"OF PLIMOTH
FROM THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT.
WITH A
REPORT OF THE PROCEEDINGS INCIDENT TO THE RETURN OF THE
MANUSCRIPT TO
PRINTED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE SECRETARY
OF THE
COMMONWEALTH,
BY ORDER OF THE GENERAL COURT.
Electronic
Version Prepared by
Dr. Ted
Hildebrandt
March
1, 2002
WRIGHT
& POTTER PRINTING CO., STATE PRINTERS,
1898.
INTRODUCTION.
To many people the return of the Bradford
Manu-
script is a
fresh discovery of colonial history. By
very
many it has
been called, incorrectly, the log of the
"Mayflower." Indeed, that is the title by which it is
described in
the decree of the Consistorial Court of
ford
undertook its preparation long after the arrival
of the
Pilgrims, and it cannot be properly considered
as in any
sense a log or daily journal of the voyage
of the"
Mayflower ." It is, in point of fact, a history
of the
Plymouth Colony, chiefly in the form of annals,
extending
from the inception of the colony down to
the year
1647. The matter has been in print since
1856, put
forth through the public spirit of the Mas-
sachusetts
Historical Society, which secured a tran-
script of
the document from
in the
society's proceedings of the above-named year.
As thus
presented, it had copious notes, prepared with
great care
by the late Charles Deane; but these are
not given in
the present volume, wherein only such
comments as
seem indispensable to a proper under-
standing of
the story have been made, leaving what-
iv
ever
elaboration may seem desirable to some future
private
enterprise.
It is a matter of regret that no picture
of Governor
flower
Company left an authenticated portrait of him-
self, and
that, painted in
this
volume. In those early days
have been a
poor field for portrait painters. The
people were
struggling for their daily bread rather
than for
to-morrow's fame through the transmission
of their
features to posterity.
The volume of the original manuscript, as
it was
presented to
the Governor of the Commonwealth and
is now
deposited in the State Library, is a folio
measuring
eleven and one-half inches in length, seven
and
seven-eighths inches in width and one and one-half
inches in
thickness. It is bound in parchment,
once
white, but
now grimy and much the worse for wear,
being
somewhat cracked and considerably scaled.
Much
scribbling,
evidently by the
upon its
surface, and out of the confusion may
be read the
name of Mercy Bradford, a daughter of the
governor. On the inside of the front cover is
pasted a
sheet of manilla paper, on which is written
the
following: --
"
Consistory Court of the Diocese of
In the matter of the application of The
Honorable
Thomas
Francis Bayard, Ambassador Extraordinary
and
Plenipotentiary
INTRODUCTION. v
in
him, on
behalf of the President and Citizens of the said States,
of the
original manuscript book entitled and known as The Log
of the
Mayflower.
Produced in Court this 25th day of March,
1897, and marked
with the
letter A.
HARRY
W. LEE
Registrar.
Doctors Commons"
Then come two manilla leaves, on both sides
of
which is
written the decree of the
These leaves
and the manilla sheet pasted on the in-
side of the
front cover were evidently inserted after
the decree
was passed.
Next comes a leaf (apparently the original
first leaf
of the
book), and on it are verses, signed "A. M."
on the death
of Mrs. Bradford. The next is evidently
one of the
leaves of the original book. At the top
of the page
is written the following: --
This book was rit by govener William
bradford and given
to his son
mager William Bradford and by him to his son mager
John
Bradford. rit by me Samuel brad ford
mach 20, 1705
At the bottom of the same page the name
John
written with
the book turned wrong side up.
vi
The next is
a leaf bearing the following, in the
handwriting
of Thomas Prince: --
TUESDAY, June 4--1728
Calling at Major John Bradford's at
son of Major
Wm. Bradford formerly Dep Gov'r of Plimouth
Colony, who
was eldest son of Wm. Bradford Esq their 2nd
Gov'r, &
author of this History; ye sd Major John Bradford
gave me
several manuscript octavoes wh he assured me were
written with
his said Grandfather Gov'r Bradford's own hand.
