You weren't told the whole story about the first Thanksgiving. It's not the one that kids hear in the government schools or in popularized American culture. Here's what really happened:
In 1620, 102 Pilgrims, Separatists from the Church of England sailed east across the Atlantic aboard the cramped 100 ft. "Mayflower" in a voyage that if compared with today, would be like a voyage to the moon. For 66 days they lived in an ill-lit, close-quartered, rolling, pitching, stinking, over-heated "below-decks"; the hatches battened down, the smell of the bilge in their nostrils, and the crew hostile towards Separatists. Cloistered in a space the size of a volleyball court, 102 people with their spiritual leader William Bradford endured the unendurable. Why? Because they wanted to worship God without the onerous legalistic restrictions imposed on them by England.
On the voyage over, just two people died. One was a crew member who repeatedly mocked the Pilgrims until one day he died and that silenced the rest of the crew for the rest of the voyage; and the other, because he refused orders to drink lemon juice and so died of scurvy. They were en route to the mouth of the Hudson River in a huge swath of territory extending from Virginia to New England called the "Virginia Plantation", uninhabited by Europeans, in near-absolute wilderness, but claimed and peopled by hostile Indian tribes. If they had landed where they were supposed to land, they would've certainly been slaughtered. But they were blown off course by hundreds of miles and forced to land in a place known today as Massachusetts, and in a region where, unknown to them, no tribe lived because all tribes feared that the land was cursed by a great Spirit who had wiped out all the former Pautuxet inhabitants. The Pautuxets were known by their neighbors as one of the most ferocious of tribes, who had also killed every white settler and explorer they had ever met. In the spring of that year a single Pautuxet named Squanto arrived in the Pilgrim camp and said in perfect English: "Welcome Englishmen! Do you have any beer?"
Squanto's entire Pautuxet tribe had been wiped out by disease while he was a prisoner on a ship bound for England. From the English he had been rescued by Spanish friars who taught him the rudiments of Christianity. Then he somehow managed to return to his homeland intending to rejoin his tribe. But when he returned and found them all dead, he wandered into the region of the Wampanoags. The Wampanoags hated the Pautuxets. Yet the Wampanoag chief Massasoit decided to spare Squanto's life and to let him live among them. When Chief Massasoit was told by Squanto of the Pilgrims' arrival, he sent him back to them with Samoset, one of his own braves, in order to find out more about them and how they dared live in a region cursed by what the Indian nations believed was a dread and unknown Spirit. When both Squanto and Samoset reported back to the Wampanoag chief what they had seen and heard, Massasoit decided to show mercy to the Pilgrims, likely because he feared that the great and unknown Spirit was protecting them. Chief Massasoit instructed Squanto to help the Pilgrims.
The Pilgrims knew next to nothing about survival in the American wilderness. They didn't know how to plant or hunt or fish, except by their experience in England. They would've likely starved to death. But Squanto taught them how to refine maple syrup, make popcorn, trap and trade in beaver pelts with surrounding tribes, fertilize the soil; and how to become economically successful. At the end of their second year there, by order of their governor, Wiliam Bradford, a day of thanksgiving was proclaimed in the autumn, and Bradford invited Chief Massasoit to celebrate with them. When Massasoit came, he brought more than twice as many tribesmen with him as the remaining Pilgrims (some had died). But fortunately he brought his own food too. He arrived a day too early and stayed 3 days too late. He was the guest who wouldn't go home, and he enjoyed himself immensely. And so this day of Thanksgiving was extended for 3 days more.
There were foot-races, games, shooting matches and sports, and by order of Governor Bradford the public giving of thanks to God, the Great Spirit that Massasoit so feared. And there they thanked God for Massasoit's kindness, too. And it was here that the Wampanoags heard the gospel of Jesus Christ for the first time.
[from: The Light and the Glory: Did God Have a Plan for America? by David Marshall & Peter Manuel, Fleming Revel]
When I was a little Jewish kid in third grade in the year they took prayer out of the government schools, my teacher Mrs. Helen Hunt made us all memorize this Thanksgiving poem. I still remember some of it today:
"The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers"
by Felicia Dorothea Hemans.
The breaking waves dashed high
On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods, against a stormy sky
Their giant branches tossed.
And the heavy night hung dark
The hills and water o'er,
When a band of exiles moored their bark
On the wild New England shore.
Not as the conqueror comes,
They, the true-hearted, came;
Not with the roll of the stirring drums
And the trumpet that sings of fame.
Not as the flying come,
In silence and in fear,
They shook the depths of the desert's gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.
Amidst the storm they sang,
And the stars heard and the sea;
And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang
To the anthem of the free.
The ocean-eagle soared
From his nest by the white wave's foam,
And the rocking pines of the forest roared -
This was their welcome home!
There were men with hoary hair
Amidst that pilgrim band:
Why had they come to wither there,
Away from their childhood's land?
There was woman's fearless eye,
Lit by her deep love's truth;
There was manhood's brow serenely high
And the fiery heart of youth.
What sought they thus afar?
Bright jewels of the mine?
The wealth of the seas? the spoils of war?
They sought a faith's pure shrine!
