In "Mourt's Relation" It Appears That In The Conferences That Were Held Aboard The Ship In Cape Cod Harbor, As

To the most desirable place for the colonists to locate, "Robert Coppin our pilot, made relation of a great navigable

River and great harbor in the headland of the Bay, almost right over against Cape Cod, being a right line not much above eight leagues distant," etc. Mrs. Jane G. Austin asserts, though absolutely without warrant of any reliable authority, known tradition, or probability, that "Coppin's harbor . . . afterward proved to be Cut River and the site of Marshfield," but in another place she contradicts this by stating that it was "Jones River, Duxbury." As Coppin described his putative harbor, called "Thievish Harbor," a "great navigable river and good harbor" were in close relation, which was never true of either the Jones River or "Cut River" localities, while any one familiar with the region knows that what Mrs. Austin knew as "Cut River" had no existence in the Pilgrims' early days, but was the work of man, superseding a small river-mouth (Green Harbor River), which was so shallow as to have its exit closed by the sand-shift of a single storm.

Young, with almost equal recklessness, says: "The other headland of the bay," alluded to by Coppin, was Manomet Point, and the river was probably the North River in Scituate; but there are no "great navigable river and good harbor" in conjunction in the neighborhood of Manomet, or of the North River, - the former having no river and the latter no harbor. If Coppin had not declared that he had never seen the mouth of Plymouth harbor before ("mine eyes never saw this place before"), it might readily have been believed that Plymouth harbor was the "Thievish Harbor" of his description, so well do they correspond.

Goodwin, the brother of Mrs. Austin, quite at variance with his sister's conclusions, states, with every probability confirming him, that the harbor Coppin sought "may have been Boston, Ipswich, Newburyport, or Portsmouth."

As a result of his "relation" as to a desirable harbor, Coppin was made the "pilot" of the "third expedition," which left the ship in the shallop, Wednesday, December 6, and, after varying disasters and a narrow escape from shipwreck - through Coppin's mistake - landed Friday night after dark, in the storm, on the island previously mentioned, ever since called "Clarke's Island," at the mouth of Plymouth harbor.

Nothing further is known of Coppin except that he returned to England with the ship. He has passed into history only as Robert Coppin, "the second mate" (or "pilot") of the MAY-FLOWER.

But one other officer in merchant ships of the MAY-FLOWER class in her day was dignified by the address of "Master" (or Mister), or had rank with the Captain and Mates as a quarter-deck officer, - except in those instances where a surgeon or a chaplain was carried. That the MAY-FLOWER carried no special ship's-surgeon has been supposed from the fact of Dr. Fuller's attendance alike on her passengers and crew, and the increased mortality of the seamen - after his removal on shore.

[The author is greatly indebted to his esteemed friend, Mr. George Ernest Bowman, Secretary-General of the Society of MAY-FLOWER Descendants, for information of much value upon this point. He believes that he has discovered trustworthy evidence of the existence of a small volume bearing upon its title-page an inscription that would certainly indicate that the MAY-FLOWER had her own surgeon. A copy of the inscription, which Mr. Bowman declares well attested (the book not being within reach), reads as follows: - "To Giles Heale Chirurgeon, from Isaac Allerton in Virginia. Feb. 10, 1620."

Giles Heale's name will be recognized as that of one of the witnesses to John Carver's copy of William Mullens's nuncupative will, and, if he was the ship's-surgeon, might very naturally appear in that relation. If book and inscription exist and the latter is genuine, it would be indubitable proof that Heale (who was surely not a MAY-FLOWER passenger) was one of the ship's company, and if a "chirurgeon," the surgeon of the ship, for no other Englishmen, except those of the colonists and the ship's company, could have been at New Plymouth, at the date given, and New England was then included in the term "Virginia." It is much to be hoped that Mr. Bowman's belief may be established, and that in Giles Heale we shall have another known officer, the surgeon, of the MAY-FLOWER.]

That she had no chaplain goes without saying. The Pilgrims had their spiritual adviser with them in the person of Elder Brewster, and were not likely to tolerate a priest of either the English or the Romish church on a vessel carrying them. The officer referred to was the representative of the business interests of the owner or chartering-party, on whose account the ship made the voyage; and in that day was known as the "ship's-merchant," later as the "purser," and in some relations as the "supercargo." No mention of an officer thus designated, belonging to the MAY-FLOWER, has ever been made by any writer, so far as known, and it devolves upon the author to indicate his existence and to establish, so far as possible, both this and his identity.

A certain "Master Williamson," whose name and presence, though but once mentioned by Governor Bradford, have greatly puzzled Pilgrim historians, seems to have filled this berth on board the MAY-FLOWER. Bradford tells us that on Thursday, March 22, 1620/21, "Master Williamson" was designated to accompany Captain Standish - practically as an officer of the guard - to receive and escort the Pokanoket chief, Massasoit, to Governor Carver, on the occasion of the former's first visit of state. Prior to the recent discovery in London, by an American genealogist, of a copy of the nuncupative will of Master William Mullens, one of the MAY-FLOWER Pilgrims, clearly dictated to Governor John Carver on board the ship, in the harbor of New Plymouth (probably) Wednesday, February 21, 1620 (though not written out by Carver till April 2, 1620), on which day (as we learn from Bradford), Master Mullens died, no other mention of "Master Williamson" than that above quoted was known, and his very existence was seriously questioned.

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