Discover Gainsborough | A Sure Refuge – Mayflower Choral Commission

Composer David Fawcett has written ‘A Sure Refuge’, a major new 50 minute cantata reflecting on the Pilgrims’ story and its resonance today. David is a former student at Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School in Gainsborough and Head Chorister and Organ Scholar at All Saints’ Parish Church. He is also a choral director and professional musician.

This piece of work was commissioned by West Lindsey District Council supported by funding from Arts Council England.

The first performance will take place on Saturday 13 November at All Saints Parish Church in Gainsborough. For more information or to book click here. You can also visit www.davidfawcettcomposer.com/a-sure-refuge to listen to samples, and to read more about David’s cantata.

Continue reading “A Sure Refuge – Mayflower Choral Commission”

West Lindsey District Council recognises this historic date by raising awareness of the area’s links by contributing to the online documentary.

Wednesday 16 September is an important date in history, marking the 400^th anniversary of the sailing of the Mayflower.

Gainsborough has a special connection to the Mayflower anniversary through the Separatist movements that originated in this region, some of whom later led the journey to America.

Presented by well-known TV historian Dan Snow, the documentary will reflect the story of the Pilgrims’ roots and their journeys, the impact on the Native American people who helped them when they first arrived and the wider colonial context of the Mayflower’s voyage.

Continue reading “TV Historian Dan Snow Commemorates the 400th Anniversary of the Sailing of the Mayflower”

Coming to America

The Mayflower set sail for Virginia in September 1620 with around 130 passengers and crew. In late
November, the ship sighted land – but they were further north than planned. After a long voyage across the
Atlantic, the Pilgrims were just off the coast of Massachusetts.

Continue reading “Voyage”

Indentured passengers on the Mayflower

There were a range of different passengers on the Mayflower, a mixture of Separatist families and others sent to help establish a new colony by those sponsoring the voyage.

Continue reading “Servitude”

The Pilgrims leave England for the last time

The Mayflower set sail from Plymouth on the 16^th September 1620 – or the 6^th September according to Bradford’s diary (to explain, and just to make things a bit more complicated, in 1752, the Old Style Julian calendar was changed to the New Style Gregorian calendar we know today – 11 days were dropped from September and before that the year ended on 24^th March).

Many of the Separatist families from Leiden who had been on the leaky Speedwell were now on the Mayflower with other families, all setting off as colonists for a New World – new of course to them, but not to the indigenous people who had lived there for thousands of years.

Continue reading “Departure”

A tale of two ships: the Speedwell and the Mayflower

In the summer of 1620, the Separatists in Holland had decided which of them would sail first to America. They boarded the ship they had bought, the Speedwell, ready to join another ship hired in England, the Mayflower.

Bradford, their chronicler and later colony Governor, picks up the story as they depart from Holland:

“Thus hoisting sail, with a prosperous wind they came in short time to Southampton, where they found the bigger ship come from London, lying ready, with all the rest of their company. After a joyful welcome, and mutual congratulations, with other friendly entertainments, they fell to parley about their business…” Continue reading “Ships”

For “they knew they were pilgrims”: preparing for a voyage

Once the Separatists in Holland started to conclude they wanted to move on again from the homes they had established in Leiden, there was much work to be done.

They had lengthy discussions about where they should go. Some suggested Guiana while others preferred Virginia, where the earlier Jamestown colony had been established. They decided Virginia would be better, as Bradford recounts:

“Such hot countries [like Guiana have] grievous diseases, and many noisome impediments, which other more temperate places are freer from, and would not … agree with our English bodies … if they should there live, & do well, the jealous Spaniard would never suffer them long, but would displant or overthrow them, as he did the French in Florida … they should have none to protect them, & their own strength would be too small to resist so potent an enemy, & so near a neighbour.”

Continue reading “Pilgrims”

Religious riots, wars and rebellion in a turbulent Europe

The Pilgrims’ lives in Leiden began to become increasingly difficult and uncertain in the years running up to 1620. They had been accepted in the city, but there were other factions who they didn’t always agree with.

Continue reading “Debates”

To play the King: the Pilgrims continue to provoke James I

Even though the Pilgrims were now living in Holland, they were still at odds with the English authorities and the King, James I.

Leading Pilgrim and Elder William Brewster had set up a printing press with the financial support of another of their group, Thomas Brewer, in their new home city of Leiden. Brewster printed writings which helped spread the word about the Pilgrims’ religious beliefs. They wanted to bring about change, and believed that books were a good way to reach more people.

Continue reading “Sedition”

Life in Leiden

Many of the Separatists from the Gainsborough area and other places in England had escaped to Holland in 1608, and after a year in Amsterdam, they moved – under the leadership of Rev John Robinson – to the neighbouring city of Leiden.

Bradford, Separatist Pilgrim and later diarist of their lives and times, described their new home as, “a fair & beautiful city, and of a sweet situation, but made more famous by the university [there], in which of late had been so many learned men.” The University was definitely an attraction for some of their group, particularly Robinson.

Continue reading “Immigrants”