Aye, call it holy ground,
The soil where first they trod
They have left unstained what there they found -
Freedom to worship God!
In 1620, 102 Pilgrims, Separatists from the Church of England sailed east across the Atlantic aboard the cramped 100 ft. "Mayflower" in a voyage that if compared with today, would be like a voyage to the moon. For 66 days they lived in an ill-lit, close-quartered, rolling, pitching, stinking, over-heated "below-decks"; the hatches battened down, the smell of the bilge in their nostrils, and the crew hostile towards Separatists. Cloistered in a space the size of a volleyball court, 102 people with their spiritual leader William Bradford endured the unendurable. Why? Because they wanted to worship God without the onerous legalistic restrictions imposed on them by England.
On the voyage over, just two people died. One was a crew member who repeatedly mocked the Pilgrims until one day he died and that silenced the rest of the crew for the rest of the voyage; and the other, because he refused orders to drink lemon juice and so died of scurvy. They were en route to the mouth of the Hudson River in a huge swath of territory extending from Virginia to New England called the "Virginia Plantation", uninhabited by Europeans, in near-absolute wilderness, but claimed and peopled by hostile Indian tribes. If they had landed where they were supposed to land, they would've certainly been slaughtered. But they were blown off course by hundreds of miles and forced to land in a place known today as Massachusetts, and in a region where, unknown to them, no tribe lived because all tribes feared that the land was cursed by a great Spirit who had wiped out all the former Pautuxet inhabitants. The Pautuxets were known by their neighbors as one of the most ferocious of tribes, who had also killed every white settler and explorer they had ever met. In the spring of that year a single Pautuxet named Squanto arrived in the Pilgrim camp and said in perfect English: "Welcome Englishmen! Do you have any beer?"
Squanto's entire Pautuxet tribe had been wiped out by disease while he was a prisoner on a ship bound for England. From the English he had been rescued by Spanish friars who taught him the rudiments of Christianity. Then he somehow managed to return to his homeland intending to rejoin his tribe. But when he returned and found them all dead, he wandered into the region of the Wampanoags. The Wampanoags hated the Pautuxets. Yet the Wampanoag chief Massasoit decided to spare Squanto's life and to let him live among them. When Chief Massasoit was told by Squanto of the Pilgrims' arrival, he sent him back to them with Samoset, one of his own braves, in order to find out more about them and how they dared live in a region cursed by what the Indian nations believed was a dread and unknown Spirit. When both Squanto and Samoset reported back to the Wampanoag chief what they had seen and heard, Massasoit decided to show mercy to the Pilgrims, likely because he feared that the great and unknown Spirit was protecting them. Chief Massasoit instructed Squanto to help the Pilgrims.
The Pilgrims knew next to nothing about survival in the American wilderness. They didn't know how to plant or hunt or fish, except by their experience in England. They would've likely starved to death. But Squanto taught them how to refine maple syrup, make popcorn, trap and trade in beaver pelts with surrounding tribes, fertilize the soil; and how to become economically successful. At the end of their second year there, by order of their governor, Wiliam Bradford, a day of thanksgiving was proclaimed in the autumn, and Bradford invited Chief Massasoit to celebrate with them. When Massasoit came, he brought more than twice as many tribesmen with him as the remaining Pilgrims (some had died). But fortunately he brought his own food too. He arrived a day too early and stayed 3 days too late. He was the guest who wouldn't go home, and he enjoyed himself immensely. And so this day of Thanksgiving was extended for 3 days more.
There were foot-races, games, shooting matches and sports, and by order of Governor Bradford the public giving of thanks to God, the Great Spirit that Massasoit so feared. And there they thanked God for Massasoit's kindness, too. And it was here that the Wampanoags heard the gospel of Jesus Christ for the first time.
[from: The Light and the Glory: Did God Have a Plan for America? by David Marshall & Peter Manuel, Fleming Revel]
When I was a little Jewish kid in third grade in the year they took prayer out of the government schools, my teacher Mrs. Helen Hunt made us all memorize this Thanksgiving poem. I still remember some of it today:
"The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers"
by Felicia Dorothea Hemans.
The breaking waves dashed high
On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods, against a stormy sky
Their giant branches tossed.
And the heavy night hung dark
The hills and water o'er,
When a band of exiles moored their bark
On the wild New England shore.
Not as the conqueror comes,
They, the true-hearted, came;
Not with the roll of the stirring drums
And the trumpet that sings of fame.
Not as the flying come,
In silence and in fear,
They shook the depths of the desert's gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.
Amidst the storm they sang,
And the stars heard and the sea;
And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang
To the anthem of the free.
The ocean-eagle soared
From his nest by the white wave's foam,
And the rocking pines of the forest roared -
This was their welcome home!
There were men with hoary hair
Amidst that pilgrim band:
Why had they come to wither there,
Away from their childhood's land?
There was woman's fearless eye,
Lit by her deep love's truth;
There was manhood's brow serenely high
And the fiery heart of youth.
What sought they thus afar?
Bright jewels of the mine?
The wealth of the seas? the spoils of war?
They sought a faith's pure shrine!
Aye, call it holy ground,
The soil where first they trod
They have left unstained what there they found -
Freedom to worship God!
