Along the Pilgrim Trail, Part 23
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| The Mayflower Pub, Rotherhithe, London and 43 members of the Mayflower Society Tour |
Vincent and I recently took
the General Society of Mayflower Descendants Historic Sites Tour of England,
Wales and The Netherlands along with 41 other enthusiast participants (known as
"The 43"). We traced the footsteps of the Separatists and the
Mayflower passengers and crew all around these countries with some amazing tour
directors, guides, historians and authors. We were given access to places
off the usual tourist trails, and behind the scenes. We had a wonderful
time, and this is the last blog post of this series.
Since October I have been blogging about our tour to
England and Holland with the General Society of Mayflower Descendants. For 22 posts I have traced the footsteps of
our Pilgrim ancestors from the origins of the Separatists in Babsworth and Gainsborough,
to the home villages and parishes of the Pilgrim Fathers and Mothers, to their
escape to Holland, and back again to England before finally departing Plymouth
in Devonshire in 1620. Many readers
never knew all these stories, and it has been interesting to relive the
adventures of these early colonists before they even came to the New World.
In the 22nd post the Separatists and the
adventurers left Plymouth. Most of you
know what happened next when they crossed the stormy Atlantic Ocean for 66
days, landed at Cape Cod, searched for a place to plant their colony, and endured
a terrible winter when 50 of the 102 settlers died. However, by springtime they had made alliances
with the Native Wampanoag people, planted their first crops, and were on their
way to surviving in New England.
On 5 April 1621 Captain Christopher Jones and his crew
returned to England. None of the colonists
decided to return with him, although he offered to bring anyone who wanted to
return. They returned to London in 31
days, less than half the time it took to get to Cape Cod.
Less than a year later, Captain Jones died in
Rotherhithe, a neighborhood along the Thames River in London. This was where the Mayflower landed on her
return. Jones’s widow and the other
three owners of the Mayflower (Jones was the fourth owner) applied for an
appraisal of the ship in 1622. It appraised for 128 pounds, 8 shillings, and 4
pence. The ship was then probably
scrapped.
Rotherhithe is a place where you can see many memorials
to Capt. Christopher Jones, and to the Mayflower. My two favorite memorials are the statue
called “Sunbeam Weekly and the Pilgrim’s Pocket,” and the Mayflower Inn. The Mayflower Pub, where descendants are
invited to sign a book and list their Mayflower ancestors. The Mayflower originally sailed from near
this pub, which was originally called “The Shippe”, and then rebuilt in the 18th
century and renamed “The Spread Eagle”, and then renamed “The Crown”. We also
visited St. Mary’s Church, where Capt. Jones is buried, and there is a plaque
commemorating the Mayflower.
This is the last of the blog posts, because this is
where the Mayflower came to rest, and was eventually scrapped. The story doesn’t end here, because the
colonists that Capt. Christopher Jones left behind prospered, and were
eventually joined with their beloved kinfolk and friends from Leiden when the
ships Fortune and James arrived in the subsequent years.
You know the rest of the story!
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| Sunbeam Weekly and the Pilgrim's Pocket This statue is named for a popular series of children's historic comic books. The little boy is reading about the history of America, and a Pilgrim is looking over his shoulder. The Pilgrim's pocket includes a lobster, a guide to London, and a cross. |
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| St. Mary's Church, Rotherhithe, where Capt. Christopher Jones is buried |
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| This is Yours Truly, signing the book for descendants at the Mayflower Pub in Rotherhithe. We all had a nice lunch, and all signed the book. This was one of the highlights of the entire trip for me! |
The Mayflower Pub in Rotherhithe website: http://www.mayflowerpub.co.uk/
Other blog posts in this series:
Part 1 of
this series "Babworth, Nottinghamshire":
Part 2 of
this series "Scrooby Manor"
Part 3 of
this series “Gainsborough, Lincolnshire”:
Part 4 of
this series "Harwich, Essex, home of the Mayflower"
Part 5
this series "Stephen Hopkins of Upper Clatford, Hampshire"
Part 6 of
this series "William Mullins of Dorking, Surrey"
Part 7 of
this series “Edward Winslow of Droitwich, Worcestershire”
Part 8 of
this series "The Fullers of Reddenhall, Norfolk":
Part 9 of
this series "John Howland of Fenstanton, Cambridgeshire":
Part 10
of this series "Tilley and Sampson of Henlow, Bedfordshire":
Part 11
of this series "William Bradford of Austerfield, Yorkshire":
Part 12
of this series "Francis Eaton of Bristol":
Part 13
of this series "James Chilton, Robert Cushman of Canterbury, Kent,
England":
Part 14
of this series "Fishtoft, Lincolnshire where the Pilgrims were
betrayed":
Part 15
of this series "Boston, Lincolnshire, where the Pilgrims were jailed":
Part 16
of this series "Immingham, Lincolnshire to Holland":
Part 17
of this series “In Exile in Amsterdam”:
Part 18
of this series “St. Pieterskerk in Leiden, The Netherlands”:
Part 19
of this series "Touring Leiden":
Part 20
of this series "Delfshaven, Holland"
Part 21
of this series “Dartmouth, Devonshire”
Part 22
of this series “Plymouth, Devonshire”
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Heather
Wilkinson Rojo, "Along the Pilgrim Trail ~ The Mayflower
returns to Rotherhithe, London, England”, Nutfield Genealogy, posted December
18, 2017, (
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