University of Rhode Island DigitalCommons@URI Open Access Master's Theses 2014 “BY GOODLY RIVER'S UNINHABITED” WATERWAYS AND PLYMOUTH COLONY Jordan Coulobme University of Rhode Island, jcoulombe@my.edu Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.edu/theses Recommended Citation Coulobme, Jordan, "“BY GOODLY RIVER'S UNINHABITED” WATERWAYS AND PLYMOUTH COLONY" (2014). Open Access Master's Theses.edu/theses/439 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@URI. It has been accepted for inclusion in Open Access Master's Theses by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@URI. For more information, please contact digitalcommons@etal.
“BY GOODLY RIVER'S UNINHABITED” WATERWAYS AND PLYMOUTH COLONY BY JORDAN COULOMBE A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS IN HISTORY UNIVERSITY OF RHODE ISLAND 2014 MASTER OF ARTS IN HISTORY THESIS OF JORDAN COULOMBE APPROVED: Thesis Committee: Major Professor Erik Loomis Timothy George Kristine Bovy Nasser H. Zawia DEAN OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF RHODE ISLAND 2014 Abstract The colonists of Plymouth were dependent on aquatic environments for the dispersal and acquisition of ideas, goods, and people. This thesis builds on of the work of Donald Worster and Michael Rawson amongst others to examine the importance of water in Plymouth Colony. Ultimately this study utilizes primary documents to argue that the abundance of aquatic environments in the colonies played a crucial role in allowing for the establishment of a permanent colony in New England.
The rise of environmental history over the past several decades presents a natural tool for analyzing the experiences of Plymouth's earliest settlers. Between the years of 1620 and 1640, Plymouth colony was little more than a struggling outpost whose future success was far from granted. Lack of food, isolation, low populations, challenging environmental conditions and threats from Amerindians and other Europeans proved incessant obstacles to the establishment of a stable colony. The Pilgrims overcome these challenges largely because of the abundance of aquatic environments located in the region.
Plymouth's settlers implemented these waterways for a variety of uses ranging from obtaining food and profit to fertilizing fields, establishing land ownership and maintaining their connections to England. While Plymouth's citizens intended to establish themselves on the terrestrial environments of New England, this process was invariably tied to the aquatic environments surrounding them. These waterways allowed the colony to survive and flourish and in the process Plymouth created a deep reliance on its aquatic resources that lingers on in modern New England. Placing colonial Plymouth under this environmental lens adds a degree of complexity to historical understandings of Plymouth by moving beyond the solely human elements of the colony's establishment and survival.
Accepting the environment as a historical actor is imperative to fully understanding the experiences of the earliest European colonists in the Americas. By reinterpreting Plymouth's history it is possible to gain a deeper understanding of human experience in New England while simultaneously reinforcing the interconnected nature of human and natural histories. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This thesis is the result of numerous contributions. As a young historian all that one can ask for is the support and guidance of those who have gone through the process before.
To say that I have been lucky in that regard would be an understatement. The faculty in the URI history department have expressed a constant interest in this project, providing ideas, asking questions and challenging my assumptions to help me expand and broaden the scope of the project. In particular Rod Mather, Evelyn Sterne, and Miriam Reumann have shown a tremendous amount of interest despite not being directly involved in the project. I've also been lucky enough to receive aid from outside of the URI faculty.
As always, Javier Marion at Emmanuel College has been an exceptional mentor and guide and has continued to provide feedback and support. The greatest thanks goes to the members of the Thesis Committee who have been incredibly invested in the whole process. Linda Welters' professionalism and organization has made her a fantastic Defense Chair. Kristine Bovy and Tim George have both been integral to the completion of this project by going out of their way to provide accessible and consistent feedback and support.
Their willingness to be flexible and their thoroughness in fulfilling their roles has been essential to the completion of this thesis and has made the entire process significantly easier. Finally Erik Loomis has been a tremendous mentor and guide throughout the whole process. His patience and support have been major factors in the completion of this project and his feedback has made me a better writer and historian. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ii.Table of Contents 1.Introduction: Revisiting Colonial Plymouth 13.Chapter 1: Aquatic Commodities 45……………………………………….Chapter 2: Aquatic Transportation 74……………………………………….Chapter 3: Aquatic Access 101………………………………………Conclusion: Why Plymouth Matters 106………………………………………Bibliography v Introduction: Revisiting Colonial Plymouth When William Bradford and the other colonists aboard the Mayflower first caught sight of Cape Cod in 1620 they were thrilled to have completed the arduous passage across the Atlantic, and yet apprehensive as to what New England had in store for them.
Bradford asked, “what could they see but a hidious and desolate wildernes, full of wild beasts and willd men?” Despite these fears they could not turn back from their chosen path as, “If they looked behind them, ther was ye mighty ocean which they had passed and was now as a maine barr and goulfe to seperate them from all ye civill parts of ye world.”1 The Atlantic Ocean stood as a barrier to the colonists, a seemingly insurmountable obstacle which, due to their lack of sustenance, could not be traversed. The ocean and the rivers running into it bent Bradford, Edward Winslow, Emmanuel Altham, John Pory and countless other Pilgrims and Englishmen to their will, dictating where and when they could travel, what types of resources they would have access too, and to a certain extent whether or not they and their colony would survive. Despite the immense control which these waterways held over the lives of Plymouth's earliest settlers they were also sources of life, survival, sustenance and opportunity. Rivers, streams, lakes, marshes and oceans amongst other landscapes provided countless needs to the settlers.
