Today, the Pilgrim Tercentenary Commemorative Silver Half Dollar Coin remembers when the men from the Mayflower stepped on Plymouth Rock looking for a suitable settlement location.
Through the years, there has been controversy about the date and about who stepped on the rock first.
This article from the Congregational Quarterly of April 1870 provided a view into that day 396 years ago:
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John Alden and Plymouth Rock.
Rev. John A. Vinton sends us historical memoranda relating to “The Landing of the Pilgrims,” from which we make some extracts which will throw light upon an historic event, and perhaps dissipate some of the romance hitherto surrounding it.
He says, “In an obituary notice of a deceased clergyman, not long since, it was said, ‘He was a lineal descendant of John Alden, known in the history of the Pilgrims as the youth who first leaped upon the Rock at Plymouth.’
Being myself ‘a lineal descendant of John Alden,’ and as strongly inclined as anyone to maintain his right to honors which are justly his due, I am nevertheless constrained by the respect due to authentic history to say that the tradition here referred to, and which has been repeated with undoubting confidence perhaps thousands of times, is utterly without the least foundation.
“The facts touching the ‘Landing of the Pilgrims,’ as we have them in ‘Mourt’s Relation,’ are these. The company, of one hundred and one persons, who came in the Mayflower to Provincetown harbor, November 11, 1620, O. S., after sending out two exploring parties, and being dissatisfied with their reports, dispatched a third party to find, if possible, a fit place for settlement.
“This party left the Mayflower in a shallop, on Wednesday, December 6, answering to December 16, New Style, and consisted of the following individuals: Myles Standish, John Carver, William Bradford, Edward Winslow, John Tilley, Edward Tilley, John Howland, Richard Warren, Stephen Hopkins, Edward Doten; being, as the account says, ‘ten of our men, who were of themselves willing to undertake it.’ Besides these, were two hired seamen, John Allerton and Thomas English, Clarke, the master’s mate, and pilot of the Mayflower, Robert Coppin, the gunner of the vessel, and three common sailors, — seventeen in all.
“This party, after exploring the inner shore of the peninsula of Cape Cod, found themselves on Friday evening under the lee of Clark’s Island, in Plymouth harbor. Having on that day encountered a severe storm, and broken the mast of their shallop, they stayed all Saturday on the island to refit.
“They also spent the next day, the Sabbath, on the island, although the weather was inclement and time was precious.
“On Monday, December 11, answering to December 21 of the New Style, they landed on the Rock of Plymouth, not to make a settlement, as is commonly supposed, but to see whether the place was fit for a settlement to be made.
“What did they on that day? ‘On Monday we sounded the Harbour, and found it a very good Harbour for our shipping; we marched also into the Land, and found divers corne fields, and little running brookes, a place very good for situation, so we returned to our ship again with good news to the rest of our people, which did much comfort their hearts.’
“In other words, they examined Plymouth harbor and its shore, from Eel River, in Plymouth, to Jones River, in Kingston; decided on this as the place for settlement, and on the following day, Tuesday, December 12, in their shallop, struck across the bay to the Mayflower, still in Provincetown harbor, a distance in a straight line of about twenty-five miles.
“Let it be carefully noted: 1. That no landing was effected on what is now proudly called ‘Forefathers’ Day,’ except for the purpose of exploration. 2. John Alden was not of the company who landed on Plymouth Rock on said Forefathers’ Day. 3. Mary Chilton was not of that company, nor any other woman, and so that romantic story about her landing has no foundation. 4. The Mayflower did not come into Plymouth harbor till Saturday, December 16 (26). 5. The Mayflower continued in that harbor at anchor, from that time all winter long, without landing her entire company. For, 6. The company of the Pilgrims, especially the women and children, abode in her the greater part of the time, except those who were employed in putting up buildings on the shore, and these seem to have returned to the vessel every night. 7. The ‘Landing ‘ was not completed till Wednesday, March 21, corresponding to the last day of that month by our present reckoning.
“It is far from my thoughts to disparage the ‘Landing of the Pilgrims.’ It was a most memorable event, entitled to all the consideration which has ever been given to it. But there was no such affair as has commonly been imagined to have taken place on the 21st or 22d of December, 1620. Sargent’s picture of the ‘Landing,’ which now hangs in Pilgrim Hall, in Plymouth, and the engravings copied from it, represent a myth, a mere fancy, and wholly mislead the beholder.
“John Alden the ancestor of nearly all who bear the name in this country, and of a still greater multitude bearing the names of Adams, Bass, Copeland, Delano, Peabody, Sampson, Standish, Thayer, and I know not how many more, was born in England about 1599, and died in Duxbury September 12, 1687, aged eighty-eight.
“He was not of the Leyden Church, but joined the company of the Mayflower at Southampton, where the ship stopped for supplies. He was probably the youngest of those who signed the immortal compact of civil government in the harbor of Provincetown, November 15, 1620, as he was certainly the last male survivor of that glorious company. He was almost constantly in public employment, and was a man of sound wisdom, of great integrity, and high moral worth.”
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The Pilgrim Tercentenary Commemorative Silver Half Dollar Coin shows with an artist’s image of the men spending the Sabbath on Clark’s Island.
