Learn how and why the Pilgrims left England to come to America! In England in the early 1600s, everyone was forced to join the Church of England. Young William Bradford and his friends believed they had every right to belong to whichever church they wanted. In the name of religious freedom, they fled to Holland, then sailed to America to start a new life. But the winter was harsh, and before a year passed, half the settlers had died. Yet, through hard work and strong faith, a tough group of Pilgrims did survive. Their belief in freedom of religion became an American ideal that still lives on today. James Daugherty draws on the Pilgrims' own journals to give a fresh and moving account of their life and traditions, their quest for religious freedom, and the founding of one of our nation's most beloved holidays; Thanksgiving.

All Americans are familiar with the story of the Pilgrims—persecuted for their religion in the Old World, they crossed the ocean to settle in a wild and dangerous land. But for most of us, the story ends after their brutal first winter at Plymouth with a supposedly peaceful encounter with the Native Americans and a happy Thanksgiving. Now, through the vivid memoirs, letters, and personal accounts in The Pilgrim Chronicles, you will discover the full, compelling story of their anguished journey and heroic strength. Award-winning historian Rod Gragg brings the Pilgrims to life in this lavishly illustrated guide, filled with moving, eyewitness narratives. From their persecution in England and painful exile in Holland to their voyage across the Atlantic and their struggle to survive among the Indians in an untamed wilderness, Gragg takes you on the harrowing and inspiring journey of a people seeking religious freedom.

An ambitious new history of the Pilgrims and Plymouth Colony, published for the 400th anniversary of the Mayflower’s landing In 1620, separatists from the Church of England set sail across the Atlantic aboard the Mayflower. Understanding themselves as spiritual pilgrims, they left to preserve their liberty to worship God in accordance with their understanding of the Bible. There exists, however, an alternative, more dispiriting version of their story. In it, the Pilgrims are religious zealots who persecuted dissenters and decimated the Native peoples through warfare and by stealing their land. The Pilgrims’ definition of liberty was, in practice, very narrow. Drawing on original research using underutilized sources, John G. Turner moves beyond these familiar narratives in his sweeping and authoritative new history of Plymouth Colony. Instead of depicting the Pilgrims as otherworldly saints or extraordinary sinners, he tells how a variety of English settlers and Native peoples engaged in a contest for the meaning of American liberty.

Describes how the first Thanksgiving celebration.

Leading into the 400th anniversary of the voyage of the Mayflower, Martyn Whittock examines the lives of the “saints” (members of the Separatist puritan congregations) and “strangers” (economic migrants) on the original ship who collectively became known to history as “the Pilgrims.”The story of the Pilgrims has taken on a life of its own as one of our founding national myths—their escape from religious persecution, the dangerous transatlantic journey, that brutal first winter. Throughout the narrative, we meet characters already familiar to us through Thanksgiving folklore—Captain Jones, Myles Standish, and Tisquantum (Squanto)—as well as new ones.There is Mary Chilton, the first woman to set foot on shore, and asylum seeker William Bradford. We meet fur trapper John Howland and little Mary More, who was brought as an indentured servant. Then there is Stephen Hopkins, who had already survived one shipwreck and was the only Mayflower passenger with any prior Amer- ican experience. Decidedly un-puritanical, he kept a tavern and was frequently chastised for allowing drinking on Sundays.Epic and intimate, Mayflower Lives is a rich and rewarding book that promises to enthrall readers of early American history.