incredible - I just found the telling a bit dull. Still easier read than most documents of the time, Bradford is a great writer, he just... maybe needed an editor to punch things up. Maybe because I was under time constraints; perhaps I'll return to this when I've got more time on my hands. But wow, really, what a fucking story. Some of the events which occur are so on-the-nose, metaphorically-speaking, that this could pass as fiction if not for Bradford's emphasis more on historiography.
Thomas Morton could have been one of the all-time greatest antagonists in the history of fiction if he'd made his way into a novel instead; this great metaphor of struggle between religion and secularism, repression and hedonism, the "civilized" world and the "outside" world, our constructed human nature and our fears of what we might truly be when left to our own devices.
This book has everything. Disease. Gunfights. Death. Drama. Betrayal. Political intrigue. Religious and social commentary. Incredible cast of characters. Huge momentous omens. Loss of innocence. Sex, drugs, and Puritanism. Incredible. Story. The telling just... bored me a little. Would, however, make an incredible movie and wouldn't need a single fucking exaggeration by poetic license.
Thomas Morton could have been one of the all-time greatest antagonists in the history of fiction if he'd made his way into a novel instead; this great metaphor of struggle between religion and secularism, repression and hedonism, the "civilized" world and the "outside" world, our constructed human nature and our fears of what we might truly be when left to our own devices.
This book has everything. Disease. Gunfights. Death. Drama. Betrayal. Political intrigue. Religious and social commentary. Incredible cast of characters. Huge momentous omens. Loss of innocence. Sex, drugs, and Puritanism. Incredible. Story. The telling just... bored me a little. Would, however, make an incredible movie and wouldn't need a single fucking exaggeration by poetic license.
April 11, 2017
It was a such detailed book recording truthfully what really happened during that tumultuous period of time, which helps us modern people to understand why the things turned out the way they are. With those contents we can slowly connect the dots and let the past come alive again.
January 14, 2017
Somewhere between an after-the-fact diary and a modern blog, these reminiscences of the long-time governor of the first major English settlement in Massachusetts is a fascinating read, not only for Bradford's own measured comments, but more particularly for his inclusion of the numerous letters among the various New World settlements and England. The letters remove his assertions from being one-sided comments by giving them the backing of the commentators' original words.
It was a tough, often harrowing life, especially for the first landers, who lost half their number to disease and privation. The "adventurers" back home, who financed the Puritans partly for religious reasons but more in the hope of profit, prove continually untrustworthy in word and deed – though god knows they suffered losses enough in the process.
To today's ear, the continual effusions over God's goodness might ring extreme, perhaps hollow, if confined to Bradford, but they round out every one of the letters from any correspondent. After a bit, I found myself ignoring the last two paragraphs of the letters with their perhaps heartfelt but still formulaic religiosity. Altogether, this history reflects a wholly different outlook on what life means, how it is lived and where it appears to be headed.
This edition, from 1920, has been modernized in language to some degree, but I didn't feel that that affected the meaning or the sense of time and place in the original.
It was a tough, often harrowing life, especially for the first landers, who lost half their number to disease and privation. The "adventurers" back home, who financed the Puritans partly for religious reasons but more in the hope of profit, prove continually untrustworthy in word and deed – though god knows they suffered losses enough in the process.
To today's ear, the continual effusions over God's goodness might ring extreme, perhaps hollow, if confined to Bradford, but they round out every one of the letters from any correspondent. After a bit, I found myself ignoring the last two paragraphs of the letters with their perhaps heartfelt but still formulaic religiosity. Altogether, this history reflects a wholly different outlook on what life means, how it is lived and where it appears to be headed.
This edition, from 1920, has been modernized in language to some degree, but I didn't feel that that affected the meaning or the sense of time and place in the original.
April 24, 2008
I like all things historical, so this one was interesting to me.
How DO you start a settlement??
Lots of detail, lots of setback, it is amazing that anyone survived it let alone wrote it all down..
William Bradford was there!
Written in the style and vernacular of the day (1600's)
How DO you start a settlement??
Lots of detail, lots of setback, it is amazing that anyone survived it let alone wrote it all down..
William Bradford was there!
Written in the style and vernacular of the day (1600's)
November 18, 2009
A good look at the Pilgrims, their trials and their progress.
