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The First Thanksgiving

The site and date of origin of Thanksgiving are matters of dispute, with regional claims being made by widely disparate locations in North America. The chief claims are: Saint Augustine, Florida – 1565; Baffin Island, Canada – 1578; Jamestown, Virginia – 1619 and Plymouth, Massachusetts – 1621.

Thanksgiving in Plymouth

The Mayflower arrived in Plymouth in December of 1620.  No further ships arrived in Plymouth until immediately after the first Thanksgiving at Plymouth – the Fortune arrived in November of 1621.

According to the Pilgrim Hall Museum, there are two (and only two) primary sources for the events of autumn 1621 in Plymouth that suggest the first Thanksgiving at Plymouth: Edward Winslow writing in Mourt’s Relation and William Bradford writing in Of Plymouth Plantation:

Edward Winslow, Mourt’s Relation: “our harvest being gotten in, our governour sent foure men on fowling, that so we might after a speciall manner rejoyce together, after we had gathered the fruits of our labours;”

“they foure in one day killed as much fowle, as with a little helpe beside, served the Company almost a weeke, at which time amongst other Recreations, we exercised our Armes …”

“many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king Massasoyt, with some ninetie men, whom for three dayes we entertained and feasted …”

“and they went out and killed five Deere, which they brought to the Plantation and bestowed on our Governour, and upon the Captaine and others. “

“And although it be not always so plentifull, as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so farre from want,  that we often wish you partakers of our plentie.”

William Bradford, Of Plimoth Plantation: “They begane now to gather in ye small harvest they had, and to fitte up their houses and dwellings against winter, being all well recovered in health & strenght, and had all things in good plenty …”

“for as some were thus imployed in affairs abroad, others were excersised in fishing, aboute codd, & bass, & other fish, of which yey tooke good store, of which every family had their portion.”

“All ye somer ther was no want.  And now begane to come in store of foule, as winter approached, of which this place did abound when they came first (but afterward decreased by degrees).”

“And besids water foule, ther was great store of wild Turkies, of which they tooke many, besids venison, &c. …”

“Besids, they had about a peck a meale a weeke to a person, or now since harvest, Indean corn to yt proportion.  Which made many afterwards write so largly of their plenty hear to their freinds in England, which were not fained,  but true reports.”

As noted, at the end of the 1621 summer, when harvest was in, Governor John Carver called for a special celebration. The colonists began to gather food for a traditional English “harvest home.”

This festival was held throughout England at harvest’s end to give thanks for the bounty and celebrate the end of the most intense period of work for farmers.

The Native Americans traditionally celebrated a harvest festival similar to the harvest home.

Turner said what most people do not know about the first Thanksgiving at Plymouth is that the Wampanoag and Pilgrims did not sit down for a big turkey dinner and it was not an event that the Wampanoag knew about or were invited to in advance. In September/October 1621, the Pilgrims had just harvested their first crops, and they had a good yield.

They “sent four men on fowling,” which comes from the one paragraph account by Pilgrim Edward Winslow, one of only two historical sources of this famous harvest feast. Winslow also stated, “we exercised our arms.”

“Most historians believe what happened was Massasoit got word that there was a tremendous amount of gun fire coming from the Pilgrim village,” Turner said. “So he thought they were being attacked and he was going to bear aid.”

When the Wampanoag showed up, they were invited to join the Pilgrims in their feast, but there was not enough food to feed the chief and his 90 warriors.

“He [Massasoit] sends his men out, and they bring back five deer, which they present to the chief of the English town [William Bradford].”

“So, there is this whole ceremonial gift-giving, as well. When you give it as a gift, it is more than just food,” said Kathleen Wall, a Colonial Foodways Culinarian at Plimoth Plantation.

The harvest feast lasted for three days.

No other ships arrived in Plymouth until after the first Thanksgiving at Plymouth.  The Pilgrims at the first Thanksgiving at Plymouth are all the Mayflower survivors.

Thanksgiving in Hawai‘i

It’s not clear when the first western Thanksgiving feast was held in Hawaiʻi, but from all apparent possibilities, the first recorded one took place in Honolulu and was held among the families of the American missionaries from New England.

According to the reported entry in Lowell Smith’s journal on December 6, 1838: “This day has been observed by us missionaries and people of Honolulu as a day of Thanksgiving and praise to Almighty God. Something new for this nation.”

“The people turned out pretty well and they dined in small groups and in a few instances in large groups. We missionaries all dined at Dr. Judd’s and supped at Brother Bingham’s. … An interesting day; seemed like old times – Thanksgiving in the United States.”

