A Relation or Journal of the English Plantation at Plymouth (Mourt’s Relation)
The first printed account of the Plymouth colony, published in London in 1622 from journals and letters sent home by the settlers. It includes a letter of 11 December 1621 that describes the first harvest and the visit of Massasoit.
The book was printed in London in 1622 from papers carried back on the first ship to return. It contains a journal of the landing and the first months, accounts of several journeys to the neighbouring peoples, and a letter headed as sent from New England to a friend. The letter is dated from Plymouth on 11 December and signed “E. W.”; Dexter, the editor, takes the writer to be Edward Winslow.
The letter says that after the harvest the governor sent four men fowling so that the company might rejoice together, and that many Indians came, among them “their greatest King Massasoyt, with some ninetie men”, who were entertained for three days and who killed five deer for the English. It was written to encourage friends in England to come or to invest, and it describes the colony’s relations with its neighbours at their best. It is cited in the Pilgrims Land at Plymouth.
Cited in
- 1620, firm date