January 11, 2013
Of Plymouth Plantation is an interesting and important book, not just for Thanksgiving week but for any time of year. The Pilgrim Father William Bradford is a vigorous and energetic writer. Bradford sees the events that befall the Plymouth Colony he leads as part of a Biblical conflict between good and evil, with the Pilgrims as lonely wanderers on a godly path. That godly path had a high cost; Bradford's first wife fell to her death from the deck of the Mayflower, and scholars still wonder if she actually committed suicide after seeing the bleak coast of New England. Bradford's readiness to see the Native Americans of Massachusetts as cruel "savages" is disheartening in the extreme, and some parts of the book therefore make for difficult reading. But the sheer force of will that fills these pages provides a glimpse of the leadership qualities that helped Bradford get the Pilgrims through that first cruel winter of 1620, so that they could celebrate the first Thanksgiving in 1621.
I suspect many readers turn to this book around Thanksgiving; I know that is my tendency. So if it's some future Thanksgiving Day, between the Macy's parade and the Detroit Lions football game, and you're looking for the relevant holiday-related passage while the turkey and stuffing send up sweet savors from the oven, here it is -- not Bradford's own words, but those of fellow Pilgrim Father Edward Winslow, in a letter from December of 1621:
"Our harvest being gotten in, our Governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a more special manner rejoice together, after we had gathered the fruit of our labours. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the Company almost a week. At which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king, Massasoit with some 90 men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted. And they went out and killed five deer which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our Governor and upon the Captain and others." (p. 90).
The staples of the modern Thanksgiving table are not specifically mentioned in Winslow's letter, but it is fun to speculate on how Winslow's words may have influenced the festival that Americans look forward to every November.
History-minded readers, especially those with ties to New England, should find this book fascinating. Rhode Islanders, for example, might take an interest in Bradford's description of Roger Williams, the founder of the Rhode Island colony, as "a man godly and zealous, having many precious parts but very unsettled in judgment", someone who "began to fall into some strange opinions, and from opinion to practice" (257). Nowadays, we might tend to look at Williams, in contrast to Bradford, as an American model, because of Williams's championing of pluralism and religious liberty. But it is interesting to see Bradford struggling to balance his disapproval for Williams's theology with his respect for Williams the man, as he praises Williams's "gifts" and "his teaching well approved, for the benefit whereof I still bless God and am thankful to him", but closes his discussion by saying that Williams "is to be pitied and prayed for; and so I shall leave the matter and desire the Lord to show him his errors and reduce him into the way of truth" (257).
Other luminaries of the Plymouth colony are in evidence as well -- for example, the famed Native American Squanto ("a special instrument sent of God for their good beyond their expectation"), without whose help the Pilgrims might not have made it through that first bitter winter of 1620. Also making their appearances in these pages are the redoubtable soldier Miles Standish and the cooper John Alden, immortalized in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poetry as rivals for the hand of Priscilla. And one of the most interesting moments in the book occurs when Bradford's Pilgrims come into conflict with Thomas Morton of Merrymount, a curious character whom fans of Nathaniel Hawthorne will know from Hawthorne's story "The Maypole of Merry Mount." What is known from history is that Morton travelled to New England and set up for himself, leading a settlement whose liberal principles contravened the stern tenets of Separatist and Puritan New England. In Bradford's reading, Morton is a "Lord of Misrule, [who] maintained a School of Atheism" (205), and the eventual downfall of his relaxed and pleasure-oriented regime represents the triumph of God's principles. Morton, unsurprisingly, saw things differently.
My favorite edition of this book is the one edited by naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison for Alfred A. Knopf in 1952. Morison conveys well the energy and determination that underlie Bradford's writings and his approach to life (even though a docent at the Leiden American Pilgrim Museum, in the Dutch city where the Pilgrims lived for 12 years after they left England but before they voyaged to America, told me that he finds some of Morison's editing highly iffy). It is fascinating to see Morison apply the insights of Of Plymouth Plantation to the Cold War era in which he edited and published this book. Clearly, for example, Morison is thinking of the Soviet Union, Red China, and the Korean conflict when he writes in the preface that "In the debates in the New England Confederation over the Narragansetts, we are confronted with the United Nations in miniature -- shall we start a 'preventive' war now and risk losing all, or wait yet a little while, hoping that we, not they, will grow stronger?" (p. xi). Perhaps it is for that reason that Morison describes Bradford's work as expressing a set of values "that exalts and heartens one in an age of uncertainty, when courage falters and faith grows dim" (p. xii). The sources of uncertainty may have changed over the years, but there are always likely to be threats that challenge one's courage and confront one's belief system. And I suspect that for many years to come, Of Plymouth Plantation, with its status as the first great book to come directly out of the American experience, will continue to provide comfort to future generations of Americans, facing future threats that we cannot now anticipate.
