Welcome to What You Didn't Hear. On today's episode,
we're taking a deep dive into William Bradford,
the first governor of the Plymouth Colony, and
the very first Christmas for the Mayflower Pilgrims.
So come jump in with me while we explore how
the governor of Plymouth stole Christmas. When
we hear about the pilgrims at Plymouth, the story
almost always gravitates towards the first Thanksgiving,
which took place the year after they made landfall
in 1621. But tucked away in the history books
is a much smaller, stranger story, Governor Bradford's
quiet little war against Christmas. So let's
dig into what actually happened on Christmas
Day in 1621 in Plymouth Colony. After multiple
delays and a failed attempt to depart England
in August of 1620, the Mayflower and its sister
ship, the Speedwell, finally set out in early
September. But after even more complications,
the Mayflower was forced to continue alone. This
meant their arrival in the Americas came much
later in the season, and left the Pilgrims facing
a brutal winter with limited supplies and almost
no shelter. On November 19th, they spotted present
-day Cape Cod. They attempted to sail south toward
the colony of Virginia, where they were actually
supposed to settle, but harsh storms forced them
back. On November 21st, they dropped anchor near
what is now Provincetown Harbor. On December
7th, the first scouting party went ashore to
search for a suitable location to build shelters.
But they were wildly unprepared for winter conditions
far harsher than anything they'd faced in England.
It's safe to assume that without the help of
the local native people, the Plymouth colony
would have likely been a complete failure. Nearly
half of the Mayflower's crew didn't survive the
winter, and only 53 of the original 102 passengers
lived to see the spring of 1621. While the passengers
remained on the Mayflower through the worst of
the cold and sickness, the crew and able -bodied
men went ashore to build shelters and gather
food, with crucial assistance from the Wampanoag.
It was bleak, it was tragic, so when I approach
the episode about the governor who stole Christmas,
I do so with full respect for how desperate their
situation really was. Surviving the first winter
was only half the battle. The beliefs that shaped
this colony ran just as deep as the cold. And
those beliefs, they didn't leave much room for
Christmas cheer. A good portion of the Mayflower's
passengers were separatists fleeing the Church
of England to build a society rooted in strict
Puritan religious practice. Others were hired
laborers, servants, farmers, or businessmen hoping
for opportunity in New England after the failed
attempt to reach Virginia. In the 1600s, Christmas
traditions in England weren't far off from what
we recognize today. Feasts of roasted meats and
sweets, evergreen decorations, drinking and gambling,
singing, and general merrymaking. But Puritans
rejected these celebrations. Since the Bible
didn't explicitly instruct Christians to observe
Christmas or Easter, they refused to recognize
either holiday. For them, December 25th was simply
another day of labor. A journal entry from the
Mayflower reads, Monday, the 25th day, we went
on shore, some to fell timber, some to saw, some
to rive, and some to carry. So no man rested
all that day. While men went ashore to work on
the Plymouth plantation, others who remained
aboard the ship dipped into the Mayflower's beer
stores and celebrated quietly in their own way.
Just enough to acknowledge the holiday, but not
enough to challenge Puritan authority. And that
brings us to the next December, when Plymouth
had finally found a bit of stability, and welcomed
a brand new group of colonists who brought their
own ideas about how Christmas should be celebrated.
Fast forward one year to 1621. The colony has
survived and new settlers have arrived, and suddenly
William Bradford finds himself facing something
that the deadly winter had not prepared him for.
Holiday spirit. In early November of 1621, a
new ship arrived at Plymouth. Most of the passengers
weren't seeking religious refuge. They were seeking
opportunity. These newcomers brought with them
the Christmas customs that Bradford and the Puritans
found rowdy and irreverent. Only a few weeks
after what we now call the first Thanksgiving,
work remained constant. winter preparation was
in full swing and bradford routinely sent every
able -bodied man out to gather wood but on december
twenty fifth and sixteen twenty one a number
of the newcomers objected to the governor's orders
from william bradford's journal he refers to
himself in the third person as the gov and he
writes on the day called christmas day the gov
called them out to work as was used But most
of this new company excused themselves and said
it went against their consciousness to work on
that day. So the Gov told them that if they made
it a matter of conscience, he would spare them
till they were better informed. So at first,
Bradford agreed to let the non -Puritan newcomers
observe the holiday, assuming, of course, that
they would do so quietly in their homes in reverent
prayer. But when Bradford returned from his morning
work, He did not find prayerful reflection. He
found sports, singing, games, celebration, all
out in the open. Again from his journal. When
they came home at noon from their work, he found
them in the street at play openly, some pitching
the bar and some at stoolball, and such like
sports. So he went to them and took away their
implements, and told them that this was against
his consciousness, that they should play while
others work. He warned them that if they wanted
to treat the day as a sacred observance, then
they needed to stay inside and observe it. There
would be no gaming or reveling in the streets.
Their games were confiscated and the men were
put to work like everyone else. In the years
that followed, the Puritans formally banned Christmas
celebrations altogether, imposing a five -shilling
fine on anyone caught observing the holiday.
There is no real record of this penalty being
enforced, mostly because Christmas celebrations
quickly faded out after this incident. The ban
would eventually be repealed in 1681, and almost
two centuries later, in 1870, Christmas was officially
recognized as a federal holiday in the United
States. So what really happened that December
day in 1621? In a colony born from hardship,
faith, and sheer endurance, Christmas wasn't
the warm, twinkling celebration we imagine today.
It became instead a flashpoint, a moment where
cultures, beliefs, and expectations collided
on the frozen streets of Plymouth. William Bradford
didn't set out to steal Christmas, but in his
drive for order, unity, and Puritan discipline,
he certainly shut it down. Yet this small episode,
this confiscation of stoolball bats and bars,
reminds us that history is built just as much
from tiny, very human moments as from grand events
like the Mayflower Landing or the First Thanksgiving.
The story of the governor who stole Christmas
isn't just a quirky footnote. It reveals the
tension between personal freedom and communal
survival, between religious conviction and cultural
difference. and between what the pilgrims wanted
their new world to be, and what it was quickly
becoming. And while the Puritans may have succeeded,
at least temporarily, in keeping Christmas out
of Plymouth, the holiday, and all its music,
feasting, revelry, and play, would eventually
return to New England with a vengeance. Thank
you for taking this deep dive with me into a
lesser -known chapter of early American history.
If you enjoyed learning what you didn't hear
about the first Christmas in Plymouth, be sure
to follow the show, leave a review, and join
me next time as we uncover more stories hiding
between the lines of history. Until then, stay
curious.