Turkey, parties, and harvest plenty. Many classrooms throughout the U.S. have a basic tale they share with the children. Kids learn to make turkeys out of paper plates or cardboard cut-outs with their hands. Few, however, relate some of the real struggles early colonists had trying to survive in the New World.
For those given to a certain reading of history, Thanksgiving marked that early time when Europeans began their colonization of the Americas and a massive genocidal insurgency.[1] Indians were portrayed as a bunch of friendly, peace-loving folk that help the Pilgrims survive. Pilgrims were simply “oppressive colonizers.”[2] The Pilgrims, and those after them, got all their land from the Indians either through deception or force, as Indians allegedly had no view of property rights and so were duped into various transactions with Europeans.
This popular narrative is completely wrong.
First, the background of the colonists in the New World was diverse. For the most part, those who came here had a common Christian background, but those who settled in the different parts of America had various denominational differences. To say those from each of these denominations didn’t like each other is an understatement. Those in Virginia were predominantly Presbyterian and royalist supporters. Pilgrims, who landed at Plymouth Rock, were separatists (from the Church of England) who were fleeing religious persecution. Those in the rest of New England tended to be Puritans. These Puritans were Anglicans who wanted to purify the Anglican Church from within. They ended up eventually absorbing the Pilgrims. Those who settled in Pennsylvania were Quakers and those in Rhode Island were Baptists.
Here is the time line for when each group moved to the nation that would come to be known as the United States:
1607- First English colony established at Jamestown (although briefly abandoned for the year 1610)
1620- Pilgrims arrive in Plymouth
1629-1640- Puritans moved to Massachusetts
1642-1675- a few English aristocrats and large number of their servants moved to Virginia
1675-1725- English from the North Midlands and Wales settled in Delaware
1718-1775- Immigrants from Yorkshire, Scotland, and Northern Ireland moved inland to the Appalachian backcountry[3]
Those who arrived in the American colonies arrived with political charters. They did not think they had a property right to America, but they had political rights. This meant they would have the opportunity to negotiate with the natives for land. Over time, and for different reasons, they’d find many Indians willing to do just that.
Note that prior to the American Revolution, the vast number of Europeans in the Colonies were east of the Appalachians. Native Americans occupied most of what we call America today.
Colonists traded metal weapons and instruments, unknown in America prior to the Europeans (contrary to the Mormon narrative), to Indians in exchange for tobacco, food, and land. The American Indians were happy to do so as they had an abundance of land, and had no metal-ware at all. Moreover, some Indians were savvy enough to know that the European settlers could form a barrier against aggressive Indian tribes that started moving into their areas. This was a strategic advantage for many tribes, and caused a loss of many Colonial lives.
Secondly, many who made the crossing to the new world died either on the journey or soon after arriving. Of those on the Mayflower, five died during the crossing and forty-five of the one hundred and two died the following winter. They had lost half those who had come across from their number.
The dangers were numerous. Of these dangers, William Bradford writes of the Indians after their crossing, “but these savage barbarians, when they met with them (as after will appear) were readier to fill their sides full of arrows than other wise.”[4]
The area around where the Pilgrims landed was inhabited by a tribe known as the Wampanoag. There was another fierce and war-like tribe in the area known as the Pequots. The Wampanoag, led by Massasoit, decided to make a treaty with the Pilgrims to aid them if they were attacked and in exchange the Pilgrims would aid them in case of an attack. As we know from history, the Pequots eventually warred against the Colonists. Contrary to the popular understanding, the Pequots were not wiped out in a genocidal massacre, though they were defeated.
Third, notwithstanding the threat of Indians, there were also problems related to shelter and food. Those initially arriving in the colonies had agreed to a type of contract expressed later by Karl Marx, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”
This is how Bradford describes it:
“The experience that was had in this common course and condition…may well evince the vanity of that conceit of Plato’s…the taking away of property, and bringing in community into a common wealth, would make them happy and flourishing; as if they were wiser than God. For his community (so far as it was) was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For the young men that were most able and fit for labour and service did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children, without any recompense. The strong…had no more division of victuals [i.e., food] and clothes, than he that was weak and not able to do a quarter the other could; this was though injustice.”
Bradford’s description is typical of socialist states today. Everyone receives an equal amount regardless of whether or how hard they work. Many among the colonists thought this was unjust. This experience in the Plymouth Plantation was not unique. Jamestown also had a similar social organization in the beginning and saw its population reduced from around five-hundred to sixty in 1609-1610.
Those in Plymouth faced many challenges their first summer of 1621. Historian Richard Maybury records that they suffered not only from a famine, but also had among them many thieves. He explained Bradford’s point that these were men who were not working that took to stealing food from the crops at night when they were barely able to be eaten. The first Thanksgiving meal was, in his words, “the last meal of condemned men.”
Bradford then explains that “God in his wisdom saw another course fitter for them.”[5] This came through giving to “every family a parcel of land, according to the proportion of their number for that end…and ranged all boys and youth under some family. This had very good success; for it made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than other ways would have been by any means the Governor or any other could use, and saved him a great deal of trouble, and gave far better content. The women now went willingly, into the field, and took their little ones with them to set corn, which before would allege weakness, and inability; whom to have compelled would have been thought great tyranny and oppression.”[6]
The incentives that came from the property caused people to freely produce more than could have been had from the tyranny of coercion. This motivated women, who claimed beforehand to be too weak or unable, to work the fields along with the men. As a result, not only did those in the colony have plenty, they made enough to begin to export their goods.
Those who founded our nation suffered many trials. They have
left us some important lessons that should not be forgotten. Along the way they
learned that peace, property, and freedom caused everyone to prosper. The first
Europeans give us yet another historical reminder against the claim that
socialism, redistribution, and war can bring utopia. Let us make sure to
educate each new generation about history, human nature, and economics to
ensure that never again will hundreds of millions of lives to be lost to
socialist planners.
[1] The ABC sitcom Single Parents highlighted this recently with a teacher who greets students with “Happy Genocide Day.”
[2] This mischaracterization is seen in an episode of The Simpsons.
[3] Adapted from Tom Woods, The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History, 1.
[4] William Bradford, History of the Plymouth Plantation: http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/bdorsey1/41docs/14-bra.html
[5] Ibid.
[6] Ibid.
Leave a Reply