Laura Judd, in Sketches of Life in Honolulu noted on January 1, 1841: “There were twenty-five adults and thirty-two children of the station in Honolulu, and a proposition to unite in appropriate religious exercises and a Thanksgiving dinner, met with unanimous approval. …”

“Each lady was to furnish such dishes as suited her taste and convenience, while the table arrangements were the portion of one individual. … At three o’clock we had donned our best apparel, and sat down at the long table to enjoy a double feast.”

The first Thanksgiving Proclamation in Hawaiʻi appears to have been issued on November 23, 1849, and set the 31st day of December as a date of Thanksgiving.

US National Holiday

The celebratory day of Thanksgiving changed over time.

The Continental Congress proclaimed the first national Thanksgiving in 1777. A somber event, it specifically recommended “that servile labor and such recreations (although at other times innocent) may be unbecoming the purpose of this appointment [and should] be omitted on so solemn an occasion.”

Presidents Washington, Adams and Monroe proclaimed national Thanksgivings, but the custom fell out of use by 1815, after which the celebration of the holiday was limited to individual state observances. By the 1850s, almost every state and territory celebrated Thanksgiving. (plimoth-org)

In the 19th century, the modern Thanksgiving holiday started to take shape. In 1846, Sarah Josepha Hale, editor of a magazine called Godey’s Lady’s Book, campaigned for an annual national thanksgiving holiday.

But it wasn’t until 1863, when President Abraham Lincoln declared two national Thanksgivings; one in August to commemorate the Battle of Gettysburg during the Civil War, and the other in November to give thanks for “general blessings.” It’s the second one that we celebrate today. (National Geographic)

Neither Lincoln nor his successors, however, made the holiday a fixed annual event.

Finally, on December 26, 1941 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed into law a bill making the date of Thanksgiving a matter of federal law, fixing the day as the fourth Thursday of November.

Click the following link to a general summary about the First Thanksgiving:

https://imagesofoldhawaii.com/wp-content/uploads/First-Thanksgiving.pdf

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Strangers

In the 1500s England broke away from the Roman Catholic Church and created a new church called the Church of England (sometimes referred to as the Anglican Church).

Everyone in England had to belong to the Anglican Church. There was a group of people called Separatists that wanted to separate from that church.

William Bradford found like-minded Christians in a separatist congregation in the village of Scrooby, close to his hometown of Austerfield, England.

In 1607, the Anglican Church became aware of the Scrooby congregation and arrested some, placing others under surveillance, and fining those they could.

The congregation, under the leadership of John Robinson sold their belongings and relocated to Leiden, the Netherlands, where the government practiced a policy of religious tolerance.  Later, they looked to leave to America.

The Separatists signed a contract with the Virginia Company to establish a colony. By its terms, the stockholders who financed the journey (“Adventurers”) would share in the new colony’s profits.

The Separatists called themselves “Saints.”  When the recruiting for the voyage was done, several of the Leiden Saints were unable or unwilling to go.

In order to fill the ship and protect their investments, the Adventurers started to recruit colonists in London, recruiting them at large without any regard to their religious beliefs.  The Separatists called these the “Strangers.”

The Strangers were a group of skilled workers who were sent along by the investors to help build the colony.  They were considered common folk and included merchants, craftsmen and indentured servants. 

The Strangers had their own reasons for joining the journey, and didn’t share the goal of the Saints of separating from the Church of England.

The Mayflower set sail from Plymouth, England, with approximately 130 people on board: 102 passengers, the rest crew.  Most traveled with families; some left behind family members who were to sail on later voyages.

There were 74-males (50-men) and 28-females (19-women, 3 were pregnant); the 69-adult passengers were mainly in their 30s (the average age of the men is estimated to be 34). The 14-young adults ranged between the ages of 13 and 18, and the 19-children were 12 and under (Deetz). After arriving in harsh winter weather, one-half of the passengers died during the “general sickness” of colds, coughs and fevers.

The Mayflower Compact

The Pilgrims intended to land in Northern Virginia, which at the time included the region as far north as the Hudson River in the modern State of New York.

The Hudson River, in fact, was their originally intended destination.  They had received good reports on this region while in the Netherlands.  All things considered, the Mayflower was almost right on target, missing the Hudson River by just a few degrees.

The voyage itself across the Atlantic Ocean took 66 days, from their departure on September 6 (OS) (September 16 (NS)), until Cape Cod was sighted on November 9 (OS)(November 19 (NS)), 1620.

As the Mayflower approached land, the crew spotted Cape Cod just as the sun rose.  The Pilgrims decided to head south, to the mouth of the Hudson River in New York, where they intended to make their plantation.   However, as the Mayflower headed south, it encountered some very rough seas, and nearly shipwrecked.

The Pilgrims then decided, rather than risk another attempt to go south, they would just stay and explore Cape Cod.  They turned back north, rounded the tip, and anchored in what is now Provincetown Harbor.  The Pilgrims would spend the next month and a half exploring Cape Cod, trying to decide where they would build their plantation.

