Peter T Young

January 14, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Standing Bear

“A Hawaiian by the name of Frank Grouard is living as a scout in the American Army under General Crook, fighting Sioux Indians.” (Kuakoa, September 30, 1876; Krauss)

Whoa, that’s getting waaay ahead of ourselves … let’s look back.

May 23, 1843, Elders Benjamin F Grouard, Addison Pratt, Noah Rogers and Knowlton F Hanks, intending for the Hawaiian Islands, set sail as the first Mormon missionaries to the Pacific Islands. Rather than Hawai’i, they ended up in the Solomon Islands. (Cluff)

In 1846, Elder Grouard married Ana, a local chieffess; a few years later, on September 20, 1850, Frank Grouard was born. A couple years later (1852,) the Grouards and Pratts left Polynesia. In California, young Grouard was turned over to Addison and Louisa Pratt, for care. (His own mother had returned to the islands and later died; Elder Grouard died in 1894.) (Trowse)

The Pratts, with Grouard, emigrated to Utah. Grouard ran away and at the age of nineteen, ended up a Pony Express mail carrier … “out West” through hostile Indian Country (between California and Montana.) (Trowse)

“During one of his trips on a lonely trail he was captured by Crow Indians and taken prisoner. The Crows took him many miles from the road, and in a lonely forest, stripped off his clothes and possessions, then released him to wander alone.”

“He wandered, cold and hungry, a piece of fur for clothing, eating grasshoppers and other bugs for food. When he had given up hope of surviving, he was discovered by a group of Sioux Indians. Because of his expressions of aloha, they took a liking to him.” (Kuakoa, September 30, 1876; Krauss)

There were two factions in the camp – one led by Chief Sitting Bull, the other led by Chief Crazy Horse. Grouard was held for nearly seven years, during the first two of which he was practically a prisoner.

He all but became an Indian, and, though he declared he never, as an Indian, fired upon a white man, he took part in scores of battles against other enemies of the Sioux and in hundreds of forays after game and the horses and cattle of settlers. (Trowse)

“The Sioux took him into a heavily forested area where he was cared for. Chief Sitting Bull adopted him to be his own child of his own blood but with a different language. He grew in stature to be greatly admired by the Indians for his skill and wit.” (Kuakoa, September 30, 1876; Krauss)

He was given the name ‘Standing Bear.’

“In a very short time, he became one of the best riders of wild Indian horses and he became one of the best shots. For nine years he lived with the Indians, his manner becoming much like them.” (Kuakoa, September 30, 1876; Krauss)

He learned the landscape, customs and traditions – all the while constantly on alert to escape captivity. Around age 26, he eventually escaped from his Indian captors. Then, Grouard became an Indian Scout in the American Army under General George Crook, fighting Sioux Indians.

Almost every summer for nearly a dozen years, Grouard was in the field as a scout, commanding as many as 500 scouts and friendly Indians with all the Indian fighters who made reputations in subduing the Indians. He was wounded many times, suffered almost incredible hardships, saved small armies on several occasions and often saved the lives of individual men and officers.

He never led a party to disaster, was invariably chosen to head any “forlorn hope” enterprise or to make any particularly perilous ride; with Grouard, victory followed victory. Gen. Crook never wearied of telling anecdotes of Grouard and praising his favorite. (Trowes)

Crook noted, “he would sooner lose one-third of any command than lose Grouard and accredits him as the greatest scout and rider and one of the best shots and bravest men that ever lived.” (Berndt)

By February 1876, believing there was peace, many Indians were leaving the reservations in search of food. Orders had been given by the American government to return, but they did not take it seriously. General Crook began his winter march from Fort Fetterman, March 1, 1876 with many companies of troops.

When Sitting Bull learned that Grouard was the scout for General Crook, he saw the chance to kill Grouard in battle. By March 17, Grouard located Crazy Horse’s village on the Powder River in Montana. (Dodson) In May 1876, in preparation for the summer campaign, the Army was fitted out at Fort Laramie, Wyoming.

Fort Laramie, founded as a local trading post in 1834 at the confluence of the Laramie and North Platte Rivers, soon served as a stop for folks emigrating West on the Oregon, California and Mormon Trails (the westward migration peaked in 1850 with more than 50,000 traveling the trails annually.)

