Thanksgiving in Plymouth, 1621

About 100 people were on board the Mayflower when it arrived at Cape Cod 11 November 1620. About half of these were English Puritans, Separatists in relation to the Church of England. We tend to refer to them as the Pilgrims. Knowing little of what they were doing, they planned poorly and arrived at possibly the worst time of the year, just at the beginning of a harsh New England winter. Given the shortages of shelter and food, about half of the 100 died that first winter. In his history, their leader, William Bradford, writes, "But that which was most sad and lamentable was, that in two or three months' time half of their company died, especially in January and February, being the depth of winter, and wanting houses and other comforts; being infected with the scurvy and other diseases which this long voyage and their inaccommodate condition had brought upon them."

But with the coming of spring and the help of the "locals," Samoset and Squanto in particular, corn was planted and life improved.

The first Thanksgiving took place about a year after their arrival. Bradford writes this about it:

They now began to gather in the small harvest they had, and to fit up their houses and dwellings against winter, being all well recovered in health and strength, and had all things in good plenty; for as some were thus employed in affairs abroad, others were exercised in fishing, about cod, and bass, and other fish, of which they took good store, of which every family had their portion. And now began to come in store of fowl, as winter approached, of which this place did abound when the came first (but afterward decreased by degrees). And besides waterfowl, there was great store of wild turkeys, of which they took many, besides venison, etc. Besides they had about a peck of meal a week to a person, or now since harvest, Indian corn to that proportion. Which made many afterwards write so largely of their plenty to their friends in England, which were not feigned, but true reports.

In a letter dated 11 December 1621, one of the Plymouth folk named Edward Winslow wrote the following to a friend in England:

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.

It's a nice story about a time that it's difficult for us to imagine these days.

The Thanksgiving celebration still retains something of its origins. Perhaps being sandwiched between Halloween and Christmas, it has to some degree escaped the brutal commercialization that has ruined both of those.

Whether you care to remember Bradford and the Pilgrims of Plymouth Plantation or not, be thankful this holiday for what you have, for the good that has come your way and the evil that has not, for your individual mind and heart as far as they are untainted by the worst (often posing as the best) of this world, for one another.