Back in England, the Pilgrims had signed a contract with the Virginia Company to establish a colony near the Hudson River, which at the time was part of Virginia. By its terms, the stockholders who financed the journey would share in the new colony’s profits.

After bad weather during the Atlantic crossing pushed the Mayflower hundreds of miles further north, to Cape Cod, the “Strangers” didn’t think they should be subject to the contract’s provisions anymore.

William Bradford wrote in his history of Plymouth Plantation:  “In these hard and difficulte beginings they found some discontents and murmurings arise amongst some, and mutinous speeches and carriages in other; but they were soone quelled and overcome by the wisdome, patience, and just and equall carriage of things by the Gov[emo]r and better part, which clave faithfully togeather in the maine.”

To quell the conflict and preserve unity, Pilgrim leaders drafted the Mayflower Compact before going ashore. The brief document (about 200 words) bound its signers into a body politic for the purpose of forming a government and pledged them to abide by any laws and regulations that would later be established “for the general good of the colony.” (Britannica)

The document, drafted and signed aboard the ship by nearly all of the adult male passengers, would become known as the Mayflower Compact. (Of those that did not sign, some had been hired as seamen only for one year and others may have been too ill to write. No women signed it.)

The Mayflower is “indissolubly linked with the fundamentals of American democratic institutions. She was the wave-rocked cradle of our liberties.” (Henry B. Culver, Naval Historian, 1924)

General Society of Mayflower Descendants

The first Society of Mayflower Descendants was established in New York City on December 22, 1894 as a society for lineal descendants of the Mayflower Pilgrims. Three more states followed in 1896: Connecticut on March 7, Massachusetts on March 28, and Pennsylvania on July 1. Delegates from the existing Societies met in Plymouth, Massachusetts, to form the General Society of Mayflower Descendants on January 12, 1897.

To be a member of the Mayflower Society, you must be able to prove direct lineal descent from a passenger (Saint or Stranger) aboard the Mayflower who stayed on to establish the colony.

Though the crew of the Mayflower certainly made significant sacrifices in completing the journey, the Mayflower Society recognizes only those passengers who stayed to form Plymouth Colony. The crew returned to England in the spring of 1621 so no members are listed above and descent from a crew member does not qualify one for membership.

This is a summary, click the following link for more:

In the 1500s England broke away from the Roman Catholic Church and created a new church called the Church of England (sometimes referred to as the Anglican Church).

Everyone in England had to belong to the Anglican Church. There was a group of people called Separatists that wanted to separate from that church.

William Bradford found like-minded Christians in a separatist congregation in the village of Scrooby, close to his hometown of Austerfield, England.

In 1607, the Anglican Church became aware of the Scrooby congregation and arrested some, placing others under surveillance, and fining those they could.

The congregation, under the leadership of John Robinson sold their belongings and relocated to Leiden, the Netherlands, where the government practiced a policy of religious tolerance. Later, they looked to leave to America.

The Separatists signed a contract with the Virginia Company to establish a colony. By its terms, the stockholders who financed the journey (“Adventurers”) would share in the new colony’s profits.

The Separatists called themselves “Saints.” When the recruiting for the voyage was done, several of the Leiden Saints were unable or unwilling to go.

In order to fill the ship and protect their investments, the Adventurers started to recruit colonists in London, recruiting them at large without any regard to their religious beliefs. The Separatists called these the “Strangers.”

The Strangers were a group of skilled workers who were sent along by the investors to help build the colony. They were considered common folk and included merchants, craftsmen and indentured servants.

The Strangers had their own reasons for joining the journey, and didn’t share the goal of the Saints of separating from the Church of England.

The Mayflower set sail from Plymouth, England, with approximately 130 people on board: 102 passengers, the rest crew. Most traveled with families; some left behind family members who were to sail on later voyages.

There were 74-males (50-men) and 28-females (19-women, 3 were pregnant); the 69-adult passengers were mainly in their 30s (the average age of the men is estimated to be 34). The 14-young adults ranged between the ages of 13 and 18, and the 19-children were 12 and under (Deetz). After arriving in harsh winter weather, one-half of the passengers died during the “general sickness” of colds, coughs and fevers.

The Mayflower Compact

The Pilgrims intended to land in Northern Virginia, which at the time included the region as far north as the Hudson River in the modern State of New York.

The Hudson River, in fact, was their originally intended destination. They had received good reports on this region while in the Netherlands. All things considered, the Mayflower was almost right on target, missing the Hudson River by just a few degrees.

The voyage itself across the Atlantic Ocean took 66 days, from their departure on September 6 (OS) (September 16 (NS)), until Cape Cod was sighted on November 9 (OS)(November 19 (NS)), 1620.