The US military purchased the post in 1849 and stationed soldiers there to protect the wagon trains. The US Civil War took soldiers away from it and other outposts. The Western migration continued. With the ending of the Civil War, soldiers came back. (Talbott)

Tension between the native inhabitants of the Great Plains and the encroaching settlers resulted in a series of conflicts … this eventually led to the Sioux Wars. The most notable fight, fought June 25–26, 1876, was the Battle of Little Big Horn (Lt Col George Armstrong Custer lost – Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse and others won.) (Grouard was not involved in that fight.)

Most native Americans were confined to reservations by 1877. In September 1877, Chief Crazy Horse left the reservation and General Crook had him arrested. When Crazy Horse saw he was being led to a guard house, he resisted and was stabbed to death by a guard. (Denardo)

In the fall of 1877, Sitting Bull headed north to Canada; life there was tough and in 1881 he surrendered to the US. In 1889 Sitting Bull was shot by Police. (NPS)

Grouard continued in the service of the US government until the end of the Indian Wars. Frank Grouard died at St. Louis, Missouri in 1905 where he was eulogized as a “scout of national fame”.

“To him perhaps more than to any other one man is due the early reclamation of that rich section of the mainland embraced in South Dakota, a large part of Montana, the whole of Northern Nebraska, and the whole of Northern Wyoming. Let us, then, write him as a factor – a Polynesian factor – in the making of the nation of nations.” (Trowse)

(There is conflicting information on the ethnicity of Grouard – Kuakoa reported in 1876 that Grouard was half-Hawaiian; he, himself, claimed to be “partial Hawaiian” (Dobson) and he told Trowse that his mother was a “woman of the Sandwich Islands”. (Trowse) Several others note he was son of a chiefess from the Solomon or ‘Friendly’ Islands (Tonga.))

There is more to the story … After serving with the Confederate Army during the Civil War, John Carpenter Hunton came West to work at Fort Laramie. His brother James came to join him in 1876; James’ headstone tells the rest of his history that ended later that year – “Killed by Indians”.

As noted above, the Sioux Wars military campaign provisioned at Fort Laramie, prior to heading north to South Dakota and Montana. Hunton was fort sutler (providing provisions out of the camp post) – Hunton and Grouard were at the fort at the same time, so it is likely they met.

They had closer ties than that. Hunton lived with/was married to LaLie (sister to fellow scout (and half-breed) Baptiste Garnier (Little Bat.)) LaLie later left Hunton and married Grouard – that marriage didn’t last either, and she left Grouard, too.

Oh, one other ‘rest of the story’ … John Hunton is Nelia’s Great Great Uncle. On a number of ocassions, we visited Fort Laramie and the John and James Hunton gravesites in Wyoming.

January 13, 2022 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Dwight Baldwin

Dwight Baldwin was born on September 29, 1798 to Seth Baldwin (1775 –1832,) (a farmer) and Rhoda Hull Baldwin in Durham, Connecticut, and moved to Durham, New York, in 1804. His father, He was the second of 12 children. (Baldwin Genealogy)

He was employed with his father on the farm, enjoying the benefits of the common school, and generally in winter of a select school, till the age of sixteen. In the fall of 1814, he commenced the study of Latin, with a view to prepare for College.

The last of his teachers being a graduate of Williams College, he was induced to enter at Williams, where he spent two years; and then he left Williams and entered Yale College, where he graduated in September, 1821.

By the recommendation of President Day, the next two years he was employed as Principal of the Academy in Kingston, Ulster County, NY. A third year was spent in teaching a select school in Catskill, Greene county. He then devoted himself to the study of medicine, at the same time teaching a select school in Durham, NY.

Then, he got caught in the religious fervor; about the first of March, 1826, he found relief in believing in an Almighty Redeemer, a hope which has never forsaken him. Religion became the all-absorbing subject of his thought by day and by night. (Baldwin Genealogy)

He soon came to the decision to join a mission, and September 3, of that year, he united with the Congregational Church in Durham, NY, and soon after he entered the Theological Seminary at Auburn, where he spent three years, offering his services into the American Board of Boston for a Foreign Mission … and they were accepted.

He did not have time to await official recognition of his medical degree so at direction of the Prudential Committee he took his diploma as Master of Science. He was ordained at Utica, NY on October 6, 1830.

