It was one of the leaders of the Dutch-settled contingency in Bit naughty methinks, seeing as they weren’t technically going on a “Pilgrimage”, more than they were moving home. It is only in recent years that a second definition has appeared in dictionaries, that of the Pilgrim to denote one of the “Pilgrim Fathers”. In the contemporary context, the word “Pilgrim” denoted somebody who undertook a journey to a sacred place of religious spiritualism or faith, such as those who went on pilgrimage to the Holy Land, or journeyed to a specific shrine or Church – the Shrine of Thomas Becket at Canterbury was a popular choice in earlier times as an example. The initial Mayflower plan had been an extension of that colony to the North of Jamestown, however through fair means or foul, they landed much further north in the area of Cape Cod, in what is now Provincetown Harbour. Some conveniently overlook that America had already been successfully colonised in and around Virginia for a good fifteen years before they arrived.

OK, lets unpick this bit of history and see what happens.įirstly, we have to remember that the Pilgrim Fathers weren’t the first settlers in the new found lands of America. So we all know the story… bunch of Puritans, bit of religious persecution and New England was born. Gallery of famous 17th-century Puritan theologians: Thomas Gouge, William Bridge, Thomas Manton, John Flavel, Richard Sibbes, Stephen Charnock, William Bates, John Owen, John Howe and Richard Baxter

Separatists pilgrims