Such, roughly sketched, was the Pilgrim
ship, the renowned MAY-FLOWER, as, drafted from the meagre but fairly
trustworthy and suggestive data available, she appears to us of to-day.
HER HISTORY:
In even the little we know of the later history of the ship, one cannot
always be quite sure of her identity in the records of vessels of her
name, of which there have been many. Dr. Nathaniel B. Shurtleff, of
Boston, says that "a vessel bearing this name was owned in England about
fifteen years or more before the voyage of our forefathers, but it would
be impossible to prove or disprove its identity with the renowned
MAY-FLOWER, however great such a probability might be. It is known,
nevertheless, that - the identical famous vessel afterwards hailed from
various English ports, such as London, Yarmouth, and Southampton, and
that it was much used in transporting immigrants to this country. What
eventually became of it and what was the end of its career, are equally
unknown to history." Goodwin says: "It does not appear that the
MAY-FLOWER ever revisited Plymouth, but in 1629 she came to Salem," with
a company of the Leyden people for Plymouth, under command of Captain
William Peirce, the warm friend of the Pilgrims, and in 1630 was one of
the large fleet that attended John Winthrop, under a different master,
discharging her passengers at Charlestown. Nothing is certainly known of
her after that time. In 1648 a ship [hereinafter mentioned by Hunter]
named the MAY-FLOWER was engaged in the slave trade, and the ill-informed
as well as the ill-disposed have sometimes sneeringly alleged that this
was our historic ship; but it is ascertained that the slaver was a vessel
of three hundred and fifty tons, - nearly twice the size of our ship of
happy memory. In 1588 the officials of Lynn (England) offered the
"MAY-FLOWER" (150 tons) to join the fleet against the dreaded Spanish
Armada. In 1657, Samuel Vassall, of London, complained that the
government had twice impressed his ship, MAY-FLOWER, which he had
"fitted out with sixty men, for the Straits." Rev. Joseph Hunter,
author of "The Founders of New Plymouth," one of the most eminent
antiquarians in England, and an indefatigable student of Pilgrim history
among British archives, says: "I have not observed the name of MAY
FLOWER [in which style he always writes it] before the year 1583 . . .
But the name soon became exceedingly popular among those to whom
belonged the giving of the names to vessels in the merchant-service.
Before the close of that century [the sixteenth] we have a MAY-FLOWER of
Hastings; a MAY-FLOWER of Rie; a MAY-FLOWER of Newcastle: a MAY FLOWER
of Lynn; and a MAY-FLOWER Of Yarmouth: both in 1589. Also a MAY-FLOWER
of Hull, 1599; a MAY FLOWER of London of eighty tons burden, 1587, and
1594, Of which Richard Ireland was the master, and another MAY-FLOWER of
the same port, of ninety tons burthen, of which Robert White was the
master in 1594, and a third MAY-FLOWER of London, unless it is the same
vessel with one of the two just spoken of, only with a different master,
William Morecock.
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