The Pilgrim Story / Being largely a compilation from the documents of Governor Bradford and Governor Winslow, severally and in collaboration; together with a list of Mayflower passengers.

by William Franklin Atwood

With this in view a party of thirty set forth on Dec. 7, “for the better discovery of this place.” They found signs of Indian habitation also “more of their corn and of their beans of various colors. The corn and beans they brought away proposing to give them good satisfaction when they should meet with any of them (as about 6 months afterward they did, to their good content).” “And here it is to be noted a special Providence of God, and a great mercy to this poor people that here they got seed to plant them corn the next year or else they might have starved, for they had none, nor any likelihood to get any until the season had been past (as the sequel did manifest).”

Not finding the desired harborage or place for permanent settlement this party returned to the Mayflower.

During their absence and while the Mayflower lay in the Harbor of Provincetown, a son was born to Susanna White, wife of William White. He was named Peregrine.

THE SHALLOP ARRIVES AT PLYMOUTH
The Landing

Wed. Dec. 16

On the sixteenth of December another party set out in the shallop “upon further discovery intending to circulate that deep bay of Cape Cod.” This party consisted of Myles Standish, John Carver, William Bradford, Edward Winslow, John Tilley, Edward Tilley, John Howland, Richard Warren, Stephen Hopkins, Edward Dotey, John Allerton, Thomas English, the ship’s mates, Mr. Clark and Mr. Coppin, and the master gunner and three sailors.

“The weather was very cold and it froze so hard as the spray of the sea lighting on their coats, they were as if they had been glazed.”

Proceeding as far as Wellfleet they discovered a party of “ten or twelve Indians very busy about a black thing,—what it was we could not tell,—until afterwards they saw us, and ran to and fro, as if they had been carrying something away. We landed a league or two from them where we made us a barricade and got firewood and set out sentinels and betook us to our lodging, such as it was.” This landing was at Eastham ten miles distant.

Thurs. Dec. 17

When morning came the company was divided, eight cruising along shore in the shallop while the remainder explored the land bordering thereon. They came to the spot “where they saw the Indians the night before and found they had been cutting up a great fish like a grampus.” (small whale or blackfish).