The maiden voyage of the Mayflower II: Provincetown was first again

My knowledge of the world drops off sharply beyond the Orleans rotary, but the recent hullabaloo about the Mayflower II passing through the Cape Cod Canal really sizzled my synapses.

Thus, a steep learning curve began. I figured the "II" in the name of the ship was likely a clue that the original Mayflower had retired to The Villages in Florida and was raising heck on a tricked-out golf cart.

But that doesn't seem to be the case, although the fate of the original Mayflower appears to be murky, at least to a bumbling historical sleuth like me.

An intriguing possibility about what happened to the Mayflower was raised by noted historian and physician Charles Edward Banks in his 1929 book about the English ancestry and homes of the Pilgrims. Here's what he wrote:

"What finally became of her is an unsettled problem. Dr. Rendel Harris, an English historian of the Pilgrim ship, has published interesting material which he claims as proof that this historic vessel was finally broken up and her timbers used in the construction of a barn at Jordan's (village) in Buckinghamshire."

So let's assume the original Mayflower is no more. How the heck did folks come up with the idea to build a replica in the first place?

According to an account on the Plimoth Patuxet Museums website, a reproduction of the Mayflower "was always part of (founder) Harry Hornblower’s vision for Plimoth Patuxet Museums." The organization contracted a naval architect to cook up plans for a Mayflower-type ship in the early 1950s.

A similar plan was springing to life at roughly the same time in England, where a fellow named Warwick Charlton had founded Project Mayflower Ltd. "to honor the alliance of friendship forged between the United States and United Kingdom during World War II," according to Plimoth Patuxet.

Team Charlton read an article by Plimoth Patuxet's naval architect, which led to Plimoth Patuxet sharing their research and plans. The game was afoot!

According to his 2002 obituary in The Telegraph, an English newspaper, "Charlton was determined that everything about the ship and its voyage should be authentic."

The Mayflower II was built in Devon, England in the mid-1950s, as the creative Charlton was able to find all sorts of ways to finance the replica, including charging folks two shillings to get a look at the ongoing construction.

According to Charlton's obituary, "On April 20, 1957, amid much publicity on both sides of the Atlantic .... the 33-man crew, dressed as Pilgrim Fathers, set sail from Brixham. Powered solely by sail, Mayflower II took 54 days .... to cross the Atlantic, during which time the crew encountered a violent storm and a severe depletion of supplies. The beer ration was reduced to a bottle a day."

The final destination on the ship's maiden voyage was Plymouth, a seaside town located somewhere off-Cape. But all Cape Codders know that the original Pilgrims stopped in Provincetown first, and so did the Mayflower II.

The June 13, 1957 front page headline in the Provincetown Advocate newspaper read: "Mayflower II Makes Safe Harbor Here As Thousands Line Shore In Welcome."

Here's some of the Advocate story: "The Mayflower II rounded Long Point and headed into the harbor at 12:30 yesterday afternoon, 53 days out of England, thus marking Provincetown's authentic place in the history of the nation as the first landing place of the Pilgrims."

Local officials also stressed the Provincetown-first storyline: "Joseph Lema Jr., Chairman of the Board of Selectmen, reading from a scroll, said, 'You have attested your fidelity to history by stopping first in the waters of this ancient Town of Provincetown where your forefathers first touched foot on the soil of the Western hemisphere."

It seems the Pilgrim rivalry between Provincetown and Plymouth was still going strong back then. The Advocate article ends with this: "Whatever follows in Plymouth will be anti-climatic, Provincetown felt. For this original landing place the real story took place in the harbor, here."

Eric Williams, when not solving Curious Cape Cod mysteries, writes about a variety of ways to enjoy the Cape, the weather, wildlife and other subjects. Contact him at ewilliams@capecodonline.com. Follow him on X: @capecast.

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This article originally appeared on Cape Cod Times: History of the Mayflower II: Maiden voyage visited Cape Cod