I suspect many readers turn to this book around Thanksgiving; I know that is my tendency. So if it's some future Thanksgiving Day, between the Macy's parade and the Detroit Lions football game, and you're looking for the relevant holiday-related passage while the turkey and stuffing send up sweet savors from the oven, here it is -- not Bradford's own words, but those of fellow Pilgrim Father Edward Winslow, in a letter from December of 1621:
"Our harvest being gotten in, our Governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a more special manner rejoice together, after we had gathered the fruit of our labours. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the Company almost a week. At which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king, Massasoit with some 90 men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted. And they went out and killed five deer which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our Governor and upon the Captain and others." (p. 90).
The staples of the modern Thanksgiving table are not specifically mentioned in Winslow's letter, but it is fun to speculate on how Winslow's words may have influenced the festival that Americans look forward to every November.
History-minded readers, especially those with ties to New England, should find this book fascinating. Rhode Islanders, for example, might take an interest in Bradford's description of Roger Williams, the founder of the Rhode Island colony, as "a man godly and zealous, having many precious parts but very unsettled in judgment", someone who "began to fall into some strange opinions, and from opinion to practice" (257). Nowadays, we might tend to look at Williams, in contrast to Bradford, as an American model, because of Williams's championing of pluralism and religious liberty. But it is interesting to see Bradford struggling to balance his disapproval for Williams's theology with his respect for Williams the man, as he praises Williams's "gifts" and "his teaching well approved, for the benefit whereof I still bless God and am thankful to him", but closes his discussion by saying that Williams "is to be pitied and prayed for; and so I shall leave the matter and desire the Lord to show him his errors and reduce him into the way of truth" (257).
Other luminaries of the Plymouth colony are in evidence as well -- for example, the famed Native American Squanto ("a special instrument sent of God for their good beyond their expectation"), without whose help the Pilgrims might not have made it through that first bitter winter of 1620. Also making their appearances in these pages are the redoubtable soldier Miles Standish and the cooper John Alden, immortalized in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poetry as rivals for the hand of Priscilla. And one of the most interesting moments in the book occurs when Bradford's Pilgrims come into conflict with Thomas Morton of Merrymount, a curious character whom fans of Nathaniel Hawthorne will know from Hawthorne's story "The Maypole of Merry Mount." What is known from history is that Morton travelled to New England and set up for himself, leading a settlement whose liberal principles contravened the stern tenets of Separatist and Puritan New England. In Bradford's reading, Morton is a "Lord of Misrule, [who] maintained a School of Atheism" (205), and the eventual downfall of his relaxed and pleasure-oriented regime represents the triumph of God's principles. Morton, unsurprisingly, saw things differently.
My favorite edition of this book is the one edited by naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison for Alfred A. Knopf in 1952. Morison conveys well the energy and determination that underlie Bradford's writings and his approach to life (even though a docent at the Leiden American Pilgrim Museum, in the Dutch city where the Pilgrims lived for 12 years after they left England but before they voyaged to America, told me that he finds some of Morison's editing highly iffy). It is fascinating to see Morison apply the insights of Of Plymouth Plantation to the Cold War era in which he edited and published this book. Clearly, for example, Morison is thinking of the Soviet Union, Red China, and the Korean conflict when he writes in the preface that "In the debates in the New England Confederation over the Narragansetts, we are confronted with the United Nations in miniature -- shall we start a 'preventive' war now and risk losing all, or wait yet a little while, hoping that we, not they, will grow stronger?" (p. xi). Perhaps it is for that reason that Morison describes Bradford's work as expressing a set of values "that exalts and heartens one in an age of uncertainty, when courage falters and faith grows dim" (p. xii). The sources of uncertainty may have changed over the years, but there are always likely to be threats that challenge one's courage and confront one's belief system. And I suspect that for many years to come, Of Plymouth Plantation, with its status as the first great book to come directly out of the American experience, will continue to provide comfort to future generations of Americans, facing future threats that we cannot now anticipate.
