The Pilgrims, who celebrated the first thanksgiving in America , were fleeing religious persecution in their native England . In 1609 a group of Pilgrims left England for the religious freedom in Holland where they lived and prospered. After a few years their children were speaking Dutch and had become attached to the dutch way of life. This worried the Pilgrims. They considered the Dutch frivolous and their ideas a threat to their children's education and morality.
So they decided to leave Holland and travel to the New World . Their trip was financed by a group of English investors, the Merchant Adventurers. It was agreed that the Pilgrims would be given passage and supplies in exchange for their working for their backers for 7 years.
On Sept. 6, 1620 the Pilgrims set sail for the New World on a ship called the Mayflower. They sailed from Plymouth , England and aboard were 44 Pilgrims, who called themselves the "Saints", and 66 others ,whom the Pilgrims called the "Strangers."
The long trip was cold and damp and took 65 days. Since there was the danger of fire on the wooden ship, the food had to be eaten cold. Many passengers became sick and one person died by the time land was sighted on November 10th.
The long trip led to many disagreements between the "Saints" and the "Strangers". After land was sighted a meeting was held and an agreement was worked out, called the Mayflower Compact, which guaranteed equality and unified the two groups. They joined together and named themselves the "Pilgrims."
Although they had first sighted land off Cape Cod they did not settle until they arrived at Plymouth , which had been named by Captain John Smith in 1614. It was there that the Pilgrims decide to settle. Plymouth offered an excellent harbor. A large brook offered a resource for fish. The Pilgrims biggest concern was attack by the local Native American Indians. But the Patuxets were a peaceful group and did not prove to be a threat.
The first winter was devastating to the Pilgrims. The cold, snow and sleet was exceptionally heavy, interfering with the workers as they tried to construct their settlement. March brought warmer weather and the health of the Pilgrims improved, but many had died during the long winter. Of the 110 Pilgrims and crew who left England , less that 50 survived the first winter.
On March 16, 1621 , what was to become an important event took place, an Indian brave walked into the Plymouth settlement. The Pilgrims were frightened until the Indian called out "Welcome" (in English!).
His name was Samoset and he was an Abnaki Indian. He had learned English from the captains of fishing boats that had sailed off the coast. After staying the night Samoset left the next day. He soon returned with another Indian named Squanto who spoke better English than Samoset. Squanto told the Pilgrims of his voyages across the ocean and his visits to England and Spain . It was in England where he had learned English.
[Samoset (1590?-1653?)Samoset was an Abnaki Indian sachem, or chief, of Pemaquid, a district at the mouth of the Kennebec River in southeastern Maine . As early as 1607, the English had sailed into Pemaquid's excellent harbor to fish and trade for furs. Samoset learned a little English from these visitors.
In the summer of 1620, Samoset traveled south to Cape Cod peninsula, the territory of the Wampanoag nation. The following December, a group of English founded Plimouth Colony at the base of Cape Cod . In March 1621, after observing the Plimouth colonists for several months, the Wampanoag sachem, Massasoit, sent Samoset to inform the colonists that their settlement lay in Wampanoag territory. Samoset strode confidently toward the strangers, greeting them with the words, "Welcome, Englishmen!"
The astonished colonists described Samoset as "a tall, straight man; the hair of his head black." Dressed only in a fringed breechcloth in spite of the cold March wind, Samoset was pleased when the colonists put a coat around his shoulders. The entire afternoon, he sat with the English and described the Indian nations of the region to them.
Samoset returned to Massasoit with a message that the colonists wanted to trade for beaver and other furs. On another visit, he was accompanied by Squanto (Tisquantum), a Pawtuxet Indian. The two men announced that sachem Massasoit was now waiting to formally meet the settlers.
The climax of Samoset's diplomacy was the March 1621 treaty between Plimouth Colony and Massasoit of the Wampanoag Confederacy. Massasoit agreed to be "King James' man" in alliance with Plimouth. Samoset returned to Maine and in 1625 deeded about 12,000 acres (4,800 hectares) of Pemaquid territory to John Brown, an English settler. This is said to have been the first legal transfer of Indian land to an Englishman. Samoset died about 1653 and was buried in his family plot on Monhegan Island .
Squanto's importance to the Pilgrims was enormous and it can be said that they would not have survived without his help. It was Squanto who taught the Pilgrims how to tap the maple trees for sap. He taught them which plants were poisonous and which had medicinal powers. He taught them how to plant the Indian corn by heaping the earth into low mounds with several seeds and fish in each mound. The decaying fish fertilized the corn. He also taught them to plant other crops with the corn.
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Squanto, c.1580-1622, a Pawtuxet Indian later associated with the Wampanoag after his tribe was decimated by plague, was seized (1614) by a ship's captain and taken to Spain as a slave. He went from there to England and finally back (1619) to North America, where he was employed by the governor of Newfoundland . Squanto was later brought to Plymouth , where he taught the colonists to improve their crops by using fish fertilizer, but it has been questioned whether this was an Indian method or something Squanto had learned abroad. He served as interpreter at the 1621 treaty between the colonists and Massasoit. Soon after, he died of a disease that he had contracted while guiding Gov. William Bradford's expedition across Cape Cod .
The harvest in October was very successful and the Pilgrims found themselves with enough food to put away for the winter. There was corn, fruits and vegetables, fish to be packed in salt, and meat to be cured over smoky fires.
The Pilgrims had much to celebrate, they had built homes in the wilderness, they had raised enough crops to keep them alive during the long coming winter, they were at peace with their Indian neighbors. They had beaten the odds and it was time to celebrate.
The Pilgrim Governor William Bradford proclaimed a day of thanksgiving to be shared by all the colonists and the neighboring Native Americans. They invited Squanto and the other Indians to join them in their celebration. Their chief, Massasoit, and 90 braves came to the celebration which lasted for 3 days. They played games, ran races, marched and played drums. The Indians demonstrated their skills with the bow and arrow and the Pilgrims demonstrated their musket skills. Exactly when the festival took place is uncertain, but it is believed the celebration took place in mid-October.
The following year the Pilgrims harvest was not as bountiful, as they were still unused to growing the corn. During the year they had also shared their stored food with newcomers and the Pilgrims ran short of food.
The 3rd year brought a spring and summer that was hot and dry with the crops dying in the fields. Governor Bradford ordered a day of fasting and prayer, and it was soon thereafter that the rain came. To celebrate - November 29th of that year was proclaimed a day of thanksgiving. This date is believed to be the real true beginning of the present day Thanksgiving Day.
The custom of an annually celebrated thanksgiving, held after the harvest, continued through the years. During the American Revolution (late 1770's) a day of national thanksgiving was suggested by the Continental Congress.
In 1817 New York State had adopted Thanksgiving Day as an annual custom. By the middle of the 19th century many other states also celebrated a Thanksgiving Day. In 1863 President Abraham Lincoln appointed a national day of thanksgiving. Since then each president has issued a
Thanksgiving Day proclamation, usually designating the fourth Thursday of each November as the holiday.
