[Footnote 16:  Bradford, Plimoth Plantation, 90-110; Eggleston, Beginners of a Nation, 184, note 4.]

[Footnote 17:  Morton, New England’s Memorial, 56.]

CHAPTER X

DEVELOPMENT OF NEW PLYMOUTH

(1621-1643)

During the winter of 1620-1621 the emigrants suffered greatly from scurvy and exposure.  More than half the company perished, and the seamen on the Mayflower suffered as much.[1] With the appearance of spring the mortality ceased, and a friendly intercourse with the natives began.  These Indians were the Pokanokets, whose number had been very much thinned by the pestilence.  After the first hostilities directed against the exploring parties they avoided the whites, and held a meeting in a dark and dismal swamp, where the medicine-men for three days together tried vainly to subject the new-comers to the spell of their conjurations.

At last, in March, 1621, an Indian came boldly into camp, and, in broken English, bade the strangers “welcome.”  It was found that his name was Samoset, and that he came from Monhegan, an island distant about a day’s sail towards the east, where he had picked up a few English words from the fishermen who frequented that region.  In a short time he returned, bringing Squanto, or Tisquantum, stolen by Hunt seven years before, and restored to his country in 1620 by Sir Ferdinando Gorges.  Squanto, who could speak English, stated that Massasoit was near at hand, and on invitation that chief appeared, and soon a treaty of peace and friendship was concluded; after which Massasoit returned to his town of Sowams, forty miles distant, while Squanto continued with the colonists and made himself useful in many ways.[2]

In the beginning of April, 1621, the Mayflower went back to England, and the colonists planted corn in the fields once tilled by Indians whom the pestilence had destroyed.  While engaged in this work the governor, John Carver, died, and his place was supplied by William Bradford, with Isaac Allerton as assistant or councilman.  During the summer the settlers were very busy.  They fitted up their cabins, amassed a good supply of beaver, and harvested a fair crop of corn.  In the fall a ship arrived, bringing thirty-five new settlers poorly provided.  It also brought a patent, dated June 1, 1621, from the Council for New England, made out to John Pierce, by whom the original patent from the London Company had been obtained.  The patent did not define the territorial limits, but allowed one hundred acres for every emigrant and fifteen hundred acres for public buildings, in the same proportion of one hundred acres to every workman.[3]

The ship tarried only fourteen days, and returned with a large cargo of clapboard and beaver skins of the value of L500, which was, however, captured on the way to England by a French cruiser.  After the departure the governor distributed the new-comers among the different families, and because of the necessity of sharing with them, put everybody on half allowance.  The prospect for the winter was not hopeful, for to the danger from starvation was added danger from the Indians.