December 1, 2021
The first part of this carries value above and beyond a colony chronology. The self-Governance, the failure of a socialism-based system, the balancing of theology and self determination are all very important concepts/natural experiments. The historical value is also extremely high. Growing up less than 10 miles from where the Pilgrims landed, I’m surprised it has taken me almost 40 years to read this. The second half offers less philosophical value. This modern translation is easy to read and well done. I’m glad this book was not lost to the ages. 3 Stars.
December 1, 2025
Excellent book. I read this quite a while ago so I don’t remember a lot about it, but even though the pacing was a little slow I found it completely fascinating. I loved the insight into the daily lives of the pilgrims and the almost journal like entries. I wish more people would read this to hear how the pilgrims experimented with communism and failed!
Fun fact I’ve learned in the years since reading this is that one of my friends is a descendant of the guy who tricks the pilgrims in this book.
Fun fact I’ve learned in the years since reading this is that one of my friends is a descendant of the guy who tricks the pilgrims in this book.
October 30, 2022
There are a few interesting tidbit pieces here and there, but the writing itself made it a struggle to pay attention.
Read
February 3, 2010http://bookcents.blogspot.com/2010/02...
Some general thoughts on the book:
While religion was a central aspect of the Pilgrims’ experience, the business aspect appears as a major focus. As I mentioned in Nathaniel Philbrick’s Mayflower, the Pilgrims were constantly being taken advantage of in many of their dealings. While they do show increasing business savvy (hiring an additional person to oversee a new agent, for example), some things were out of their control. The death of the lone ship carpenter, for example, would limit their trading ability until an adequate boat can be built.
Since Bradford was the governor of the colony for many of the years covered, his role in insuring safety and providing supplies merits special attention. Even though the book is written in the third person and often downplays his own role in events, Bradford proved to be an exemplary leader. The decision to make everyone responsible for growing and providing their own food insured adequate harvests after their initial communal system failed.
While Bradford appears to be a trustworthy fellow, I think it is important to keep in mind that there was a propaganda war centered on the colonies, a battle for how history was to be recorded and business interests awarded. Several times Bradford addresses charges against the colonists, such as Thomas Weston calling the Pilgrims “good beggars” or Isaac Allerton’s “infamouse & scurillous booke against many godly & cheefe men of the cuntrie; full of lyes & slanders, and fraight with profane callumnies against their names and persons, and the ways of God.” Conflicts arise between parties because of differing interests. These disagreements occur among and between different groups, including the various colonies, plantations and businessmen in England, religious and non-religious settlers, and settlers from different countries.
Some general thoughts on the book:
While religion was a central aspect of the Pilgrims’ experience, the business aspect appears as a major focus. As I mentioned in Nathaniel Philbrick’s Mayflower, the Pilgrims were constantly being taken advantage of in many of their dealings. While they do show increasing business savvy (hiring an additional person to oversee a new agent, for example), some things were out of their control. The death of the lone ship carpenter, for example, would limit their trading ability until an adequate boat can be built.
Since Bradford was the governor of the colony for many of the years covered, his role in insuring safety and providing supplies merits special attention. Even though the book is written in the third person and often downplays his own role in events, Bradford proved to be an exemplary leader. The decision to make everyone responsible for growing and providing their own food insured adequate harvests after their initial communal system failed.
While Bradford appears to be a trustworthy fellow, I think it is important to keep in mind that there was a propaganda war centered on the colonies, a battle for how history was to be recorded and business interests awarded. Several times Bradford addresses charges against the colonists, such as Thomas Weston calling the Pilgrims “good beggars” or Isaac Allerton’s “infamouse & scurillous booke against many godly & cheefe men of the cuntrie; full of lyes & slanders, and fraight with profane callumnies against their names and persons, and the ways of God.” Conflicts arise between parties because of differing interests. These disagreements occur among and between different groups, including the various colonies, plantations and businessmen in England, religious and non-religious settlers, and settlers from different countries.
February 8, 2019
Written by my 11th great grandfather William Bradford, this narrative covers the time leading up to, during, and after the pilgrimage from Holland to New England.
William became and served as governor of New Plymouth on and off for 30 year and during that time, decided to document this journey for posterity.
Not a page turner but an important historical text about the earliest days of settlements in America, survival, and resilience.
