Mayflower was the ship that carried the first Pilgrims to America, in 1620. The ship also carried a group of “strangers” who did not follow the Separatist religious practices of the Pilgrims. The Mayflower was built around 1610 and probably had three masts and two decks. It probably measured about 90 feet (27 meters) long and weighed about 160 long tons (163 metric tons). Its master, Christopher Jones, was a quarter-owner.
The Mayflower left England on Aug. 15 (Aug. 5 according to the calendar then in use), 1620, with another ship, the Speedwell. After turning back twice because of leaks on the Speedwell, the Mayflower sailed alone from Plymouth, England, on September 16 (September 6), with 102 passengers. The ship reached Cape Cod on November 21 (November 11), off what is now Provincetown Harbor. It reached the present site of Plymouth, Massachusetts, on December 26 (December 16), five days after a small party explored the site.
The Mayflower left America on April 15 (April 5), 1621. Historians are not certain what happened to the ship after it returned to England. A 1624 appraisal of the ship following Jones’s death describes it as “in ruins.”
The Mayflower II, built the way the original Mayflower is thought to have looked, is kept in Plymouth, Massachusetts. In 1957, it crossed the Atlantic in 54 days. The Britons who built the replica gave it to the American people as a symbol of friendship.
