The Conditions On The Mayflower: What Was It Like On The Famous Ship?

Our elementary school lesson about the pilgrims gave us a romantic view of the founding of the United States, but in fact, crossing the Atlantic at Mayflower was a torturous experience, crushing many people into a damp, damp ship. It was unnatural, smelly, and absolutely pathetic.

Mayflower think think you think you

The Mayflower was surprisingly small, only 25 feet wide and 106 feet long. The place where the passengers stayed was certainly small, about the size of two semi-trailers with a roof only five feet high, meaning that most pilgrims could not stand fully. In that small place, 102 people spent a month in the harbor and then more than two months at sea with zero privacy or insulation from the elements. The hard water of the North Atlantic seeps into the wood, holding the entire traveler's chili in a film of moisture, and the pilgrims practically fall asleep on top of each other. Some families tried to take out their own spots by hanging curtains, but they were not very effective. Even when a passenger named Elizabeth Hopkins gave birth to a son named Oceanus, the rest of the passengers could hear the entire result.

Chamber Pot in Westerwald Ceramics in the early 18th century.

A stinky ride

When nature said, the pilgrims aboard the Mayflower did not have a bathroom to run. We may find that shocking today, but in the 1600s, no one had a bathroom. People relieved themselves in outhouses or chamber pots, originally a fancy word for a bucket in a corner of the house that people uprooted to do their business. However, in the home, a degree of privacy was usually given - such a crowd was not on the Mayflower. Often, chamber utensils were emptied only when they were full, and even then, pilgrims did not have an abundance of cleaning supplies.

As if he was not very stinky, the pilgrims had to bathe on a ship without water for months, and many of them drowned in the sea. Like other bodily wastes, their vomit was collected in buckets, placed unilaterally in the passenger hold and emptied only when necessary.

Preserved hardtack from the American Civil War, Wentworth Museum, Pensacola, Florida.

Little food but enough

No luxury food was served on the Mayflower. The crew stocked the galley with fresh meat, vegetables, and fish before leaving England, but the Mayflower quickly molded his ruined sister ship, Speedwell, and their bread, after taking food from passengers as fresh as expected. ran out. Moist condition. It is simply preserved food, such as dried fish and salted pork, and hardtack, a type of biscuit whose lack of moisture gives it a longer shelf life but also a brick consistency.

It wasn't all bad: In the 1600s, it was thought that barrels of fresh water would deteriorate over time, so the pilgrims drank from a can of beer that pulled them off the double duty of keeping them hydrated and lifting their spirits. . They ate only twice a day for a total of 500 calories, and each lost about 25% of their body weight during the trip, but at least they were running around drunk the whole time.

Mayflower II, a replica of the original Mayflower, docked in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

It wasn't over when it was over

The pilgrim landed at Plymouth Rock in early November, just as a harsh New England winter was beginning. With no settlement on the land, the pilgrims opted to leave the langar in the harbor and stay on the ship knowing that they were all well and ill, possibly from that point through the winter. It turned out that they were not nearly as sick as they would be yet: Although only one person died while traveling across the Atlantic, more than half of the passengers, including a little Oshin Hopkins, died in Mayflower, because of the winter The disease spread through the passenger catch. The bitter cold and lack of food also did not help. Religious persecution probably did not seem so bad at that point, but again, it would need to go back.