William became and served as governor of New Plymouth on and off for 30 year and during that time, decided to document this journey for posterity.
Not a page turner but an important historical text about the earliest days of settlements in America, survival, and resilience.
October 26, 2014
the most unbearably boring thing I've ever read in my entire life. I understand it's importance, but fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk i almost cried reading this. I'm taking it for survey of american literature class and I understand the importance of knowing the cultural context of literature before reading it, but this was Hell non the less.
September 25, 2018
Important primary source for New England history, easy to get bogged down in some of the finer details, but essential in understanding the Plymouth colony and the life of William Bradford
November 3, 2025
Interesting to hear William Bradford's views on early American politics and church history
October 19, 2020
This book is a vitally important book to read when it comes to understanding the self-perception of American settlers of New England during the key period when the colonists were first establishing themselves. This is some pointed and uncompromising writing, and the author demonstrates all of the self-examination and righteous indignation that one would expect from a thoughtful Calvinist writer with a passion for Christian purity and a desire to know and to follow the will of God as he understands it. What comes through most obviously in this work, and makes it particularly important to understand and to appreciate, is the way that the author deals with the corruption that was present from the beginning in the English (and then British) colonial efforts. Over and over again Bradford rages at elite English figures who claim to be working on behalf of his separatist colony but instead are enriching themselves through crony deals in mixing their own personal profit with the business they are involved in on behalf of the Plymouth colony as a whole, all of which requires a great deal of effort on the part of the author to manage as one of the longtime leaders of the Plymouth colony. If Plymouth is geographically peripheral to the main business of New England colonies, its early start and the power of this book have helped keep it at the center of American self-image centuries after the colony ceased to have an independent existence.
This book is a sizable one at almost 350 pages and it is divided into two parts. The first part of the book takes ten chapters to cover the period between 1608 and 1620 when the Separatists fled religious persecution in England and were religious refugees in Leyden, where the author points out the rectitude of himself and his fellow brethren as well as the participation of some of them in the efforts against Arminianism. After that comes the heart of the book, a detailed exploration of the period between 1620 and 1646, most of which was time where Bradford was at the center of government in the Plymouth colony and was forced to deal with a variety of issues, including dissatisfied people badmouthing himself and his brethren, various threats of Indian wars, the need to cooperate on borders with neighboring Massachusetts Bay, relations with the backers of the Plymouth colony and their shady business dealings, and internal political and religious matters within the community. Overall, the author offers some shrewd judgments on such figures as Roger Williams and Miles Standish, and shows himself to be a canny if not particularly worldly wise leader, making this a worthwhile and honest account of the frustrations of early colonial life.
In reading this book, one gets a fair understanding of what was on the mind of the leaders of the Plymouth Plantation. I found myself having a fairly easy time understanding where the author was coming from as he pondered on matters of divine providence and also reflected upon the state of the church as well as the matters of state that make for good government. The author is a demonstration of the reality that one does not need to be any worse of a leader or any less shrewd in taking advantage of opportunity simply because one is godly. Even so, it does appear as if the brethren at Plymouth were not as shrewd as they probably could have been. The constant dealing with sharp and corrupt practices that the author shows consistently in his history is demonstrative of the fact that he and his people were viewed as being targets of dishonest people and sharp practices, and that this did not change for decades points out that Jacobean England and the time of Charles I was by no means the sort of time where the righteous prospered in government. And not all readers will find the author's celebration at the judgment that came upon King Charles I to be particularly pleasant, regardless of our republican sympathies.
This book is a sizable one at almost 350 pages and it is divided into two parts. The first part of the book takes ten chapters to cover the period between 1608 and 1620 when the Separatists fled religious persecution in England and were religious refugees in Leyden, where the author points out the rectitude of himself and his fellow brethren as well as the participation of some of them in the efforts against Arminianism. After that comes the heart of the book, a detailed exploration of the period between 1620 and 1646, most of which was time where Bradford was at the center of government in the Plymouth colony and was forced to deal with a variety of issues, including dissatisfied people badmouthing himself and his brethren, various threats of Indian wars, the need to cooperate on borders with neighboring Massachusetts Bay, relations with the backers of the Plymouth colony and their shady business dealings, and internal political and religious matters within the community. Overall, the author offers some shrewd judgments on such figures as Roger Williams and Miles Standish, and shows himself to be a canny if not particularly worldly wise leader, making this a worthwhile and honest account of the frustrations of early colonial life.