He was introduced by a friend to Charlotte Fowler, daughter of Deacon Solomon Fowler of North Branford, Connecticut, and a few weeks later was married to her on December 3, 1830. Twenty-five days later they set sail with the Fourth Company of missionaries to Hawaiʻi on the ship ‘New England;’ he arrived at Honolulu, June 7, 1831. (Baldwin)

Soon after their arrival, the Missionaries were assigned to different stations over the group, wherever there seemed to be the greatest opportunity of doing good. After a few months in Honolulu he was assigned to help Lorenzo Lyons in Waimea, Hawaiʻi Island. He remained there three years, from 1832 to 1835. (The Friend, December 1922)

In 1835, ill health caused Baldwin to leave Waimea and seek recovery in the Society Islands. “Such was the opinion of all I consulted at Honolulu, & though I could preach & attend to other duties, & it was trying to part with my dear family, yet I was afraid I might hereafter repent, should I not go; so I came to the conclusion to go.” (Baldwin, November 20, 1835)

“We sailed from Honolulu the 14th of July (1835) … We anchored at Papeete bay, on the NW side of Tahiti, in just one month from the time we sailed. … During the ten days we were at Tahiti, I did all I could, to visit the several stations”. (Baldwin)

“From Tahiti we sailed to Huahine, (then) we set sail for these islands. We were favored with good winds & in 20 days saw Hawaii … I landed Sept. 20th thankful at finding wife & little ones safe & well.” (While he was in Tahiti, his family had settled into their new home at Lāhainā.) (Baldwin, November 20, 1835)

The Lāhainā mission was started in 1823; William Richards had been pastor for 13-years. Lāhainā was then the favorite Royal Center of the King, and nearly all the high Chiefs of the Islands; it was the Kingdom’s capital (from the 1820s through the mid-1840s.)

It was also a thriving harbor in those days, being a port of call for the whale ships which sometimes filled the bay so full that one could jump from one deck to another.

Father and Mother Baldwin as they were often called, opened their home to all. Officers and masters of ships were the recipients of their wholehearted hospitality. Dr. Baldwin was physician for the mission families, and the government physician for Maui, Molokaʻi and Lānaʻi. (The Friend, December 1922)

“A barrel of whale oil furnished light for a year. The flour brought by the missionary steamer Morning Star came once a year and several times it had been so wetted in the storms off Cape Horn that it had hardened and it was necessary to chisel off the daily measure for cooking.”

“Vegetables, however, grew in their own garden and there was an abundance of fruit, such as bananas, grapes, and watermelons, and one does not hear that they suffered from their poverty.” (Baldwin)

Baldwin preached at the Waine‘e Church (“Moving Water;”) the cornerstone was laid on September 14, 1828, for this ‘first stone meeting-house built at the Islands,’ It was dedicated on March 4, 1832. The Hawaiian royalty attended services there.

(After fire destroyed the church in 1894, Baldwin’s son, Henry Perrine Baldwin, helped fund its restoration. Damaged and restored several times, the Church finally changed its name from Waine‘e Church, to Waiola Church (“Water of Life”) in 1954, and has safely-stood since.)

A series of epidemics swept through the Hawaiian Islands in the 1840s, whooping cough and measles, soon after followed by waves of dysentery and influenza; then, in 1853, a terrible smallpox epidemic. Although precise counts are not known, there were thousands of smallpox deaths on O‘ahu; Baldwin is credited with keeping the toll to only a few hundred on Maui.

“My journal has been long laid aside – not because I have not had thousands of things to record but mainly because press of cares has left little leisure to record what is passing in & what we are engaged. … 1853 was wonderfully taken up with our war with small pox on the islands.” (Baldwin, October 8, 1854)

“(Baldwin) was constant in his ministrations, taxing his strength almost to its limit. He was obliged to cross the channel to Molokai and Lanai often when the weather was very stormy, and too, very dangerous.”

