The Women Who Came in The Mayflower

by Annie Russell Marble

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Biography, Womens Studies, Classics, Historical

44 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1920

Reviews

[Josephine M Morris · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Women Who Came on the Mayflower

Some of these people were my ancestors and it was very interesting to read about what is known of the women in the group. Much has been written about the men so this was great to read.

[Addie · Rating 4 out of 5]

While this was quite short it still had some great information & cute stories about the Pilgrims who sailed on the Mayflower. At times the text was a bit slow, but not boring.

[SheLove2Read · Rating 1 out of 5]

I had hoped this would be an account of some of the brave and courageous women who came to this land on the Mayflower in the 1600s. It was and it wasn't. This reads more like a college term paper than a novel or historical document. Women are mentioned in this book but just in short snippets and never at any length. Huge disappointment.

[Susan Molloy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Surprisingly, this is a fairly good book about the women and girls who came to North American on the Mayflower. It tells about the strength of those women, the types of clothing they wore, their roles in the infant society, their relationships between the men and within their families, and their educational levels. Throughout this book, there is discussion about the men and boys in the settlement, too, and this is important to buttress that with the women’s roles.

This book is not the final word on The Women Who Came in the Mayflower, but it is a good jumping off point for further reading.

Following are a few excerpts:

Disease stalked among them on land and on shipboard like a demon. . . .
Fifteen of the twenty-nine women who sailed from England and Holland were buried on Plymouth hillside during the winter and spring.

All the men and grown boys were expected to plant and harvest, fish and hunt for the common use of all the households. If food was scarce, even a worse condition existed as to clothing in the summer of 1623. The women must have been taxed to keep the clothes mended for their families as protection against the cold and storms.

There is an interesting tidbit. Captain John Alden, “like his sister, Elizabeth . . . had thirteen children. He was once accused of witchcraft, he was present at a trial, and was imprisoned fifteen weeks without being allowed bail.”

And, some things do not change except for dates and centuries:

The first duel on [was on] June 18, between Edward Lister and Edward Dotey, both servants of Stephen Hopkins. Tradition ascribed the cause to a quarrel over the attractive elder daughter of their master, Constance Hopkins.

I enjoyed reading this, although at times it is a bit dry in spots.
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🟣Kindle version.

[Dale · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are some parts of this book which give interesting insights into the lives of the early Pilgrims. Mostly it seemed to be lists of names and dates, which might be interesting from a genealogical perspective but makes for difficult reading.

[Johnyfive · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very boring, the title is misleading.

This was more about the men who came to America, not the woman. It was mainly just lists of names. This book is outdated and a forced read.

[Allison · Rating 5 out of 5]

I strongly recommend this concise and informative book for fans of Early American History, Women's Studies and/or Genealogy that leads to or might lead to The Mayflower.

During the Covidity (Spring 2020-Summer 2021 and it isn't over as of August 2021), I have been able to spend considerably more time working on our family genealogy than I've been able to for many years. As a result, I have recently confirmed that my children are descendants of The Mayflower on their late father's side, and I have recently formed suspicions about a couple of my own ancestors possibly being Mayflower descendants. In my research, I came across several references to this well-written and well researched book. I was delighted to discover that not only did my public library have a copy in its collection, it was available for checkout despite being an original first printing from 1920.

Annie Russell Marble deserves a great deal of credit for her efforts bringing this book, which is a tremendous resource, into creation and publication. After reading this work, I am interested to know more about her and to know if she wrote anything else. This is a great example of text that is essentially a record of the earliest female American immigrants told through the lens of Women's Studies at a time before the discipline, as such, existed.

Marble recognized that not only was the story of these women missing from the narrative history and traditions surrounding the earliest settlement of Massachusetts by colonists but she recognized its importance - especially its importance for the women of America in the earliest part of the 20th century.

As a genealogical resource, there are many details included about the women, their children and some of the men who arrived on The Mayflower as well as those who arrived later on The Ann and The Fortune.

The only things missing that I would have appreciated are passenger lists for the ships and family trees for the passengers discussed in the book. The passenger lists are easily enough found today online and in other easily obtainably resources. But honestly, the family trees are my own personal and selfish wish. And, today, they can be hunted down through other resources both online and in print.

However, the book was not written to be strictly a genealogical resource. At the time of publication, the addition of family trees could've easily doubled the number of pages of the book. In turn, that would have driven up the cost of publication significantly. I can imagine that sort of expense could have hindered publication and distribution. Furthermore, it is so well-written that it will not be difficult for me to extract and assemble information in the format most useful for my needs.

I will be looking to add this one to my personal collection in the future.

[James Crawford · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author notes this is not so much an examination of particular women as it is an examination of the culture of the settlers at the time. The author starts out talking about the conditions they settlers faced on the sea and then after they landed. 1621-1623 are the specific years the author is looking at.

There were 29 women on the first ship, and fifteen of them died during the winter and spring. Disease was a major problem, as was the cold temperature. Around twice as many men died during the same time period.

When the Mayflower was set to depart back to England, none of the colonists wanted to return. The family became the central focus of the settlers. The author then discusses the food they were able to get and the building of houses and a fort

There was a duel over a woman and both young men were somewhat injured. The first Thanksgiving Day actually lasted for three days. The arrival of the second ship is then covered. There was a drought, and then two more ships arrived in 1623.

The author then goes into how the colony received further ships and then expanded outward. He also goes into what happened to specific women and men in the colony.