As the Mayflower approached land, the crew spotted Cape Cod just as the sun rose. The Pilgrims decided to head south, to the mouth of the Hudson River in New York, where they intended to make their plantation. However, as the Mayflower headed south, it encountered some very rough seas, and nearly shipwrecked.

The Pilgrims then decided, rather than risk another attempt to go south, they would just stay and explore Cape Cod. They turned back north, rounded the tip, and anchored in what is now Provincetown Harbor. The Pilgrims would spend the next month and a half exploring Cape Cod, trying to decide where they would build their plantation.

Back in England, the Pilgrims had signed a contract with the Virginia Company to establish a colony near the Hudson River, which at the time was part of Virginia. By its terms, the stockholders who financed the journey would share in the new colony’s profits.

After bad weather during the Atlantic crossing pushed the Mayflower hundreds of miles further north, to Cape Cod, the “Strangers” didn’t think they should be subject to the contract’s provisions anymore.

William Bradford wrote in his history of Plymouth Plantation: “In these hard and difficulte beginings they found some discontents and murmurings arise amongst some, and mutinous speeches and carriages in other; but they were soone quelled and overcome by the wisdome, patience, and just and equall carriage of things by the Gov[emo]r and better part, which clave faithfully togeather in the maine.”

To quell the conflict and preserve unity, Pilgrim leaders drafted the Mayflower Compact before going ashore. The brief document (about 200 words) bound its signers into a body politic for the purpose of forming a government and pledged them to abide by any laws and regulations that would later be established “for the general good of the colony.” (Britannica)

The document, drafted and signed aboard the ship by nearly all of the adult male passengers, would become known as the Mayflower Compact. (Of those that did not sign, some had been hired as seamen only for one year and others may have been too ill to write. No women signed it.)

The Mayflower is “indissolubly linked with the fundamentals of American democratic institutions. She was the wave-rocked cradle of our liberties.” (Henry B. Culver, Naval Historian, 1924)

General Society of Mayflower Descendants

The first Society of Mayflower Descendants was established in New York City on December 22, 1894 as a society for lineal descendants of the Mayflower Pilgrims. Three more states followed in 1896: Connecticut on March 7, Massachusetts on March 28, and Pennsylvania on July 1. Delegates from the existing Societies met in Plymouth, Massachusetts, to form the General Society of Mayflower Descendants on January 12, 1897.

To be a member of the Mayflower Society, you must be able to prove direct lineal descent from a passenger (Saint or Stranger) aboard the Mayflower who stayed on to establish the colony.

Though the crew of the Mayflower certainly made significant sacrifices in completing the journey, the Mayflower Society recognizes only those passengers who stayed to form Plymouth Colony. The crew returned to England in the spring of 1621 so no members are listed above and descent from a crew member does not qualify one for membership.

This is a summary, click the following link for more:
https://imagesofoldhawaii.com/wp-content/uploads/Strangers.pdf

© 2022 Ho‘okuleana LLC

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Plymouth Colony Absorbed Into Province of Massachusetts Bay

Massachusetts takes its name from the Massachusett tribe of Native Americans, who lived in the Great Blue Hill region, south of Boston. The Indian term is roughly translated as “at or about the Great Hill”.

There are, however, a number of interpretations of the exact meaning of the word. The Jesuit missionary Father Rasles thought that it came from the word Messatossec, “Great-Hills-Mouth”: “mess” (mass) meaning “great”; “atsco” (as chu or wad chu) meaning “hill”; and sec (sac or saco) meaning “mouth”.

The Reverend John Cotton used another variation: “mos” and “wetuset”, meaning “Indian arrowhead”, descriptive of the Native Americans’ hill home. Another explanation is that the word comes from “massa” meaning “great” and “wachusett”, “mountain-place”.  (Secretary of the Commonwealth)

Massachusetts Bay Colony

While it is well known that the Massachusetts Bay Company, under the leadership of John Winthrop, ultimately settled Massachusetts Bay in 1630, it is less well understood that the Massachusetts Bay Company’s claim on New England was preceded by those of two other joint stock companies.

The first of these belonged to an association of “Adventurers” known as the Dorchester Company, organized by the Anglican minister John White. Although it succeeded in launching a settlement on Cape Ann in 1623, the Dorchester Company went out of existence in 1626.

In 1627, the Council for New England issued a land grant to a new group of investors, including a few from the Dorchester Company, to establish a for-profit enterprise, “The New England Company for a Plantation in Massachusetts Bay” (better known as the New England Company), led by John Endecott.

