Despite difficulties and controversy, the colonists set sail
The preparation of the voyage presented practical problems the Pilgrims were ill equipped to solve. The small number who sold their Leyden property to convert it into shipping and stores, had no experience along this line, and their ineptitude made Mr. Weston “merry with our endeavours about buying a ship....” Edward Pickering was the most knowledgeable of them in trade, but his money was not forthcoming, even though Cushman and Weston had expected him to furnish “many hundred pounds.” Pastor Robinson gave voice to pained surprise when he discovered that at the time his flock had turned over the money raised from their scanty possessions, Weston still withheld his own money and had taken absolutely no steps to provide shipping.
The preparations in England bogged down while three purchasing agents scattered their efforts to round up supplies, Cushman in London and Kent, and Carver and Christopher Martin at Southampton. Martin was an Essex man, a newcomer chosen to represent the “strangers” from Essex and London whom the adventurers had recruited to swell the ranks of the planters. He had taken part in settling the terms and was charged with keeping track of matters at Southampton. This was a poor choice, for Martin insulted the Leyden people, whose ways he probably despised. When Cushman later called for an accounting and took up cudgels for the complainers, Martin called them “froward and waspish, discontented people.”[7]
In spite of all the “clamours and jangling” about the business end of the voyage, there was one important accomplishment during the few anxious months before the Mayflower (180 tons) and the Speedwell (60 tons) sailed from Southampton on August 5, 1620. Between £1200 and £1600 was raised to cover the expedition’s costs. Carver spent £700 of this at Southampton. Unfortunately we do not know how much was supplied by any particular investor. The £50 put in by Martin, Cushman considered insignificant. £500 which the Ferrars, probably John and Nicholas, prominent in the Virginia Company, had promised and then, for some reason, withdrawn, is the only single large investment mentioned. The amount John Carver furnished is not specified, but he was credited by a later writer with having put in most of his considerable substance. With seventy-odd “Gentlemen ... Merchants ... [and] handy craftsmen” subscribing to the partnership, most investments are likely to have been small. At the last minute the party had to sell butter worth £60 to pay off a debt of £100. They left port dangerously short of supplies, a fact which, as Cushman predicted, added to their hardships in the New World.
Their financial difficulties also caused a fateful delay in beginning their voyage. The August departure date was already too late to allow time for crossing the Atlantic and building shelter in mild weather. When the Speedwell, leaky and overmasted, forced the ships to put back to land, a score of discouraged passengers withdrew from the voyage. The Mayflower, now crowded with the entire group, departed from Plymouth, leaving Robert Cushman behind to serve as chief agent with the adventurers.