Saints and Strangers: Lives of the Pilgrim Fathers and Their Families

by George Willison

Overview

A great deal has been written about the Pilgrims, perhaps more than any other small group in American history. Yet they continue to be extravagantly praised for accomplishing what they never attempted or intended, and they are even more foolishly abused for possessing attitudes and attributes foreign to them. In the popular mind they are still generally confused, to their great disadvantage, with the Puritans who settled to the north of them around Boston Bay. The purpose of the Willison narrative is to allow the Pilgrims to tell their own story, insofar as possible, in their own words and deeds.Saints and Strangers brings back to life men and women who were among the most stalwart of American ancestors. George F. Willison destroys the myth that too long has been createdin the American mind: that Pilgrims, while pious and much to be admired, were a drab, stern people dedicated to prudery. Nothing could be further from the facts. These were lusty English people who were well aware of good food, drink, and pleasurable living. They were also an adventurous, hardheaded community united in their campaign for freedom of worship.The book takes the reader from the Puritan exile in Holland, their long and troubled voyage from old Europe to new America, and the hazardous period of settling on a strange, bleak coast. ThePuritans were comprised of weavers, smiths, carpenters, printers, tailors, and working people - with scarcely a blue blood among them. It was a long trek to Plymouth Rock from English village life. Willison has produced a realistic picture of these people who often have been inaccurately portrayed with little appreciation of their substantial place in the history of a New World.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781412818254
Publisher:	Transaction Publishers
Publication date:	09/15/2011
Pages:	524
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

George F. Willison (1896-1972) was a writer and editor known most for his work in the field of American History. He was also Rhodes Scholar in Economics at Oxford University and professor of Greek and Latin at St. John’s University. His books include I Am an American - Patrick Henry and His World , Why Wars are Declared , and Here They Dug the Gold .

Table of Contents

Preface ix

I Plymouth Rock and the Pilgrim Saga 1

II The Postmaster at Scrooby 11

III Seeds of Grace and Vertue 25

IV Ye Lord's Free People 43

V Scandal in Brownists Alley 58

VI At the Green Gate, Leyden 81

VII The Merchant Adventurers 102

VIII A Waighty Vioage 121

IX Mutiny on the Mayflower 138

X Babes in the Wilderness 146

XI New Plimoth Planted 158

XII Yellow Feather, the Big Chief 168

XIII Fortune 180

XIV Cold Comfort for Hungrie Bellies 195

XV Liquidation of Wessagusset 214

XVI The Season of Gentle Showers 231

XVII Unsavorie Salte 241

XVIII The Undertakers 253

XIX Purge of Joylity 273

XX Into ye Briers 285

XXI Diaspora 312

XXII Minister Trouble 343

XXIII Thrown by the Bay Horse 373

XXIV Apotheosis 408

Appendix A The Pilgrim Company 437

Appendix B Officers of the Old Colony and of the Pilgrim Church 455

Notes 461

Selective Bibliography 487

Index 495