William Bradford (1590-1657)
From Freepedia
Image:Mayflowercompact.jpg William Bradford (1590 – May 9, 1657) was a leader of the Pilgrim settlers of the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts, and became Governor of the Plymouth Colony.
He was the son of William Bradford and his wife Alice Hanson, and was baptised on March 19, 1590 in Austerfield, Yorkshire. At an early age, he was attracted to the "primitive" congregational church in nearby Scrooby. By 1607, he was a committed member of what was termed a "separatist" church, since the church-members had wanted to separate from the Church of England. When James I began to persecute separatists in 1608, Bradford fled to the Netherlands, along with many members of the congregation. These "separatist" Puritans went first to Amsterdam before settling at Leiden. Bradford married his first wife Dorothy May (1597 – December 7, 1620) on December 10, 1613 in Amsterdam. While at Leiden, he supported himself as a fustian weaver.
Shifting alignments of the European powers (due to religious differences, struggles over the monarchies and intrigues within the ruling Habsburg clan) caused the Dutch government to fear war with Catholic Spain, and to become allied with James I of England. Pressure, and even attacks on the separatists increased in the Netherlands. Their congregation's leader, John Robinson, supported the emerging idea of starting a colony. Bradford was in the midst of this venture from the beginning. The separatists wanted to remain Englishmen (although living in the Netherlands), yet wanted to get far enough away from the Church of England and the government, to have some chance of living in peace. Arrangements were made, and William with his wife sailed for America in 1620 from Leiden, aboard the Mayflower.
Even before landing on American soil, Bradford's wife died. On December 7, 1620 Dorothy Bradford drowned within sight of Cape Cod. Supposedly, upon seeing the desolate landscape of the New England coast, she committed "suicide", by "jumping overboard". However, this story has mostly been discredited, since its original source retracted this claim. Dorothy's death still remains somewhat of a puzzle since Bradford did not include any mention of it in his writing, but he records his shore expedition on the same day in some detail. The notable omission of Dorothy's death could indicate either a "taboo" from her suicide, or a distraught Bradford.
The first winter in the new colony was a terrible experience. Half the colonists perished, including the colony's leader, John Carver. Bradford was selected as his replacement in the spring of 1621. From this point, his story is inextricably linked with the history of the Plymouth Colony.
William Bradford's second wife, Alice Carpenter, came to Plymouth aboard the Anne in July 1623, and married Governor Bradford on August 14, 1623 at Plymouth. They had three children, William, Mercy, and Joseph. Alice also helped to raise John, the son of his first marriage. William Bradford died at Plymouth, and was interred at Plymouth Burial Hill.
Some historians feel that Bradford's greatest achievement was introducing a system of privatized production. These historians contend that the colonists produced more farming for themselves, rather than for the community.
Journal
Bradford kept a detailed journal for many years. Large parts of this journal were published as Of Plymouth Plantation, and have been republished a number of times. (It is currently in print as ISBN 0075542811.) Bradford, along with Edward Winslow and others, contributed material to George Morton, who merged everything into a book, published in London in 1622, nicknamed Mourt's Relation, which was primarily a journal of the colonist's first years at Plymouth.
External links
- Bradford's History at the Pilgrim Hall Museum
- William Bradford on MayflowerHistory.com
- Family History of Governor William Bradford, 2nd Signer of the Mayflower Compact.
- William Bradford Biographical and Ancestral Summary