Endecott would ultimately found the town of Salem, Massachusetts, in 1628.  Endecott’s shares and those of fifty-six other New England Company investors would ultimately be absorbed into those of the Massachusetts Bay Company in 1629. (Genealogical-com)

The Massachusetts Bay Colony was a colony located near modern-day Boston and Salem Massachusetts.  It  was the first English chartered colony whose board of governors does not reside in England, thus paving the way for permanent settlement. (Native Philanthropy)

The Puritans used the royal charter establishing the Massachusetts Bay Company to create a government in which “freemen” – white males who owned property and paid taxes and thus could take on the responsibility of governing – elected a governor and a single legislative body called the Great and General Court, made up of assistants and deputies.

In April of 1630, the Puritans, led by one of the company’s stockholders, John Winthrop, left their homes in Boston, England and gathered at a dock in Southampton to set sail for the New World.

The fleet of 11 ships, now known as the Winthrop fleet, set sail and finally reached the shores of Massachusetts on June 12 and landed at Salem.

The Puritans established a theocratic government with the franchise limited to church members.  Bending the charter to their own purposes, the Puritans transformed the company into a religious commonwealth.

Their ambition had been to establish an ideal Christian community — a “city on a hill,” as Winthrop called it — with the eyes of England and the entire world on it. Winthrop was reelected governor, and a theocracy was in fact established.

In May 1631 the Puritan leaders agreed to recognize only church members as freemen (those entitled to vote and hold office). The company’s officers became the colony’s magistrates. The ministers of the church defined orthodoxy, and the colony’s magistrates enforced it. Dissenters were suppressed or banished.

Conflicts arose over the arbitrariness of the assistants, and in 1641 the legislature created the Body of Liberties. This document was a statement of principles for governance that protected individual liberties and was the basis for the guarantees later expressed in the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution.

Early challenges to the charter were averted by the outbreak of the English Civil War in the 1640s; for about 50 years, with little interference from England, the Massachusetts Bay Colony developed into a Puritan commonwealth.

The Massachusetts Bay Colony flourished with literacy, schools, town meetings, longer lives, clean drinking water, a cool climate, and a variety of crops. Though the Puritan faith eventually waned, the Massachusetts Bay Colony thrived and was a strong start for the New World.

In 1684, however, the government of Charles II revoked the company’s charter. The colony was merged briefly into the extensive but short-lived (1686–88) Dominion of New England, which included New Hampshire and New Jersey and the colonies lying between them.  (Oscar Zeichner)

Plymouth Colony

On September 6, 1620 (Old Style; September 16, New Style), the Mayflower departed from Plymouth, England, and headed for America.

After 65 days at sea, the Mayflower dropped anchor near present-day Provincetown on November 11 (OS; November, 21, 1620, NS), and 41 male passengers signed the Mayflower Compact, an agreement to enact “just and equal laws for the general good of the colony.”

The colonists who traveled to the New World on the Mayflower were a small group of Separatists who had fled to Holland from England to practice their religion without official interference. Economic hardship and a desire to establish an identity free of Dutch influence prompted them to seek out America.   Most of the Separatists had been living in exile in Holland for ten years before sailing for America, and the rest of the passengers were drawn from the greater London area.

The area around Plymouth and Cape Cod, settled by the Pilgrims, was known as Plymouth colony, or the Old Colony.  By the mid-1640s its population numbered about 3,000 people.

The Pilgrims were never granted a royal charter; their government was based on the Mayflower Compact. The compact was hardly democratic, since it called for rule by the elite, but it established an elective system and a basis for limited consent of the governed as the source of authority. The Old Colony was rapidly overshadowed by its Puritan neighbor to the north, the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Massachusetts Becomes a Royal Province in 1691

After losing its charter in 1684, Massachusetts continued to oppose the will of the Crown.  The Puritan government often operated as an independent state, to the point of minting its own money and even conducting its own foreign affairs.

In 1686, the British king canceled the Massachusetts charter that made it an independent colony.

When James II fled in 1688, the Puritans failed in their attempt to revive the Massachusetts Bay Company, and Massachusetts, in 1691, became a Royal Province under a Governor appointed by the Crown. 

To let more control over trade with the colonies, the King combined British colonies of Massachusetts, Plymouth and Maine and the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard into a single territory governed from England in 1691.  The religious laws instituted by the Massachusetts Bay Company were largely repealed. 

In this new Massachusetts, the franchise was given only to those who owned property or paid taxes. Continued lack of interference from Great Britain allowed the colonists to gain a tradition of self-reliance and self-government. (Maine remained a part of Massachusetts until 1820, when it was established as a separate state.)

The Massachusetts Charter of 1691 was a charter that formally established the Province of Massachusetts Bay.  The charter provided for the Governor’s appointment by the Crown rather than local election, and at the same time broadened the Governor’s powers.

Two legislative houses were permitted, however, and the requirement that every voter must be a church member was abolished.