Fish and shellfish would go on to form the basis of the colonial diet. The fur trade helped the company pay its debts and remain financially viable. Sails and boats offered rapid transportation around the region on a network of rivers and coastlines, moving goods peoples and ideas around the 1 William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation, (Boston: Wright and Potter Printing Company, 1898), 96. Finally, aquatically shaped landscapes such as meadows and marshes, provided invaluable environments for the expansion of grazing and farmlands.
Maintaining access to these lands in the face of an increasingly privatized system of land ownership became an essential objective of both the colony's governing body and individual citizens. For these reasons the waterways of Plymouth were invaluable to the establishment and maintenance of the colony. The dependence on aquatic landscapes was pervasive amongst Plymouth's first settlers and would help in the creation of a long lasting, stable colony. The accounts of colonists such as Bradford and Winslow as well as some of New England's earliest chroniclers, William Wood, Thomas Morton and Francis Higginson, all convey a fascination with aquatic landscapes and the commodities that they held.
While a rich history of Plymouth's social and political development exists, few historians have concerned themselves with the environmental implications of colonial Plymouth. Such an approach reveals a colony which was dependent on water for its survival and growth, a truth which has become no less valid in America over the past four centuries. New England has presented a fertile ground for environmental historians. William Cronon, Carolyn Merchant and Theodore Steinberg, amongst others, have examined the region and its natural qualities in seminal works in the field.
Cronon's Changes in the Land remains one of the most important works in environmental history. Cronon's ability to place the environment at the center of New England's colonization helped establish environmental history as a legitimate field of historical 2 inquiry.2 Carolyn Merchant's theoretical revisioning of the relationship between women and the natural world added diversity to what has all too often been a male dominated field.3 Steinberg questioned the environment's role in industrialization, one of the defining developments in the history of New England. Steinberg's argument ensured that the environment remain an active player even in situations that seem to be dominated by human construction and development.4 This literature played a central role in establishing major ideas in environmental history, however more recently environmental historians have focused on other regions and time periods. Interest in New England has shifted further west to regions where environmental issues are more readily apparent.
Temporally, environmental historians have begun to shift their focus towards more recent issues. This geographic and temporal shift in focus has left countless opportunities for environmental studies of colonial New England. The rapid growth of environmental history over the past several decades has introduced new ideas that can prove highly valuable in an analysis of New England's past. The differing regions and time periods that environmental history has embraced have provided backdrops through which a variety of novel questions can be asked and examined.
Two crucial developments in the study of environmental history would be the spread of literature on issues of water as well as an increase in attention to energy consumption. These two topics have sprouted substantial amounts of literature each 2 William Cronon, Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England (New York: Hill and Wang, 1983), 15. 3 Carolyn Merchant, Ecological Revolutions: Nature, Gender, and Science in New England (Univ of North Carolina Press, 1989), 14. 4 Theodore Steinberg, Nature Incorporated: Industrialization and the Waters of New England, 1st pbk.
3 which can provide some insights into studies of New England. By applying frameworks which other historians have developed to colonial New England it is possible to both glean a deeper understanding of the Pilgrim experience and simultaneously reinforce the interconnectedness of human and natural history. Particularly important to any study of water would be Donald Worster's Rivers of Empire. Worster's analysis of the scarcity of water in the development of the West creates a framework that has universal applicability; how can the lack of a particular environmental characteristic impact the development of human institutions.
Worster argues that, “The American West is not so much a colony as an empire. Indeed, since the war it has become a principal seat of the world-circling American Empire.” Furthermore, of the causes of this empire, Worster states, “that they all begin and end with water.”5 Ultimately, in Worster's framework the control of a limited resource, in this case water, dictates the creation of an empire by centralizing power in the hands of those who control water. Worster's argument is convincing and in the context of modern droughts throughout the West, bears revisiting. However, Worster's argument also provides an alternative explanation for the development of a region.
If a lack of water can shape the development of a particular society, is it possible for an abundance of water to play a similar role? This question is entirely applicable to Plymouth Colony and New England as a whole. The region is characterized by an abundance of waterways, ponds, lakes, fountains and coastlines that are so ubiquitous as to be overlooked. As 5 Donald Worster, Rivers of Empire: Water, Aridity, and the Growth of the American West (Oxford, England ; New York: Oxford University, 1992), 15. 4 predominantly terrestrial creatures it is unsurprising that people tend to focus on the landscapes that they inhabit and the solid earth on which they generally stand.
While this is true of Plymouth, to ignore the abundance of water and its impact would be to ignore a fundamental component of Plymouth's settlement and development. Another highly applicable trend in environmental history has been the growth in histories of energy. Following energy transfers between organisms provides another highly tangible connection between natural and human histories.