"Vivid and remarkably fresh... Philbrick has recast the Pilgrims for our age." --The New York Times Book Review

"We like our history sanitized and theme-parked and self-congratulatory, not bloody and angry and unflattering. But if Mayflower achieves the wide readership it deserves, perhaps a few Americans will be moved to reconsider all that." --Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post

How did America Begin?That simple question launches acclaimed author Nathaniel Philbrick on an extraordinary journey to understand the truth behind our most sacred national myth: the voyage of the Mayflower and the settlement of Plymouth Colony. As Philbrick reveals in this electrifying new history of the Pilgrims, the story of Plymouth Colony was a fifty-five year epic that began in peril and ended in war. New England erupted into a bloody conflict that nearly wiped out the English colonists and natives alike. These events shaped the existing communities and the country that would grow from them.

List of Maps

Preface: The Two Voyages

Part I Discovery

ONE They Knew They Were Pilgrims

TWO Dangerous Shoals and Roaring Breakers

THREE Into theVoid

FOUR Beaten with Their Own Rod

FIVE The Heart of Winter

SIX In a Dark and Dismal Swamp

SEVEN Thanksgiving

Part II Accommodation

EIGHT The Wall

NINE A Ruffling Course

Part III Community

TEN One Small Candle

ELEVEN The Ancient Mother

TWELVE The Trial

Part IV War

THIRTEEN Kindling the Flame

FOURTEEN The God of Armies

FIFTEEN In a Strange Way

SIXTEEN The Better Side of the Hedge

EPILOGUE Conscience

Afierword and Acknow/edgments

Appendix: Mayflower Passenger List

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Picture Credits