Would the Plymouth Colony Have Survived Without Women?

When I say I’m writing a book and start talking about my research on women’s history, people immediately start mentioning famous women.  They want to talk about Clara Barton, Mother Theresa, Ella Fitzgerald, Harriet Tubman, or Amelia Earhart. These women were wonderful and we should be proud of them. They opened doors and leveled the playing field for us by accomplishing great things.

Unsung Heroes

What about the unsung heroes --What about the women behind the scene, behind the man, behind the family, behind the community that do so much for others, should we not be honoring them? I am writing about the women who helped make it possible to settle Connecticut and for us to have a country today. You think that is too bold a statement? What if no women came here on the Mayflower and the Speedwell, and all the other ships that landed here in the 1600s? Would the Plymouth Colony have survived without women? It certainly wouldn’t have grown without their wombs to produce the children.

A Settlement of Men

Actually, there was one settlement that came after the Plymouth Colony and it was all men. Nathaniel Philbrick tells about it in Mayflower: A story of courage community and war. They were not family men and did not think about storing up food for the future. They lived for each day. Without women to garden, cook, make clothes, and everything else the women in the Plymouth Colony did, the men were lost on their own. They did not try to grow their own food, instead they stole from the Native Americans, which caused  violence. In the end, they perished. Some starved to death, others were killed by or went to live with the natives. I think a strong case can be made that if they had women with them there would have been more organization, more community and maybe the colony would have survived.

Valuable Diaries

Mayflower is a book every American should read. Philbrick’s research is extensive.  During his research, Philbrick had access to diaries of William Bradford, John Winthrop, and others that gave him insights into the temper of the period. We are fortunate today that many of these diaries have been printed and digitalized for Internet access. Unfortunately, there are few seventeenth century diaries by women. They didn’t have the time. Although most could read because it was required by the church that she read and teach her children to read the Bible. They didn’t, however, know how to write, which is evidenced by the fact they made a mark instead of a signature on legal papers.

I have always thought we do not honor enough the behind-the-scene people, who  help make things happen while others take credit. In the women’s magazine I published some years ago, we made it our mission to seek out unknown women and write about their everyday successes.

One of the reasons this project attracted me is how writers had totally ignored these women. Every time I looked at all the books written about the prominent men,  I could not help but question how prominent  they would have been if their wives had not performed as expected. The wives made their clothes befitting their positions, took care of their homes and children, and behaved according to the strict tenets of the community, making the men look good.

Who Were These Invisible Women that Helped Settle Connecticut?

One of the reasons I took on the task of writing about the history of the women of East Haddam was because they were invisible. Writing about invisible people is an exciting challenge.  Some of the families that I am researching came from Massachusetts to Hartford in the Connecticut Colony. For some of these women, there is absolutely no information at all on the local level. That means my research has to extend to other parts of New England.

Were There Horses?

When we think of Native Americans, we visualize them on horses but the New England tribes did not have horses at that time. The tribes in the plains had horses given to them by the Spaniards. Most sources say the New England colonists did not have horses. Yet, in John Winthrop’s letter to his wife during his 1630 voyage, he said they had horses abroad, along with the cows, sheep and swine.

I researched wills to see if any of these early colonists bequeathed horses and I could find none in the families I’m researching. It is a reasonable conclusion that the main group of colonists that I am following as they traveled from the Boston area to settle Hartford, Haddam and East Haddam did not have horses. In the book, I detail the facts to back up this supposition. Since the colonists did not have horses, they had to carry everything they needed to start a village. They were on a mission to start communities and “people” the land. 

 

For the women, this trek from Boston to Hartford was just as difficult (if not more so) than for the men at their sides. It was an arduous trip for all. Often the women had small children to carry and sometimes were carrying one in their womb as well. Yet, when you look at the Founders Statue in Hartford or the list of founders for Haddam and East Haddam, all you will see are the names of the men. Of course, that is how it was at that time. Now we need to change that and make these women visible.

Who Were They?

Who were these invisible women?  Mehitable (Spencer) Cone – 12 children, Hannah (Hills) Spencer – 13 children, Mary (Smith) Barnes – 8 children, Deborarh (Spencer) Hungerford – 9 Children, Sarah (Hungerford) Cone – 11 children, and many more. In the book, I profile approximately 70 women.

We need to pay attention to the contributions of the women that made the completion of the colonists’ mission to populate the land possible by having 8 to 12 children. This allowed each family to have a bigger farm and get more land. This caused trouble a few years later but that is another story.

In the Connecticut Colony, the size of a man’s estate (being land) dictated his importance in the community. A woman’s womb was a valuable commodity for raising sons to settle more land. 

Women at Risk

Considering that childbirth was the biggest killer of women at the time means that these women were risking their lives, time after time, to help build the family’s estate, a community and a state.

Of course, while these women were carrying and delivering these babies and then taking care of them as babies, they were also making the cloth to make the family’s clothing, planting and weeding the garden, making candles so they had light, milking the cow so she would have cream to make cheese and butter. She also had to bake the bread and make the meals. Just writing this has made me tired.

We should honor these women and that is why I am writing about them so they will no longer be invisible. My goal is to give them a face and a voice by telling their stories.