“He never hesitated for a moment when the call came, night or day, but hurried on with his little bag, stepped into a double canoe and was off to Lanai and from there he took a whaleboat to Molokai. It was not unusual for Dr. Baldwin to take a trip of 80 or 90 miles on horseback to visit patients in Hana.” (The Friend, December 1922)

In 1856 the health of Father Baldwin, who had worked thirty-six years without a vacation, failed and the “American Board” granted him a year’s leave of absence. He and his wife left the Islands for a year’s visit in “the states.” (Baldwin)

In 1859 Baldwin belatedly received an honorary medical degree from Dartmouth College, New Hampshire. Without having this he had suffered much embarrassment at the hands of the medical society of Honolulu who, despite the fact that he had been combining an exhausting medical practice for 27-years with his ministry, would not recognize him with a medical license unless he could produce documentary evidence of his medical degree. (HMCS)

It was with regret that Baldwin resigned his pastorate at Lāhainā, in September, 1868. That year Father Baldwin became associated with Reverend Benjamin Parker in the conduct of the native Theological Seminary at Honolulu; the Baldwins moved to Honolulu in 1870.

Mother Baldwin died on October 2, 1873; the inscription on her tombstone reads, “A life of work, love and prayer;” Dwight Baldwin died on January 3, 1886.

The Baldwins had eight children: David Dwight (1831–1912), Abigail Charlotte (1833–1913), Charles Fowler (1837–1891), Henry Perrine (1842–1911), Emily Sophronia (1844–1891) and Harriet Melinda (1846–1932). A daughter, Mary Clark died at about 2½ years of age in 1838; a son, Douglas Hoapili, died at almost 3 in 1843.

The Baldwin’s coral and stone Lāhainā Home, Baldwin House, is the oldest house in Lāhainā (completed in 1835.) It is now home to Lāhainā Restoration Foundation; they oversee and maintain 11 major historic structures in Lāhainā and provide tours of the Baldwin House. (Lots of information here from Baldwin Journals, Baldwin Genealogy and Mission Houses.)

January 12, 2022 by Peter T Young 3 Comments

$3 for 3-Minutes

“Prostitution is one of the oldest vices of the human race, and civilized communities have been experimenting with its control for centuries. The only definite conclusion that has been reached is that it is likely to exist as long as the passions of the human beings remain what they are today.” (Police Commissioner, Victor Houston; Leder)

Given that most visitors and migrants to Honolulu were male, whether they were explorers, sailors, traders, plantation workers, military or tourists, it was only a matter of time before organized prostitution flourished in the areas surrounding their arrival and lodging near the port.

The third law of Kauikeaouli in 1835 dealt with various kinds of “illicit connections” – adultery, fornication, prostitution and rape – and specified fines ranging from ten to fifty dollars for differing offenses. (Greer)

Since the 1830s, Honolulu’s official and unofficial laws have vacillated between banning and regulating the business, which is in part why the red-light district moved between Chinatown and Iwilei. (Chinatown)

At the turn of the century and until May 1917, a segregated red-light district flourished in Iwilei. They called it the ‘Iwilei Stockade.’ Inside a high stockade wall were long rows of rooms, each 8×10; there were 225 of them. Most of the women were from Japan. From 4 pm to 2 am, the stockade gates were open. (Gallagher)

Local law enforcement condoned and controlled the activities, under the guise that it was “a public necessity.” “The whole of Iwilei makai of the Oʻahu Prison has been used for the purpose of prostitution for some time past.” (Special Legislative Committee Report, 1905)

The Iwilei brothels (or “boogie houses,” as they were also called back then) were later forced to relocate to Hotel Street and a few adjoining parts of Chinatown. By 1916, the Iwilei Stockade was shut down.

The closure of the Iwilei red-light district in conjunction with growing military presence meant that Chinatown was the red-light district for decades to come. The early-1930s saw a strictly, but unofficially, regulated industry monitored and heavily taxed by local law enforcement. Female prostitutes were both local and from the mainland. (Chinatown)

At the onset of World War II in 1941, Hawaiʻi had 258,000-civilians and 43,000-soldiers. Six months later, the number of soldiers nearly tripled. In 1944, there were approximately 400,000-military members in Hawai’i.

Quick to spend military paychecks before entering combat zones, men indulged in drinking, tattoos, souvenirs, massages, penny arcades, fortune telling and prostitutes within a 10-block area of Chinatown. The ‘lights-out’ policy at sunset instituted after the bombing of Pearl Harbor increased the urgency to fit in all vice activities during the day. (Chinatown)

Hotel Street was the center of Honolulu’s red light activities, through which some 30,000 or more soldiers, sailors and war workers passed on any given day during most of World War II.

