400 years since The Mayflower: The Cooper

What did my 10x great-grandfather do for a living? Where did that profession lead him?

Family member name: John Alden
Tree branch: Smith
Lifetime: 1598 - September 12, 1687
Relation: My 10x great-grandfather (my dad's mom's dad's mom's mom's mom's mom's mom's dad's mom's dad's dad)

John Alden was 21 years old when a group of families approached him to join the crew of the ship that would take them across the ocean.  He met them in Southampton, England. Little did he know they were to be called the Pilgrims, and they were inviting him on a historic journey on the Mayflower that would change his life.  

Why did the Pilgrims want him to come along? He was a cooper.

coop·er

/ˈko͞opər,ˈko͝opər/

Learn to pronounce

noun

1. a maker or repairer of casks and barrels.

The cooper was a necessary position on any ship. He maintained all barreled supplies and provisions.

* Do you want your food to stay fresh and airtight, and therefore, not die of hunger?

* Do you want your precious beer to stay in the barrel and not leak out?

If the answer is yes, you need a qualified cooper.  They made many different containers from small buckets to large barrels, or casks.  The casks were made of wood planks and metal hoops that bound the planks together.

As a crew member of the Mayflower, and not a Pilgrim, he was expected to return to England when the ship went back in the spring.  However my 10x great-grandfather decided to remain in Plymouth and on April 5, 1621 watched the boat sail away.  He may have made his decision early on, since he was a signer of the Mayflower Compact, which was written when they arrived in November 1620.

The cooper would establish himself as a valuable member of Plymouth Colony. He and his wife Priscilla would have 10 children, of which I am one of tens of thousands of descendants.

Sources:

Wikipedia: John Alden
Colonial Coopers

Visiting the cemetery in Duxbury, MA with my dad.

400 years since the Mayflower: Captain Shrimp

I'm so disappointed.  

The one thing that I've always known about my heritage is that I'm a descendant of those who came over on the Mayflower, the Pilgrims.  The only ancestor's name I knew for many years was Myles Standish and I was proud of that ancestry.

But I just read up on Grandpa Myles.  Sigh.

Family member name: Myles Standish
Tree branch: Smith
Lifetime: 1584-1656
Relation: My 10x great-grandfather (my dad's mom's dad's mom's mom's mom's mom's mom's dad's mom's dad's dad)

The good news

* Myles Standish was hired by the Pilgrims as a military adviser.  

* Admittedly, he agreed to go on a very dangerous journey across the ocean in 1620, from which many before him had not returned. And he stayed in Plymouth when he had the option to return.

* He did his job.  He protected them in many situations.  For example, he forced them to build a protective wall around the village and organized the men into a militia.
* He was loyal to the Pilgrims.

The bad news

* He was not a Pilgrim, but instead accompanied the Pilgrims.  He did not emigrate to the new world for religious freedom.  It was a job.

* He was very short.  He was called Captain Shrimp.  Yes.

* What a psychopath!  On one mission to defend another small European village called Wessagusset, he brutally killed one of the threatening warriors, and brought the head of another back to Plymouth and displayed it at the fort for months to come.  He did this because that Indian had insulted him beforehand.  These actions had negative consequences on the Colony and the friendly local Indians for years to come.

In summary, Captain Shrimp was a loyal, non-Pilgrim sadist.  But yes, he came over on the Mayflower, and he is my 10x great-grandfather.

Standish is a well-known name in Plymouth County, Massachusetts to this day.  Here are some pictures of when my dad and I visited in 2012.

Standish Monument and my dad.  Duxbury, MA

Plaque for the Myles Standish burying ground.

The gravestone of Myles Standish.  Died 1656, Duxbury, MA.

A visit to Salem gone bad

Last night was a great episode of Genealogy Roadshow on PBS!  They actually had a lady on the show who wanted to know if the family legend was true that her relative, John Alden Jr, was involved in the Salem witch trials.  Whaaaaaattt??  My peeps!!

Family member name: John Alden, Jr.

Lifetime: 1626-1702
Tree branch: Pearson
Relation: My 10th great-uncle (my dad's mom's dad's mom's mom's mom's mom's mom's dad's mom's mom's brother)

John Alden, Sr. is my 10th great grandfather.  He was a Mayflower passenger.  His son, John, was born in Plymouth in 1626.  Johnny Jr. is not my direct ancestor (he's an uncle) so I probably would never have found this information.  So glad it was featured on TV!

Turns out Johnny was strolling through Salem on his way back from Quebec one day and a schoolgirl he never met accused him of being a witch.  Bam!  Talk about out of the blue!

John Jr. ended up spending four months in prison in Boston till he was busted out by some friends.  He got out of Dodge, realizing hysteria prevailed in the area and there was no hope of a fair trial.  He stayed away until 1693, when he went back to Salem after they stopped executing people. (!)

The charges against him were dismissed.

John Alden, Jr. was a well-known public figure in his time but is now chiefly remembered as a survivor of the Salem Witch trials, of which he wrote a much quoted account.  Click this link to read his firsthand account.

This is me visiting John Alden Sr.'s home in Duxbury, Massachusetts.  It's a national historic landmark and museum.

Source: 

Thought Co. - John Alden Jr. and the Salem Witch Trials