John Carver

The sources do not agree on when and where John Carver was born. The head of Pilgrim Hall Museum’s page gives his birth as March 12, 1580/1 (Old Style double-year form), at Great Bealings, Suffolk, England, while the text of the same page says that he was probably born in England, perhaps around 1585.⁠[1][1]

BritannicaEncyclopædia BritannicaEncyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopedia first published in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1768; the name also refers to its publisher, Chicago-based Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. (which presents itself as The Britannica Group). The print edition ended in 2012, and the company’s main businesses since then have been the online encyclopedia Britannica.com, digital education products for schools and libraries, and Merriam-Webster dictionaries.Open the full entry’s article has him born about 1576 in Nottinghamshire or Derbyshire, England.⁠[2]

The New England Historic Genealogical Society’s sketch, reasoning from the date of his first appearance in Leiden, places his birth by about 1585; of the baptism of a John Carver, son of Robert Carver, at Doncaster, Yorkshire, on September 9, 1565, cited by Banks, it observes that this would make him 44 at his first appearance in Leiden and that nothing else suggests he was that old at the time.⁠[3]

John Carver and his wife, Katherine, were members of the Separatist community at Leiden and first appear definitively in the Leiden records in 1615; he was a deacon of the congregation.⁠[1]

Katherine was the daughter of Alexander White of Sturton-le-Steeple, Nottinghamshire, and is believed to have first married a man named Leggatt before 1599. In 1604 her sister Bridget married John Robinson, later the Pilgrims’ pastor; the White, Jessop and Robinson families afterward moved to Leiden.⁠[1]

Pilgrim Hall Museum’s page dates their marriage to before May 23, 1615; the New England Historic Genealogical Society’s sketch dates it to by 1609.⁠[1][3]

Pilgrim Hall Museum’s page states that the Carvers buried a child at Leiden in November 1617 and had no other surviving children. The New England Historic Genealogical Society’s sketch records “None recorded” and adds that the two burials at St. Pancras, Leiden, in 1609 and 1617 published by Dexter were, as Jeremy D. Bangs has pointed out, misread and concern other families.⁠[1][3]

He was one of the prime organizers of the Mayflower voyage, arrangements for which began as early as 1617.⁠[1]

In a letter of June 14, 1620 (New Style), John Robinson addressed him as “My dear friend and brother.” In the summer of 1620 he and Robert Cushman travelled to London to plan and prepare for the Leiden congregation’s voyage.⁠[3]

Britannica’s article describes him as a prosperous businessman who arranged the financial backing for the voyage and chartered the Mayflower.⁠[2]

William BradfordWilliam BradfordWilliam Bradford (1590–1657) was a Mayflower passenger and the second and longest-serving governor of Plymouth Colony; his manuscript Of Plymouth Plantation is the most complete account of the Pilgrims and the colony’s early years.Open the full entry’s list of passengers puts his household first: John Carver, his wife Katherine, Desire Minter, two manservants, John Howland and Roger Wilder, the boy William Latham, a maidservant, and Jasper More, a child placed in his care.⁠[3]

In November 1620 the Mayflower reached Cape Cod and anchored in what is now Provincetown Harbor. Because the landing place lay north of the bounds of the original patent, which had no force in New England, some passengers questioned the authority of the group’s leaders.⁠[4]

On November 11, 1620, Old Style (November 21, New Style), the passengers signed the Mayflower Compact, agreeing to form a “civil body politic”; John Carver’s name stands first in the list of signers given by Pilgrim Hall Museum.⁠[4]

Immediately after the signing he was elected the first governor of the colony. Britannica’s article gives the date of his election as November 21, 1620, and his term as 1620–1621.⁠[1][2]

On December 6, 1620, he set out with Myles StandishMyles StandishMyles Standish (c. 1584–1656) was a Mayflower passenger and the military leader of Plymouth Colony; a former soldier in Holland, he later helped found Duxbury and served many times as an Assistant to the governor.Open the full entry, William Bradford, Edward WinslowEdward WinslowEdward Winslow (1595–1655) was a Mayflower passenger and one of the founders of Plymouth Colony, where he served three times as governor, handled the colony’s dealings with the Wampanoag leader Massasoit and repeatedly went to England as its agent. In his last years he served in Oliver Cromwell’s government, and he died on an expedition to the West Indies.Open the full entry and others to explore the coast of Cape Cod; the party was attacked about dawn without anyone being hurt and named the place the “First Encounter.”⁠[5]