Prostitution was illegal in Hawaiʻi. None-the-less, it existed as a highly and openly regulated system, involving the police department, government officials and the military. (Bailey & Farber)

During the war, approximately 250-prostitutes were registered with the Honolulu Police Department. They paid $1 a year for an “entertainers” license.

The going rate was $3 for servicemen – sessions lasted 3-minutes. Of the $3 charge, the madam took $1 off the top; the prostitute paid for room, board and laundry from her $2 cut.

Most houses operated officially from 8 am to noon. Most brothels required girls to see at least 100-men a day and to work at least 20 days per month. They could make $30,000 to $40,000 per year (versus the average working woman’s typical $2,000.)

The majority of official Honolulu prostitutes were white women recruited through San Francisco. Each prostitute arriving from the mainland was met at the ship by a member of the vice squad; she was then fingerprinted and given a license.

There were rules to follow; breaking them could result in a beating or removal from the Islands. Few lasted more than 6-months before heading back to the West Coast.

While Hotel Street had the reputation as the home of the brothels, most of the houses were in an area bounded by Kukui, Nuʻuanu, Hotel and River streets.

During the war years, fifteen brothels operated in this section of Chinatown, their presence signaled by neatly lettered, somewhat circumspect signs (‘The Bronx Rooms,” “The Senator Hotel,” “Rex Rooms”) and by the lines of men that wound down the streets and alleyways.

On September 10, 1944, Governor Stainback sent the following to Ferris F Laune, the council’s secretary: “I have … requested the Police Commission to take steps to close and keep closed the existing houses of prostitution in the City and County of Honolulu.” The Police Commission instructed closure of the houses on September 24. (Greer)

It hasn’t gone away; today, anyone engaged in prostitution – as a prostitute or as a client – faces a petty-misdemeanor charge, and first-time offenders, if not granted a deferred judgment, can be fined not less than $500 but not more than $1,000, or spend up to 30 days in jail, or be sentenced to probation. Subsequent offenses have higher penalties. (HRS 712-1200)

January 11, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Glimpse of Honolulu Life in early-1870s

The following is from a ‘Story’ by Clara Lydia (Moseley) Sutherland (granddaughter of Hiram Bingham and daughter of Hiram’s first child Sophia – and, my great grandmother). She gives glimpses of life as a teacher at Kawaiahaʻo Female Seminary and a look of Honolulu in the early-1870s.

Before she “was fifteen, a wonderful thing happened to me which probably changed the whole course of my life. Two of my mother’s sisters, Aunt Lydia and Aunt Lizzie, returned to Honolulu, the home of their birth and engaged in teaching in a school for Hawaiian girls which was called Kawaiahaʻo Seminary.”

“My Aunt Lydia was Principal of this school and she wrote to my mother asking if she couldn’t spare me and let me come out and teach music to her girls, knowing that I was musically inclined.”

She left her home in Union City, Michigan to join them. “Uncle Hiram (II) met us at the wharf that Sunday morning we arrived, and when we reached the house my three aunts gave me such a warm and cordial welcome that I was no longer homesick, but oh! so glad to be here on terra firma.” (Clara Lydia Sutherland)

“Very soon after my arrival in Honolulu I began taking piano lessons from Mr. Mueller, a German teacher. I also took some French lessons from him.”

“Aunt Lydia wished to give me every advantage in the way of music, so she had me take pipe organ lessons from Mr. Atkinson, the organist at Kawaiaha‘o Church.”

“The organ then in use had to be pumped by hand, so when I went over to the church to practice I always took one of the school girls to do the pumping.”

“After I had gained some confidence in the use of the pedals I substituted occasionally for Mrs. Agnes Judd, who was the regular organist at Fort Street Church.”

“This church was thus named because it stood on the corner of Fort and Beretania streets nearly opposite the Catholic Church. Mr. Frear, father of Judge Frear was its pastor at that time.”

“Some years after, it merged with Bethel Church of which Rev. S. M. Damon was pastor. They built a beautiful church on the corner of Beretania and · Richards St. and named it Central Union, and Dr. Beckwith was its first pastor.”

“About two miles out from town at the entrance of Manoa Valley was a school called Punahou (meaning ‘new spring’) and thus named because of the spring which has existed there from time immemorial.”

“This property, consisting of several acres, was given by Boki, one of the chiefs, to my grandfather for educational purposes, so in 1842, a school was started there for the benefit of the children of the missionaries.”