The new restrictions incidental to the status of a Royal Province, applied in Massachusetts and elsewhere, provoked the series of controversies that culminated in the Revolutionary War.   During the end of the seventeenth century and the beginning of the eighteenth century, Massachusetts grew in population and in maritime trade.

These were the years of the so-called Second Hundred Years’ War between France and England. In these wars, 1688-1760, Massachusetts played an important part. Its crowning feat was the capture in 1745 of the fortress of Louisburg on Cape Breton Island (NS), a fortress so strong it was known as the Gibraltar of America. At the same time, Massachusetts’ maritime trade, especially with Caribbean ports, rose to the point that Boston was known as “The Mart (or market town) of the West Indies”. (Mass Facts, Secretary of the Commonwealth)

Click the following link to a general summary about Plymouth Colony Absorbed Into Province of Massachusetts Bay:

Click to access Plymouth-Colony-Absorbed-Into-Province-of-Massachusetts-Bay.pdf

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Congregational Church

Congregational churches trace their origins to sixteenth-century England, where they were one part of a large and diverse effort to reform the Church of England.

The roots of Congregational churches in America go back to the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth in 1620 and the subsequent founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

The first Congregationalists were Independents, Puritans who believed each church should be a gathering of believers joined together under a covenant agreement, and with the power to choose their own minister. Beyond that, they disagreed about the likelihood of reforming the Church of England and the need for believers to be separated from its corrupting influences.  (Congregational Library)

In all Congregational churches members held equal power, all of them responsible to each other under the covenant that formed the basis of their life together. In fact, ministers first became church members before he could be chosen and ordained by the church. Even then the minister’s power was subject to the will of the congregation — he led by their consent.

The Pilgrims came from England to the New World seeking religious freedom at the time of the 16th century Protestant Reformation. The churches they established in New England became known as Congregational churches.

The connection with later events in New England, especially the American Revolution, does suggest that something important was happening in the Puritan Commonwealth … democracy.  But, not everyone had the right to vote — women had no official voice in church matters and dissenting Baptists and Quakers, when they were not being forcibly banished, still had to pay taxes for church support.

But in other very important ways, Congregational New England was unique in the seventeenth-century world. Ordinary citizens had unprecedented power to make decisions about land and property, and to hold their leaders in check.

Churches and church leaders played an important role in shaping New England society, but they had no direct political power. In Puritan theology, church and state had separate roles and responsibilities; however, magistrates and ministers worked together. (Congregational Library)

Congregationalists in America

American independence presented Congregationalists with obstacles as well as opportunities. By the late 1700s, the New England clergy, sometimes referred to as the Standing Order, had become thoroughly used to their social privileges, especially tax support from their local communities. Outlawed by the First Amendment to the US Constitution, religious establishment lingered on in Massachusetts until 1833.

Suddenly, the Congregational churches faced a new world, one in which they would have to support themselves through the voluntary gifts of members. While they were still weathering the effects of losing some of their most prominent churches to Unitarianism, they would also face competition from other “upstart” denominations, the Methodists and Baptists.

Despite these obstacles, Congregationalists soon took the lead in “voluntary religion,” as it was called. In 1801 Congregationalists signed a Plan of Union with the Presbyterian church, an effort to pool the resources as both denominations moved westward. A good idea in theory, the sharing did not work well in practice, especially as denominational competition heated up and Presbyterians fell into controversy and a brief schism.

They also sponsored an impressive array of voluntary organizations, including some of the earliest on behalf of foreign missions. The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (1810), the American Home Missionary Society (1826), the American Education Society, and other similar outreach groups began as cooperative efforts with other Protestant churches, but spearheaded primarily by Congregationalists.

Congregationalists like the Beecher family and schools like Ohio’s Oberlin and Lane Seminaries also led the way in social reform, especially women’s rights and abolitionism. The American Missionary Association, formed in 1846, joined the denomination’s antislavery zeal with its commitments to education and evangelism, and in the post-Civil War years established elementary schools, colleges, and theological seminaries across the South for newly-freed slaves.  (Congregational Library)

Congregationalists in Hawai’i

The Second Great Awakening spread from its origins in Connecticut to Williamstown, Massachusetts; enlightenment ideals from France were gradually being countered by an increase in religious fervor, first in the town, and then in Williams College.

In the summer of 1806, in a grove of trees, in what was then known as Sloan’s Meadow, Samuel John Mills, James Richards, Francis L Robbins, Harvey Loomis and Byram Green debated the theology of missionary service.  Their meeting was interrupted by a thunderstorm and they took shelter under a haystack until the sky cleared.

That event has since been referred to as the “Haystack Prayer Meeting” and is viewed by many scholars as the pivotal event for the development of Protestant missions in the subsequent decades and century.

