With Americans celebrating Thanksgiving at the end of the month, November seems a good time to consider the Pilgrims who sailed on the Mayflower from Europe in 1620. Whilst researching my Alexander Baxby mystery Paying in Blood, I learnt more about their roots in early 1600s Lincolnshire. The Pilgrims were Independent Protestants, not Puritans as is often stated, with a different understanding of the relationship between religion and politics.
From Queen Elizabeth’s reign, England’s government and courts enforced the national religion through a series of strict conformity laws. They prosecuted, imprisoned and executed Catholics who retained the older faith, and Puritans who wanted to ‘purify’ the Church with more Reformed Protestant (Calvinist) practices. The latter hoped for leniency when James succeeded Elizabeth, but the new king reinforced the conformity laws instead, ominously threatening to “harry them from the land or do worse”. Subsequently, some left the established Church to become Independent Separatists.
Gainsborough and Scrooby
Pastor John Robinson, William Brewster, William Bradford and others met secretly at Gainsborough Old Hall and Scrooby Manor, in Lincolnshire and neighbouring Nottinghamshire. Abandoning the Church’s prayer book and hierarchical structure, they encouraged congregational debate and participation in worship. Both male and female members spoke at business meetings and voted on important decisions, including choosing their own leaders.
Their novel way of understanding religious responsibility and authority is evident in the words they used to express their common bond, which William Bradford later quoted in his book Of Plymouth Plantation
We as the Lord’s free people
join ourselves by a covenant of the Lord
into a church estate
The Pilgrims believed God gave them freedom and responsibility to choose their religious affiliation, this being a matter of individual conscience rather than the role of the state. They knew the risk they took, such covenants being illegal at the time.
1607 was a particularly hard year, with plague, famine, floods, and a comet which was widely seen as predicting doom. Things came to a head when Archbishop Richard Bancroft’s High Commission Court issued a warrant for Robinson and Brewster’s arrests. Despite it being illegal to leave the country without a licence, the Pilgrims trekked across country to Boston, hoping to escape by ship, only to be imprisoned in the town’s guildhall. With the help of sympathising locals, eventually they sailed to join Puritans and Independents who had already settled in the Dutch Republic.
Amsterdam and Leiden
The seven northernmost low country provinces had had looser ties between religion and politics since declaring independence from Spain in 1581. Booming Amsterdam allowed Anabaptists, Huguenots, Lutherans, Sephardic Jews, Muslims and even some Catholics to follow their own customs providing they were discreet, particularly during the Twelve Years’ Truce. The Pilgrims lived amongst these groups in Amsterdam, before moving to Leiden where they were active members of society, finding employment and contributing to national debates.
Undoubtedly, such experiences helped to broaden their understanding of political authority and responsibility. They thought states should provide stability and security for differing religious groups, and prevent conflict between them, rather than mandating a particular one. Pastor Robinson does not seem to have gone as far as fellow Independent Thomas Helwys who made the first English plea for religious tolerance, for people of all faiths and none
For men’s religion is between God and themselves. The king shall not answer for it. Neither may the king be judge between God and man. Let them be heretics, Turks, Jews, or whatsoevers, it appertains not to the earthly power to punish them in the least measure
However, Robinson and the other Pilgrims definitely believed in tolerance for all Protestant groups. It is likely that Thomas’ death in Newgate Gaol, influenced their decision to seek a new home as the Twelve Years’ Truce drew to an end, rather than return to England.
Legacy
The Pilgrims’ understanding of separation between religious and political domains has persisted alongside more Puritan ones, in wide range of debates, including arguments about school curriculums, headwear choice, Muslim mayors and political endorsement of a Bible.
With hindsight, the Mayflower Pilgrims appear to have made a wise choice. Along with gratitude for their harvest, they must have been relieved to leave Europe before religious and political differences fuelled the horrors of the Thirty Years’ War.
Karen Haden’s historical crime novel Paying in Blood, set in early 1600s Lincolnshire, is available from Sharpe Books on #KindleUnlimited and to buy on Amazon at UK Link and US Link.