“When I came to the Islands in 1872 this was as yet a small school, compared to its present status. There were only about fifty pupils and there were only two buildings, both built of adobe.”

“One of these was for the Principal and the three teachers and the few pupils who came from the other Islands. The other was the Schoolhouse. The latter is still in existence and is now used by the Music Faculty and called ‘Old Music Hall’.”

“At that time the upper floor was one big schoolroom, and the rooms downstairs were used for classrooms. Mr. E. P. Church was the Principal, and his wife and Miss Haven and Mr. Chickering were the other three teachers.”

“Here I went to school for two years, and it is one of my happy memories, as I loved my teachers and my studies and made friendships which have lasted all my life.”

“Mr. Chickering, my Latin teacher, was my ideal of all that was fine and noble and manly, and I nearly lost my heart to him even at the age of 16.”

“There were no street cars in Honolulu in those days, so the school kept two omnibuses driven by boys living at the school. One went up Nuʻuanu Valley to pick up all the scholars living in that section, and the other took those of us who lived in town, and in the few scattered houses on the plains between Punahou and town.”

“There was not much to be seen but algeroba (kiawe) trees on that dry and dusty plain. King Street was the only thoroughfare.
There was no one living in Manoa Valley except a few natives in their grass huts.”

“That was only a place where we went for picnics on horseback. The bus called for some of us about 8:30 am as school began at 9 o’clock. We used to have some pretty jolly times riding back and forth, and I can remember how certain girls would have a crush on the driver and want to sit up next to him.”

“Human nature has not changed since time began, and there was plenty of flirtation and romance in those days, but we would have been considered very discreet and modest by the present generation.”

“We would take an orange or banana to school to eat at noon, but no regular lunch, so I used to come home between two and three PM nearly starved.”

“They always kept my dinner warm for me in the oven and how I did enjoy the taro! We had it nearly every day instead of potato or rice. That is probably what made me gain in weight so fast, as I had not then learned to eat poi.”

“I was a very busy girl at this time, for besides my school and my piano and organ practice I was giving piano lessons to ten or twelve of the girls in my aunt’s school.”

“I would give one before going to school in the morning, and one or two more in the afternoon. There was an old piano in the dining room where I taught, and on which the girls practiced.”

“In the back parlor was a new one, belonging to Sally King, a half white, and one of my pupils. She and I did our practicing on this.”

“Our nearest neighbors were the Castles and Cookes. The Castles lived next door and the Cookes just across the street in the old Mission House, where my grandparents and some of the other missionaries had lived.”

“This was the first frame house erected in Honolulu, the material for it having been sent around Cape Horn in 1821. It is still in existence, having been carefully preserved by the friends of the missionaries on account of its associations.”

“‘Mother Cooke’, as she was lovingly called by all who knew her, was living here at this time with her three sons, Charlie, Frank and Clarence.”

“The three daughters and oldest son, Joe, had all left the family roof, and were living in homes of their own. Charlie was married but living in the same house with his mother and occupying a three room apartment or wing which had been built onto the east end of the house.”

“These rooms should have been called ‘Honeymoon Haven’ as it is where each of Mother Cooke’s four sons began their married life.”

“The Castles were a large family of nine children, and I came to know them very well, especially the younger ones, George, James, Carrie, Helen and Henry.”

“Carrie, who was nearest my age, was as fond of music as I, and we enjoyed playing duets together …. Mr. Barnard, Clerk of the Court, an elderly gentleman who played the violin, used to give us each an evening a week when he would come to the house and play with us, thus helping us greatly in reading and in our appreciation of good music.”

Punahou School, Photograph attributed to Charles Burgess-1866

Punahou Omnibus

Punahou Omnibus-1890

Kawaiahao Church in 1885-Look towards Diamond Head

Kawaiahaʻo_Female_Seminary,_Honolulu,_c._1867

Manoa-Lantana and Kiawe-PP-59-6-006

Manoa_valley-BM

Manoa-PP-1-4-024

January 10, 2022 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Abandoning the “Common Course and Condition”

“Socialism, social and economic doctrine that calls for public rather than private ownership or control of property and natural resources. According to the socialist view, individuals do not live or work in isolation but live in cooperation with one another.”