In reading this book, one gets a fair understanding of what was on the mind of the leaders of the Plymouth Plantation. I found myself having a fairly easy time understanding where the author was coming from as he pondered on matters of divine providence and also reflected upon the state of the church as well as the matters of state that make for good government. The author is a demonstration of the reality that one does not need to be any worse of a leader or any less shrewd in taking advantage of opportunity simply because one is godly. Even so, it does appear as if the brethren at Plymouth were not as shrewd as they probably could have been. The constant dealing with sharp and corrupt practices that the author shows consistently in his history is demonstrative of the fact that he and his people were viewed as being targets of dishonest people and sharp practices, and that this did not change for decades points out that Jacobean England and the time of Charles I was by no means the sort of time where the righteous prospered in government. And not all readers will find the author's celebration at the judgment that came upon King Charles I to be particularly pleasant, regardless of our republican sympathies.
October 20, 2022
Read for class. Simultaneously one of the most important yet one of the most dull American texts ever written. And it’s importance, of course, does not lie in “oh man those Puritans were the first Freedom Men of America!” But rather it’s interesting to note the mythology America was built upon and that still informs its own creation myths today. There’s a lot of tensions within the text that aid in, lord forgive me for use of the word, a deconstruction of America and all of the tensions that lie in the margins of its creation as a settler-colonial state. Also you see in this text, and some of the other early promotional literature, a development from the framework of European mercantilism to capitalism. Bradford specifically begins to develop (like Gorges) an ontology of greed and private property relations; basically that man is only interested in his own survival and not of the community around him. I find there cld maybe something done about how Bradford and the Puritans began to develop a sort of proto-capitalist anti-relation based upon private property. Maybe? Regardless, I wouldn’t recommend anyone read this unless they are already interested in early American lit, the history and development of American ideology, settler-colonialism in America, or they are taking a class on it!
July 2, 2017
"Thus out of small beginnings greater things have grown by His hand Who made all things out of nothing, and gives being to all things that are; and as one small candle may light a thousand, so the light enkindled here has shone to many, yea, in a sense, to our whole nation; let the glorious name of Jehovah have all the praise."
William Bradford's indispensable history--which was lost during the eighteenth century and rediscovered a century later in, of all places, a London library--is as much a religious testimony as it is an account of people and events. It may rightly be called a communal hagiography, an affirmation of a providential grace that manifested itself in the survival and success of the colonists at Plymouth, and, later, at Boston.
Bradford begins his account not, as one might expect, with the voyage of the Mayflower or even the escape of the Puritans from England to Leiden. Instead, he begins with a brief exposition on Christian history as he understood it. In the beginning, the Apostles lived and taught in the true spirit of the Gospel, receiving from God a dangerous, hard-won, and vulnerable liberty which is the essence of a true Christian life. Then the dark cloud of Popery descended on Christendom, and for many centuries the light of the Gospel was obscured by the obscene and oppressive trappings and traditions of the Catholic Church. Dogma obfuscated the Word of God. Priests inserted themselves between God and man, making idols of their own authority.
The reformation took hold in England, but the fervent hopes of the Reformed congregations were quickly quashed, as the Anglican church became just as oppressive as the Roman church had been. Consequently, God's elect had to undertake its own exodus, and find its own promised land.
They first found a home in Leiden, where they proved their Calvinist chops in debates with the Arminians, as well as in their dedication to hard work and thrift. But Leiden, though a solid house, was not a home, and the Pilgrims gradually turned their gaze to America.
The establishment of Plymouth Colony was not an easy affair, but the Puritans saw challenge and adversity as opportunities for Christian witness. The greater the obstacle, the more profound the display of God's glory when it was overcome; never by the efforts of men, but always by the sovereign grace of the Creator. This philosophy was applied not only to natural calamities, like disease, famine, or the bitterly cold New England winters, but also to the people the Pilgrims encountered after they landed, whom they understood to be at once innocents living in ignorance of the Gospel and dangerous vessels of Satanic cruelty.
Bradford describes the Indians as "cruel, barbarous, and treacherous, furious in their rage, and merciless when they get the upper hand,--not content to kill, they delight in tormenting people in the most bloody manner possible; flaying some alive with the shells of fishes, cutting off the members and joints of others piecemeal, broiling them on the coals, and eating collops of their flesh in their sight whilst they live,--with other cruelties too horrible to be related."
