Mayflower Passengers – Katharine White Leggatt (Leggett) Carver and John Carver
Week Five – January 29 – February 4, 2024
Influencer Prompt
While I have a number of ancestors who I believe were influencers in my life, I thought I would take a different route today and head back into my maternal family’s history to my 11th great-aunt and her husband thereby incorporating some history in the process. She is not a direct ancestor but rather one of my collateral ancestors.
Women are often marginalized figures in history. History mostly centers on men. However, the women who stood with the men are just as important as influencers. I will begin with Katharine.
Her name was Katharine White Leggett Carver, and she was a passenger on the Mayflower! Katharine White was born between the years 1574 and 1582, the eldest daughter of Alexander White and his wife, Eleanor of Sturton-le Steeple, Nottingham, England. Katharine was a prominent woman in the English Separatist church in Leiden, Holland.
Soon after her father’s death in 1596 Katherine married George Leggat in England, a member of a yeoman family who had long settled in Sturton. From that union a daughter, Marie, was born. Her husband, George, eventually passed away leaving Katharine a widow. In the course of a few years, she relocated to Holland, and she remarried John Carver around 1615-16. Within a year they had a child, however the child died in November of 1617 and was buried in Leiden.
Katharine’s sibling were also members of the Separatist church, her sister Bridget married to Leiden congregation’s pastor, John Robinson. Her sister Jane was married to Randall Thickens, her sister Frances to Francis Jessop, and her brother was also married to a prominent church member.
John Carver, born 1576 in Nottinghamshire, was a wealthy London merchant who emigrated to Holland in 1607 or 1608 because of religious persecution in England and soon joined the Pilgrim church in Leiden. John married a French Walloon, Marie de Lannoy. He had taken up residence in Leiden more than six years before the Pilgrims had arrived to settle there. He and Marie may have been one of the original members of the Scrooby congregation. John became a prominent member of the Pilgrims’ church in Leiden. Unfortunately, Marie died in 1609 during childbirth.
It was there where he presumably met the widow Katharine White Leggat. In the course of a few years, she married John Carver around 1615-16. Within a year they had a child, however the child died in November of 1617 and was buried in Leiden.
Eventually John became the agent for the Pilgrims in securing a charter and financial support for the establishment of a colony in America and organized the Mayflower voyage of 102 souls to the New World, having landed at Plimouth (Plymouth) Rock in 1621. He was probably responsible for choosing Plymouth as the site for settlement and for making the treaty of alliance with Chief Massasoit of the Wampanoag tribe in 1621.
John Carver became the first governor of the Mayflower and the Plymouth Colony. He signed the Mayflower Compact on November 11, 1620, and the same day was elected to a one-year term as governor.
Now, a little history about the group of Separatists to which Katharine and John belonged:
The Separatists were a group of religious farmers and traders many of whom lived around the village of Scrooby in Nottinghamshire while others came from other parts of southern England. They were Protestants who wished separate from the Church of England and what they viewed as the retention of elements of the Roman Catholic Church. The Separatists, distinct from those Puritans who preferred to remain within the Church of England in order to purify it, wished to establish their own independent congregations where they would have the freedom to worship as they saw fit. Amongst other disagreements they rejected the idea of a Common Prayer Book preferring to pray in their own words, they also rejected the liturgy of the
Anglican Church and all outward displays of devotion. Since there was no separation between church and state, they were open to charges of treason. Persecuted for their beliefs by King James I, they sought refuge abroad. They attempted to flee to Holland in 1607 but the ship captain betrayed them, and they were arrested. A year later they made another attempt to flee to Holland and finally arrived in 1608 but without the women and children who were left behind and imprisoned before they were able to follow later.
Several groups of dissenters were already living in Amsterdam where they managed to find fault with one another’s interpretation of religious doctrine. One group decided to leave the city and travel south to Leiden. They were led by John Robinson, Richard Clyfton, and William Brewster. The city was a center for a large number of refugees, many who fled religious persecution, and the group found work in the growing textile industry. Robinson applied for permission for about one hundred followers in February 1609. The permission was granted on the condition that the group obeyed the city laws and caused no trouble. Although work was available, many of the workers were poor, as the pilgrims had been agricultural workers and the trade in textiles were new to them.
It was there where he presumably met the widow Katharine White Leggat. Eventually he became the agent for the Pilgrims in securing a charter and financial support for the establishment of a colony in America and organized the Mayflower voyage of 101 souls to the New World, having landed at Plimouth (Plymouth) Rock in 1621. He was probably responsible for choosing Plymouth as the site for settlement and for making the treaty of alliance with Chief Massasoit of the Wampanoag tribe in 1621. John and Katherine, along with two-man servants, a boy servant, a maid servant, and a young boy named Jasper More were among their traveling party.
The Mayflower Pilgrims (Separatists) are said to have taken the practice of civil marriage, that they practiced in Leiden with them to the Plimouth Colony. Knowledge of electing local government was another feature of Leiden life that the pilgrims are thought to have taken with them.
John Carver became the first governor of the Mayflower and the Plymouth Colony. He signed the Mayflower Compact on November 11, 1620, and the same day was elected to a one-year term as governor.
Life was extremely difficult and challenging for the 102 Pilgrims once they arrived on Cape Cod and then sailed on to safer harbors in Plymouth, founding the Massachusetts Bay Colony. It took 66 days to cross the Atlantic Ocean on the Mayflower, the usual time was 42 days.
There was no water to drink, just beer and wine, even for the children because the water in Europe had been tainted, polluted, and unsafe. Water was only used for cleaning. The alcohol began to run out due to the long voyage and during the early days of the colony. People became ill from forced detoxification and withdrawal, often times dying from the process. Eventually they learned how to distill alcohol from corn thereby easing the withdrawal of the settlers. Finally, they also learned that the water in the colony was safe to drink. Later there was the introduction of tea and boiled water.
The colonial diet, especially in New England, was based on corn which could be made into cornbread, corn pudding, corn soup, and muffins. Wild game supplemented the diet, as well as fresh fruit. Vegetables, in general, were thought to promote illness unless thoroughly cooked.
Sweet potatoes were eaten, but the belief was that anyone who ate them daily was not expected to live past seven years of their first taste of the vegetable.
It was in this hostile environment that my 11th great-grand aunt and her husband lived. Illnesses, common infections, disease, weather, and wild animal attacks were rampant. Therefore, it was of no surprise that more than half of the original 102 settlers were dead by the next year.
John and Katharine survived the harsh winter of 1620-21. Unfortunately, John Carver, died in 1621 from “sunstroke” while working in the fields and the following spring and his wife, Katharine succumbed a few weeks after John’s death reportedly of a “broken heart.” They had one child together who did not survive prior to the undertaking of the voyage to America.
So, what do you think? Were John and Katharine influencers, or just part of a group of religious worshipers seeking freedom to practice their religion? Sheep following the shepherd? My thought on the matter is that John was undoubtedly an influencer because he arranged and helped to finance immigration. Katharine also had to be an influencer especially to the women of the Mayflower. In fact, every one of those Mayflower passengers was a bold influencer in our present lives.
Today much of the history of our Mayflower ancestors has been diluted, the history books in our schools touch briefly on their lives, either by choice or because of time allotted in our curriculums. But let us never forget those first 102 influencers who are the ancestors of over thirty-five million current present-day Americans.
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