“Furthermore, everything that people produce is in some sense a social product, and everyone who contributes to the production of a good is entitled to a share in it. Society as a whole, therefore, should own or at least control property for the benefit of all its members.” (Encyclopedia Britannica)

The initial socialist approach to the Pilgrim’s early economy was not a structure that they initially chose or sought; rather, it was part of the conditions they accepted in negotiations with the Merchant Adventurers before they left.

Frankly, the Pilgrim leaders had expressed their desire to own their own lands and homes and even work two days each week for their own gain. But the Adventurers would not hear of it. The contract was a “take it or leave it” proposition. The Pilgrims reluctantly took it. (Patton)

It was not an experiment seeking the appropriate economic structure.

Bradford Notes That Socialist Living (“this comone course and condition”) wasn’t Working …

Bradford here expresses his belief that Socialism is not a Godly order or economic system.

“The experience that was had in this comone course and condition, tried sundrie years, and that amongst godly and sober men, may well evince the vanitie of that conceite of Platos & other ancients, applauded by some of later times …”

“… that ye taking away of propertie, and bringing in comunitie into a comone wealth, would make them happy and florishing; as if they were wiser then God.”

“For this comunitie (so farr as it was) was found to breed much confusion & discontent, and retard much imploymet that would have been to their benefite and comforte.”

Challenges with the Common Course and Condition

“For ye yong-men that were most able and fitte for labour & service did repine that they should spend their time & streingth to worke for other mens wives and children, with out any recompence. The strong, or man of parts, had no more in devission of victails & cloaths, then he that was weake and not able to doe a quarter ye other could; this was thought injuestice.”

“The aged and graver men to be ranked and equalised in labours, and victails, cloaths, &c., with ye meaner & yonger sorte, thought it some indignite & disrespect unto them.”

“And for mens wives to be commanded to doe servise for other men, as dresing their meate, washing their cloaths, &c., they deemd it a kind of slaverie, neither could many husbands well brooke it. Upon ye poynte all being to have alike, and all to doe alike, they thought them selves in ye like condition, and one as good as another; and so, if it did not cut of those relations that God hath set amongest men, yet it did at least much diminish and take of ye mutuall respects that should be preserved amongst them.”

“And would have bene worse if they had been men of another condition. Let none objecte this is men’s corruption, and nothing to ye course it selfe.”

“I answer, seeing all men have this corruption in them, God in his wisdome saw another course fiter for them.”

Pilgrims Seek a Better and More Abundant Result

The leaders of Plymouth colony decided to scrap their socialistic agreement with the Adventurers and the philosophy of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” Individuals were now able to own their own homes, property, and keep the fruit of their own efforts. What happened? (Patton)

“All this whille no supply was heard of, neither knew they when they might expecte any. So they begane to thinke how they might raise as much corne as they could, and obtaine a beter crope then they had done, that they might not still thus languish in miserie.”

“At length, after much debate of things, the Govr (with ye advise of ye cheefest amongest them) gave way that they should set corne every man for his owne perticuler, and in that regard trust to them selves; in all other things to goe on in ye generall way as before.”

“And so assigned to every family a parcell of land, according to the proportion of their number for that end, only for present use (but made no devission for inheritance), and ranged all boys & youth under some familie.”

“This had very good success; for it made all hands very industrious, so as much more corne was planted then other waise would have bene by any means ye Govr or any other could use, and saved him a great deall of trouble, and gave farr better contente.”

“The women now wente willingly into ye feild, and tooke their litle-ons with them to set corne, which before would aledg weaknes, and inabilitie; whom to have compelled would have bene thought great tiranie and oppression.”

In 1621, the Pilgrims planted only 26-acres. Sixty acres were planted in 1622. But in 1623, spurred on by individual enterprise, 184-acres were planted. Somehow those who alleged weakness and inability became healthy and strong. It’s amazing what incentive will do to improve the situation. (Patton)

The Pilgrim experience dating from 1623 was and is yet a prototype for the US. The Pilgrims learned the hard way that:

Socialism does not work; it diminishes individual initiative and enterprise;
Socialism is not a Godly economic system; and
Famine and drought can be used by God to humble a people and set them on a proper course. (Patton)

The Pilgrims responded. The real question today is: Can Americans learn these vital insights from the Pilgrims? (Patton)

Click the following link to a general summary about Abandoning the “Common Course and Condition”:

https://imagesofoldhawaii.com/wp-content/uploads/Common-Course-and-Condition.pdf