When speaking to my grandmother, she told me many interesting things about her ancestry. I’ve always known that I have French- Canadian and German descent on my mom’s side, and Pennsylvania Dutch on my father's side. My grandmother told me that she just recently found out that she is related to a man named Degory Priest, who was a member of the Leiden contingent and a signatory on the historic 1620 voyage of the Mayflower. This was shocking to me as I never knew I was related to someone who was on such a famous ship, and someone who signed the Mayflower Compact. For me, this is something I think is incredible because this man was a part of American history that people have been learning about for years. Not everyone can say they are related to someone who once sailed on the historic Mayflower. My grandmother found this out by doing her own ancestry research on such sites. There’s not much that is known about Priest as it was such a long time ago, but it was known that he was a hat maker from London. He planned on bringing his family later, but he died during the first winter from illness as many other pilgrims did too. After his death, the rest of his family did make it to Plymouth in 1623. This is interesting to me to know that I’m related to someone who was on such a historic voyage. He wanted to make a better life for himself and his family, as many others at that time did.
Pilgrims at this time wanted to start a new life in America and practice religious freedom. They were known as Separatists and wanted to separate from The Church of England because it was becoming too strict under King Henry VIII's rule. They originally were going to settle in Virginia to the Hudson River, but they could only make it to Cape Cod due to the weather conditions at the time. The Mayflower was a 66-day voyage with 102 passengers including men, women, and children. It wasn’t the best voyage due to the conditions at the time. Many people got seasick, the living spaces were very confined and tight, and they did encounter storms as well. In the book Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War, Philbrick said, “The ’tween decks was more of a crawlspace than a place to live, made even more claustrophobic by the passengers’ attempts to provide themselves with some privacy.” 1 This gives an example of the conditions these people had to be in for over 66 days. Some women were even pregnant on this voyage and one baby was born. Another big hardship was for families because not everyone could always go. The people who could settle their debts in Leidon were the first to go on the voyage. This is true for Degory Priest as he had to leave his family behind at first, but unfortunately, he never got to go with them and live out his life with them. This was a major hardship for families because some never saw their family again and they didn’t know when they were or if they were coming back.
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Although it was a long and dreadful journey, the Mayflower did land on Cape Cod on November 9th, 1620. After exploring, they decided to stay in Plymouth and start to build their town. A result of the voyage was a compact which was called the “Mayflower Compact.” This compact laid out the self-government in the colony because many were concerned about the lack of structure in the colony. When the colonist began to build their town is when many of them became ill, including my ancestor, Degory Priest. It is inferred that many of them suffered from scurvy or phenomena which caused many of their deaths, which was due to the conditions of the cold, wet weather. Since the colony was mostly based upon fishing, whaling, timber, and agriculture, their bodies were weakened by all the salt they were eating at the time. They weren’t getting all the nutrients their bodies needed. In a letter from a man named William Hilton, a passenger on the Mayflower sent a letter home to his family. He says, “The sea affords us great plenty of all excellent sorts of sea-fish, as the rivers and isles doth variety of wild fowl of most useful sorts.”2 They had a lot of resources for food from the ocean but often became ill.
When the pilgrims landed, they didn’t have much money, so they had to make an agreement with investors. The colonist would work for the company by sending resources from fishing and whaling back to England.3 The investors would trade the colonist's supplies such as tools and clothing.4 The pilgrims did have encounters with the Native peoples. In March 1621, they made a treaty of mutual protection with the Pokanoket Wampanoag leader, Ousamequin. The treaty basically said that no one would harm one another or steal upon one's land. The Pilgrims learned a lot from the Natives such as growing Indian corn. Pilgrims began to harvest and even have gatherings with the natives. Overall the colony was stable with a growing population. The result of this significant time in history was a representative democracy. The idea of self-government was huge because they didn’t experience that back in England. The idea of self-government would play out throughout the rest of history. People learned how to separate and think for themselves. They eventually elected their own governor John Carver, then William Bradford replaced him. Back in England they never got to elect their leaders as they were ruled by a monarchy.
This significant time in history impacted my family on my mother's side. Priest’s children would begin to build their own life and eventually would affect my grandmother, my mother, and then me. People came to America to find their freedom and to grow their families in peace, and the Mayflower journey made a big impact on American history as it represents exploration and self-government ideology.
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