The exploring party of which he was a member chose Plymouth as the site of the settlement.⁠[6]

On December 25, 1620, the men went ashore to cut timber, and in January 1621 the colonists began to build the town as two rows of houses.⁠[7]

On January 14, 1621, the newly built common house caught fire while he and William Bradford lay sick inside, and the two were nearly hurt by gunpowder stored there.⁠[5]

On March 22, 1621, Samoset and Tisquantum (Squanto) came to announce the approach of Ousamequin, the great sachem of the Wampanoag, whom the English usually called by his title, Massasoit. Within the hour Massasoit appeared on the hill opposite the English settlement with sixty men and his brother Quadequina.⁠[8]

After the two sides exchanged hostages, Massasoit crossed the brook with about twenty men, leaving their bows and arrows behind; Myles Standish met them with an escort of musketeers and brought them to an unfinished house. The governor arrived with drum and trumpet and a few musketeers, the two leaders greeted each other, the governor kissed Massasoit’s hand, and they sat down.⁠[8]

The treaty as recorded by William Bradford had six terms: Massasoit and his people would not injure the colonists; if any of his people did so, he would send the offender to them; goods taken would be restored, and the colonists would do the same for his people; each side would aid the other if unjustly attacked; he would send word to his allied neighbors so that they would not wrong the colonists and might be included in the peace; and his people would leave their bows and arrows behind when they came to the colonists. William Bradford wrote that the peace “hath now continued this 24 years.”⁠[8]

The account in Mourt’s Relation adds that the colonists would likewise leave their muskets behind when visiting Massasoit’s people and that King James would regard Massasoit as his friend and ally. Britannica’s article regards the alliance as John Carver’s major accomplishment.⁠[8][2]

William Bradford placed his death in April 1621: on a hot day, when the colonists were busy with their seed, he came out of the field very sick, complained of his head and lay down, and “within a few hours his senses failed, so as he never spake more till he died.” He was buried with volleys of shot fired by all who bore arms.⁠[3]

Britannica’s article gives the date of his death as April 15, 1621.⁠[2]

Katherine died five or six weeks after him, in May or June 1621; William Bradford called her “a weak woman.”⁠[3][9]

After his death William Bradford was chosen governor, with Isaac Allerton as his Assistant.⁠[5]

No will or inventory survives for either of them. Memorials of him note that he had considerable personal wealth and spent most of his estate in furthering the Plymouth venture.⁠[1]

Of Katherine’s other sisters, Frances married Francis Jessop in 1605 and Jane married the Leiden church member Randall Thickens in 1611. It is not known whether her first husband died before or after the move to Holland.⁠[1]

Of the six people who came with him, Roger Wilder died in the general sickness of the first winter; Desire Minter went back to England before 1623; William Latham, about twelve when he came, stayed some twenty years before returning to England and later went to the Bahamas; and the maidservant is believed to have become the second wife of Francis Eaton and died before 1626.⁠[9]

He signed the will of the Mayflower passenger William Mullins.⁠[3]

Pilgrim Hall Museum displays a sword attributed to John Carver, made of steel, iron, silver and wood, with decoration and workmanship typical of early seventeenth-century English swords. Ichabod Shaw of Plymouth gave it to the Massachusetts Historical Society in 1795, and it is on loan from that society to the Pilgrim Society.⁠[10][1]

The town of Carver, MassachusettsMassachusettsMassachusetts (officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts) is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States; its capital and largest city is Boston. One of the original 13 states, it ratified the U.S. Constitution on February 6, 1788, the sixth state to do so. Its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 7,029,917.Open the full entry, incorporated in 1790 from part of Plympton, takes its name from John Carver.⁠[11][12]

The New England Historic Genealogical Society’s sketch cites the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography’s judgment that he was “clearly one of the most respected members of the Mayflower contingent.”⁠[3]

The Commonwealth Museum’s exhibit text observes that although he was influential in organizing the voyage of the Mayflower, he died in the spring of 1621.⁠[13]

Pilgrim Hall Museum: Official website: https://www.pilgrimhall.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[14]

General Society of Mayflower Descendants: Official website: https://themayflowersociety.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[15]