In short, the Indians were like the earliest pagan persecutors of Christianity, and by living among them and exposing themselves to the danger they posed, the Pilgrims were, in a sense, fulfilling their desire to transport themselves to the time of the Apostles--paradoxically rejoicing at the prospect of torture and mutilation for the sake of their faith.
For those wondering where the American aversion to communitarianism originated--perhaps imagining it to be a product of the Red Scare--I present to you William Bradford's Protestant refutation of Plato after initial attempts by the Pilgrims to share their food in common and labor all-for-all were met with failure:
"The failure of this experiment of communal service, which was tried for several years, and by good and honest men proves the emptiness of the theory of Plato and other ancients, applauded by some of later times,--that the taking away of private property, and the possession of it in community, by a commonwealth, would make a state happy and flourishing; as if they were wiser than God...Let none argue that this is due to human failing, rather than to this communistic plan of life in itself. I answer, seeing that all men have this failing in them, that God in His wisdom saw that another plan of life was fitter for them."
For those looking for an early example of the brutality of America's Indian wars, I present the grotesque--and in Puritan eyes, God-sanctioned--end of the Pequot War:
"Those that entered [the Pequot fort] first met with fierce resistance, the enemy shooting and grappling with them. Other of the attacking party ran to their houses and set them on fire, the mats catching quickly, and, all standing close together, the wind soon fanned them into a blaze,--in fact more were burnt to death than killed otherwise. It burnt their bowstrings and made their weapons useless, and those that escaped the fire were slain by the sword,--some hewn to pieces, others run through with their rapiers, so that they were quickly dispatched and very few escaped. It is believed that there were about 400 killed. It was a fearful sight to see them frying in the fire, with streams of blood quenching it; the smell was horrible, but the victory seemed a sweet sacrifice, and they gave praise to God Who had wrought so wonderfully for them, thus to enclose their enemy, and give them so speedy a victory over such a proud and insulting foe."
Bradford's account closes with the foundation of the United Colonies of New England: the first of a series of American confederations of which the present-day United States of America is merely the latest and longest-lasting model. What united the likes of Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay, and New Haven, as it united the Thirteen Colonies over a century later, was the threat of outsiders. Thus, in the exigencies of war and strife, the first inklings of American community and national consciousness were born.
William Bradford's indispensable history--which was lost during the eighteenth century and rediscovered a century later in, of all places, a London library--is as much a religious testimony as it is an account of people and events. It may rightly be called a communal hagiography, an affirmation of a providential grace that manifested itself in the survival and success of the colonists at Plymouth, and, later, at Boston.
Bradford begins his account not, as one might expect, with the voyage of the Mayflower or even the escape of the Puritans from England to Leiden. Instead, he begins with a brief exposition on Christian history as he understood it. In the beginning, the Apostles lived and taught in the true spirit of the Gospel, receiving from God a dangerous, hard-won, and vulnerable liberty which is the essence of a true Christian life. Then the dark cloud of Popery descended on Christendom, and for many centuries the light of the Gospel was obscured by the obscene and oppressive trappings and traditions of the Catholic Church. Dogma obfuscated the Word of God. Priests inserted themselves between God and man, making idols of their own authority.
The reformation took hold in England, but the fervent hopes of the Reformed congregations were quickly quashed, as the Anglican church became just as oppressive as the Roman church had been. Consequently, God's elect had to undertake its own exodus, and find its own promised land.
They first found a home in Leiden, where they proved their Calvinist chops in debates with the Arminians, as well as in their dedication to hard work and thrift. But Leiden, though a solid house, was not a home, and the Pilgrims gradually turned their gaze to America.
The establishment of Plymouth Colony was not an easy affair, but the Puritans saw challenge and adversity as opportunities for Christian witness. The greater the obstacle, the more profound the display of God's glory when it was overcome; never by the efforts of men, but always by the sovereign grace of the Creator. This philosophy was applied not only to natural calamities, like disease, famine, or the bitterly cold New England winters, but also to the people the Pilgrims encountered after they landed, whom they understood to be at once innocents living in ignorance of the Gospel and dangerous vessels of Satanic cruelty.