He also gave
me a little Pencil Book wrote with a Blew lead
Pencil by
his sd Father ye Dep Gov'r. And He also
told me
yt He had
lent & only lent his sd Grandfather Gov'r Brad-
ford's
History of Plimouth Colony wrote by his own Hand also,
to judg
Sewall; and desired me to get it of Him or find it out,
& take
out of it what I thought proper for my New-England
Chronology:
wh I accordingly obtained, and This is ye sd His-
tory: wh I
found wrote in ye same Handwriting as ye Octavo
manuscripts
above sd.
THOMAS PRINCE.
N. B. I also mentioned to him my Desire of
lodging this History
in ye New
England Library of Prints & manuscripts, wh I had been
then
collecting for 23 years, to wh He signified his willingness -only
yt He might
have ye Perusal of it while He lived.
T. PRINCE.
Following
this, on the same page, is Thomas Prince's
printed
book-mark, as follows: --
This Book belongs to
The New-England-Library,
Begun to be collected by Thomas Prince,
upon
his entring Harvard-College, July 6
1703; and was given by
INTRODUCTION. vii
On the lower
part of a blank space which follows
the word
"by" is written: --
It now belongs to the Bishop of
There are
evidences that this leaf did not belong to
the original
book, but was inserted by Mr. Prince.
At the top of the first page of the next
leaf, which
was
evidently one of the original leaves of the book,
is written
in Samuel Bradford's hand, "march 20
Samuel
Bradford;" and just below there appears, in
Thomas
Prince's handwriting, the following: --
But major
this Book of
his Grandfather's to Mr. Sewall & that it being of
his
Grandfather's own hand writing He had so high a value of
it that he
would never Part with ye Property, but would lend
it to me
& desired me to get it, which I did, & write down this
that sd
Major Bradford and his Heirs may be known to be the
right
owners.
Below this, also in Thomas Prince's
handwriting,
appears this
line: --
"Page
243 missing when ye Book came into my Hands at 1st."
Just above
the inscription by Prince there is a line
or two of
writing, marked over in ink so carefully as
to be wholly
undecipherable. On the reverse page
of
this leaf
and on the first page of the next are written
Hebrew
words, with definitions. These are all in Gov-
viii
ernor
pears the
following:--
Though I am growne aged, yet I have had a
long-
ing desire, to see with my own eyes,
something of
that most ancient language, and holy
tongue,
in which the Law, and oracles of God were
write; and in which God, and angels, spake
to
the holy patriarks, of old time; and what
names were given to things, from the
creation.
And though I canot attaine
to much herein, yet I am refreshed,
to have seen some glimpse here-
of; (as Moses saw the Land
of canan afarr of) my aime
and desire is, to see how
the words, and phrases
lye in the holy texte;
and to dicerne some-
what of the same
for my owne
contente.
J
Then begins the history proper, the first
page of
which is
produced in facsimile in this volume, slightly
reduced. The ruled margins end with page thirteen.
From that
page to the end of the book the writing
varies
considerably, sometimes being quite coarse and
in other
places very fine, some pages containing nearly
a thousand
words each. As a rule, the writing is
upon one
side of the sheet only, but in entering notes
and
subsequent thoughts the reverse is sometimes used.
The last
page number is 270, as appears from the
facsimile
reproduction in this volume of that page.
Page 270 is
followed by two blank leaves; then on
INTRODUCTION. ix
the second
page of the next leaf appears the list of
names of
those who came over in the "Mayflower,"
covering
four pages and one column on the fifth page.
The
arrangement of this matter is shown by the fac-
simile
reproduction in this volume of the first page
of these
names. Last of all there is a leaf of
heavy
double
paper, like the one in the front of the book
containing
the verses on the death of Mrs. Bradford,
and on this
last leaf is written an index to a few por-