The first American student missionary society began in September 1808, when Samuel Mills and others called themselves “The Brethren,” whose object was “to effect, in the person of its members, a mission or missions to the heathen.”  (Smith)  Mills graduated Williams College in 1809 and later Andover Theological Seminary.

In June 1810, Mills and James Richards petitioned the General Association of the Congregational Church to establish the foreign missions.  They then established the American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Missionaries (ABCFM) at Farmington, Connecticut.  (Wesser)

ABCFM accounted for 80% of all missionary activities in America; reformed bodies (Presbyterians and Congregationalists, in particular) made up nearly 40% of the participants.

Inspiration for the ABCFM Mission to Hawai’i and Establishment of Congregational Churches in Hawai’i

“Memoirs of Henry Obookiah by Edwin W Dwight is the story of a young Hawaiian man from 19th century Hawai’i who lived for only 26 years, and yet whose brief existence changed the course of a nation and the people of Hawai’i.” (Lyon)

“For the boy was ‘Ōpūkaha’ia (his American friends spelled and pronounced it Obookiah), and his life and early death and his hope of taking Christianity to his people were the inspiration for the Sandwich Islands Mission. The ship launched was the Thaddeus, which sailed with the pioneer company from Boston in October, 1819.”

“In the long run, the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions sent eighty-four men and one hundred women to Hawaii to preach and teach, to translate and publish, to advise, and counsel – and win the hearts of the Hawaiian people. …”

“Slender and simple as it was, this book shaped the future of Hawai’i.” (Albertine Loomis’ Introduction in Memoirs of Obookiah)

“How could such a tiny book containing the biography of a young Hawaiian who died at the age of 26, in 1818, so compel a foreign nation to send its young people thousands of miles to a distant land to be committed to missionary service?”

“(A) young Hawaiian in a foreign land he was instrumental in befriending the very agents who became the cornerstone for the modern Protestant missions movement in America.”

“What had started on the other side of the Atlantic, through the persuasive works of William Carey and the formation of the Baptist Missionary Society in 1792, had now spread to America through a student-led movement by Samuel Mills Jr. and others, culminating in the formation of the ABCFM in 1810.”

“The brief life of Henry Obookiah was attributed to his being a catalyst for the founding of the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall, Connecticut.  ‘The interest he [Henry Obookiah] aroused led the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, of Boston, to establish a Missionary School at Cornwall, Conn., for ‘‘the education of heathen youth’.’”  (Lyon)

“(T)he intended audience of the Memoirs was the Christian community of New England, and that part of the book’s purpose was to stir the hearts of New Englanders towards the cause of missions in order that they would give both financially and materially to the Foreign Mission School.”

“The Memoirs tell of the life of Henry Obookiah, how his family was killed by tribal warfare in Hawai’i, and how his life was miraculously saved. The Memoirs go on to describe Obookiah departing from Hawai’i at the age of 16 and arriving in New England.”

“The major portion of the Memoirs traces young Obookiah’s progress and chronicles the fact that he studied and boarded with a succession of Congregational ministers in New England. The effect of his studies and the living arrangements with such pious Christians had a most profound effect upon Obookiah, leading to his conversion to the Christian faith.

Ōpūkaha’ia Inspired the American Protestant Mission to Hawai’i

Ōpūkaha’ia, inspired by many young men with proven sincerity and religious fervor of the missionary movement, had wanted to spread the word of Christianity back home in Hawaiʻi; his book inspired missionaries to volunteer to carry his message to the Hawaiian Islands.

On October 23, 1819, the Pioneer Company of missionaries from the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) from the northeast United States, set sail on the Thaddeus for Hawai‘i.

There were seven couples sent in the Pioneer Company of missionaries to convert the Hawaiians to Christianity.   These included two Ordained Preachers, Hiram Bingham and his wife Sybil and Asa Thurston and his wife Lucy  (note: “It was on September 29, 1819, that people interested in the starting of the Sandwich Island mission gathered in the Goshen Congregational church to witness the ordination of Hiram Bingham and Asa Thurston.”); two Teachers, Mr. Samuel Whitney and his wife Mercy and Samuel Ruggles and his wife Mary; a Doctor, Thomas Holman and his wife Lucia; a Printer, Elisha Loomis and his wife Maria; a Farmer, Daniel Chamberlain, his wife and five children.  They landed at Kailua-Kona, April 4, 1820.

Among the other Hawaiian students at the Foreign Mission School were Thomas Hopu, William Kanui, John Honoliʻi and George Prince ‘Humehume’ (son of Kauai’s Kaumuali’i).

By the time the Pioneer Company arrived, Kamehameha I had died and the centuries-old kapu system had been abolished; through the actions of King Kamehameha II (Liholiho), with encouragement by former Queens Kaʻahumanu and Keōpūolani (Liholiho’s mother), the Hawaiian people had already dismantled their heiau and had rejected their religious beliefs.

