Most Americans who know much of anything about the Mayflower and Plymouth Colony remember at least two key events: the signing of the Mayflower Compact when the Pilgrims first arrived in Plymouth in 1620, and the “First Thanksgiving” the following year. Some people also will remember the name William Bradford,
Most everyone in America today associates the city of Salem, Massachusetts with the infamous Salem Witch Trials, which took place in the year 1692. But I invite you to travel back even further in time, almost seventy years, to the year 1624, when a man named Roger Conant arrived in
The Harrisons were one of the most prominent Virginia families of the 17th and 18th centuries, including two U.S. Presidents, William Henry Harrison (1773-1841) and Benjamin Harrison (1833-1901). During the era of the Jamestowne Colony, members of the Harrison family were leading citizens, including Benjamin Harrison III, who died this
One of the most important passengers on the Mayflower in the year 1620 was William Brewster, who died this day on April 10, 1644. He was one of the original “Separatists” from Northern England who, in the early 1600’s, migrated to the Netherlands seeking religious freedom. The English Separatists remained
Among the most stalwart of the Separatists who lived through the entire saga of the Mayflower voyage to North America was Francis Cooke, who died this day on April 7, 1663 at the advanced age of about 80. Unlike most of the Separatists who journeyed to Plymouth Colony on the
What modern historians call the “Indian Wars” most often is understood to refer to the late 19th century wars of the Great Plains, including major events like the Battle of Little Big Horn, the Battle of Wounded Knee, etc. But the history of “Indian Wars” extends back to the early
Pilgrim Monument, Provincetown, Massachusetts We’ve written about several leaders of Plymouth Colony, including Mayflower passengers William Bradford, William Brewster, and John Howland. Another Plymouth leader deserving of our commemoration is Thomas Prence, who was not a Mayflower passenger, but whose long service to the Colony was unmatched: he was the
In the early years of the Jamestowne Colony, one of the families that became a dynasty of sorts over the course of the next century was the Byrd family. It began with the arrival of William Byrd I in 1669. He became a prominent member of the House of Burgesses,
One of the most important supporters of early American colonization was King James I of England, who died this day on March 27, 1625. We honor him today for all that he did to promote the earliest English settlements in North America, and to oversee the development of thriving English
In this year of commemorations of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, we at AHP want to honor our Founding Fathers who established our democratic republic, and in particular the several Founding Fathers who went on to serve as Presidents of the United States: George
We’ve written several articles about the mounting tensions between the North and South during the first half of the 19th century, much of which turned on the question of whether the newly created western territories (by virtue of the Louisiana Purchase) would allow slavery, and whether new states admitted to
Buffalo Bill, born William Frederick Cody on this date in 1846, was an American soldier, bison hunter, and showman who became one of the most famous figures of the American West. He earned the nickname “Buffalo Bill” after hunting thousands of bison to help feed railroad workers building the Kansas
The history of Plymouth Colony begins with the landing of the Mayflower in 1620, and ends with the Colony’s absorption into the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1691. In between these two events, hundreds of English settlers came to the Colony to make new lives, and several generations of Americans were
When people think of Highland warriors, they often imagine Scotland’s misty glens, tartan, and the Jacobite rebellions. Yet one of the final Highland charges in history took place not in the Highlands, but in North Carolina during the American Revolution. In 1774, Flora Macdonald — the legendary woman who helped
This year we commemorate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It was signed in the midst of the American Revolution, which would not officially end until Great Britain and the United States signed the Treaty of Paris on September 3, 1783. We know, of course,
The Dawes Act We’ve written a number of stories about the slow and steady erosion of Native-American tribal lands in the 19th century due to the encroachments of white settlers—the natural consequence of American government policies encouraging and enabling western expansion in the name of “Manifest Destiny.” One major piece