Bradford describes the Indians as "cruel, barbarous, and treacherous, furious in their rage, and merciless when they get the upper hand,--not content to kill, they delight in tormenting people in the most bloody manner possible; flaying some alive with the shells of fishes, cutting off the members and joints of others piecemeal, broiling them on the coals, and eating collops of their flesh in their sight whilst they live,--with other cruelties too horrible to be related."
In short, the Indians were like the earliest pagan persecutors of Christianity, and by living among them and exposing themselves to the danger they posed, the Pilgrims were, in a sense, fulfilling their desire to transport themselves to the time of the Apostles--paradoxically rejoicing at the prospect of torture and mutilation for the sake of their faith.
For those wondering where the American aversion to communitarianism originated--perhaps imagining it to be a product of the Red Scare--I present to you William Bradford's Protestant refutation of Plato after initial attempts by the Pilgrims to share their food in common and labor all-for-all were met with failure:
"The failure of this experiment of communal service, which was tried for several years, and by good and honest men proves the emptiness of the theory of Plato and other ancients, applauded by some of later times,--that the taking away of private property, and the possession of it in community, by a commonwealth, would make a state happy and flourishing; as if they were wiser than God...Let none argue that this is due to human failing, rather than to this communistic plan of life in itself. I answer, seeing that all men have this failing in them, that God in His wisdom saw that another plan of life was fitter for them."
For those looking for an early example of the brutality of America's Indian wars, I present the grotesque--and in Puritan eyes, God-sanctioned--end of the Pequot War:
"Those that entered [the Pequot fort] first met with fierce resistance, the enemy shooting and grappling with them. Other of the attacking party ran to their houses and set them on fire, the mats catching quickly, and, all standing close together, the wind soon fanned them into a blaze,--in fact more were burnt to death than killed otherwise. It burnt their bowstrings and made their weapons useless, and those that escaped the fire were slain by the sword,--some hewn to pieces, others run through with their rapiers, so that they were quickly dispatched and very few escaped. It is believed that there were about 400 killed. It was a fearful sight to see them frying in the fire, with streams of blood quenching it; the smell was horrible, but the victory seemed a sweet sacrifice, and they gave praise to God Who had wrought so wonderfully for them, thus to enclose their enemy, and give them so speedy a victory over such a proud and insulting foe."
Bradford's account closes with the foundation of the United Colonies of New England: the first of a series of American confederations of which the present-day United States of America is merely the latest and longest-lasting model. What united the likes of Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay, and New Haven, as it united the Thirteen Colonies over a century later, was the threat of outsiders. Thus, in the exigencies of war and strife, the first inklings of American community and national consciousness were born.
November 4, 2018
Here's the contemporary journal of what actually brought the Pilgrims to Massachusetts Bay and how they survived the first 20+ years. In fact, most of them did not survive the first year; over half dying of disease and starvation. Although Squanto appears as a help to the settlers, the indigenous people were not warm and friendly toward these newcomers. It's possible that the Europeans won the land mostly through killing off the Native Americans with European diseases. What's more, the relations with the Pilgrims backers in Britain was less than friendly as well. The settlers were being charged usurious rates and never seemed to be able to pay off the debts they owed.
So some of those stories we learned in school are most definitely true; others have been embellished by the mythologizers of early Europeans in American.
So some of those stories we learned in school are most definitely true; others have been embellished by the mythologizers of early Europeans in American.
October 12, 2024
I was assigned to read this in 5th grade. Yes, I was homeschooled. 100% do not recommend reading this at that age, no matter how advanced a reader the child may be. As I recall, I alternated between bored out of my skull and feeling guilty for rereading the "racy" sections. The racy sections being the details of how Rhode Island started.
My 5th grade one page book report began, "If you enjoy detailed accounting and business reports, then this is the book for you!" 😅
My 5th grade one page book report began, "If you enjoy detailed accounting and business reports, then this is the book for you!" 😅
January 20, 2021
Fascinating to hear of how my 12th Great grandfather came over and so grateful for the helpfulness of the Native Americans who helped them thrive in their new home.
December 8, 2021
A wonderful first hand account of Plymouth Plantation.
December 21, 2021
Nunca más este truño
December 18, 2025
Once acclimated to the 17th century language, this is a thoroughly fascinating, informative, and enjoyable read. It is overweighted with the administrative history of the colony, however, which sometimes becomes tedious.
April 18, 2021
An interesting read, and important first account. It is long though and a bit dry. Likely won't read it again, but glad I did.
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