“Memoirs of Henry Obookiah is a truly significant work in relation to both the history of the nation of Hawai’i, which later was annexed by the United States, and the profound impact that it had upon American evangelical Protestant missions. It is rare that an individual such as Henry Obookiah would be a vessel chosen to affect two nations so profoundly.”  (Lyon)

Click the following link to a general summary about the Congregational Church:

https://imagesofoldhawaii.com/wp-content/uploads/Congregational-Church.pdf

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Hobbamock

“a proper lustie man, and a man of accounte for his vallour & parts amongst ye Indeans” (Bradford)

Hobbamock (referred to in a variety of spelling derivations)  was a Native American who served as a guide, interpreter, and aide to the Pilgrims of Plymouth, Massachusetts.

Like Tisquantom (Squanto), Hobbamock was essential to the survival and diplomatic success of the English in New England.

Hobbamock actually played a much larger role in relations with the English than Squanto, although Squanto tends to get most of the attention in history books.

Hobbamock was a pneise (a warrior of great courage and wisdom) who served as the sachem’s counselor, collected the annual tribute from subject tribes, and advised him on decisions about going to war.  The pniese among the Wampanoag equate to the European concept of a noble knight. Winslow describes this class of warrior:

In 1621 a peace treaty was negotiated between John Carver, first governor of Plymouth Colony and Wampanoag sachem Ousamequin of Pokanoket, better known as Massasoit. The chief sent his trusted councilor, Hobbamock, who could speak some English, to move his large family to just outside Plymouth’s palisade.

Hobbamock was part of the Wampanoag tribe, which, in the Algonquian language, means “People of the Dawn.” Other Indians feared Hobbamock so much that when they saw him in a battle, they would immediately leave

Hobbamock was specifically asked by Massasoit (the leader of the Wampanoag) to help the Pilgrims. Hobbamock became the chief interpreter because Massasoit mistrusted Squanto.

Hobbamock converted to Christianity.  He once exclaimed, “Now I see that the Englishman’s God is a good God, for he has heard you, and sent you rain, and that without storms and tempests, which we usually have with our rain, which breaks down our corn; but yours stands whole and good still; surely your God is a good God.”  (Henry White in The Early History of New England)

Native Americans

Native Americans were an important part of the success of the Plymouth Colony, for it was Samoset who first paid the Pilgrims a friendly visit in the year of 1621. Massasoit, a great chief, was also a friend of the Colonists and signed a treaty with them which lasted for many years.

Hobbamock and Squanto were Indians who acted as guides for the Pilgrims and helped them in their hunting and planting. (Al Vermeer, Hoosier State Chronicles)

They not only served as interpreters and intermediaries with the other Indians, but taught the colonists how to plant and manure the native corn and where to catch fish, acted as guides about the country, and made themselves generally invaluable.

These services were not regarded wholly with favor by some of the Indians who were opposed to the whites, and the settlers had to teach the sachem (chief) Corbitant a sharp lesson, to make them leave their two Indian friends alone. (Adams, The Founding of New England, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1921)

Captain Standish led his triumphant little band back, accompanied by Squanto, and many other friendly Indians. The heroic achievement taught the friendly Indians that they could rely upon the protection of the white men, and was a loud warning to those who were disposed to be hostile. The enterprise occupied but two days.

As the result of this adventure, many Sachems sent in the expression of their desire to enter into a friendly alliance with the Pilgrims. Corbitant himself was frightened by such an exhibition of energy, and by his own narrow escape. He sought reconciliation through the intercession of Massasoit, and subsequently signed a treaty of submission and friendship.  (Abbott)

Rose, the first wife of Myles Standish, died at Plymouth, January 29, 1621, about a month after the landing. She was among the first to succumb to the privations of that terrible first winter. He married a second wife (Barbara), who survived him.

After his second marriage, Standish moved to his house on Captain’s Hill in Duxbury, and here he drew around him a devoted class of friends, among whom were the elder Brewster, George Partridge, John Alden, Mr. Howland, Francis Eaton, Peter Brown, George Soule, Nicholas Byrom, Moses Simmons, and other settlers of Duxbury.

The Indians also loved as well as feared him, and the faithful Hobbamock ever kept near to minister to his wants and was the faithful guide in his travels.

This devoted Indian died in 1642, having faithfully served with Standish for twenty years.  He is supposedly buried on the south side of Captain’s Hill, near the great rock called ‘The Captain’s chair.’ Tradition fixes his wigwam between two shell mounds on the shore near the Standish place, till taken home to the house of Standish, where he became a resident until his death.  (Abbott)

Click the following link to a general summary about Hobbamock:

https://imagesofoldhawaii.com/wp-content/uploads/Hobbamock.pdf

© 2022 Hoʻokuleana LLC