Beheld by TaraShea Nesbit

February 18, 2020

Beheld by TaraShea Nesbit

Plymouth Colony was founded on the premise of religious freedom for all, but that’s not exactly how things played out.  The Puritans were the governing class and persecuted the non-Puritans, particularly the Anglicans, who had traveled to the New World with them.  Ten years after the colony was founded, the division between Puritans and Anglicans was deeper than ever as former indentured servants became entitled to own land in the community.  When a parcel of land that John Billington, an Anglican, wished to purchase was given to a newly arrived Puritan, Billington killed him in a drunken rage.  These are the historical facts behind the novel.

Contrary to what we were taught in elementary school, not all of the Mayflower pilgrims were seeking religious freedom, nor were they all of the same faith or unified in their desire to create a new colony.  Many came for other reasons:  adventurers seeking economic gain, craftsmen who were necessary to build the new colony, indentured servants seeking a new start and the opportunity to own land which would have been impossible in England.  The Mayflower was actually the ship commissioned to carry the non-Puritans, but when the Speedwell, the Puritans’ ship, was abandoned in England, the Puritans were forced to join the non-Puritans on the remaining ship or be left behind. 

Told from the viewpoints of two women who lived in Plymouth, this is a fresh and interesting look at the colony.  The governor’s second wife Alice Bradford and John Billington's wife Eleanor came from opposite ends of the social spectrum.  Both describe the unrest, resentment and hypocrisy that the colonists experienced, with ever-stricter laws and harsher penalties.  The women’s only concern is life within the colony, and although the local native Americans are mentioned, there is no interaction between the two groups.  The dependence on their husbands is evident in both women’s stories, as are the hardships that women in particular faced in colonial America.

It was interesting to learn that just a few miles away from Plymouth was the community of Merrymount, where the residents drank, danced, and celebrated May Day and Christmas, all of which went against the strict rules that governed Plymouth.

Governor William Bradford completely ignored the contributions and voices of women in his book Of Plymouth Plantation, a sanitized version of the founding of Plymouth colony.  While many of the characters were real historical figures and the crime and trial depicted in the book actually happened, obviously the dialog and some of the actions are fictional.  I recommend this anyone interested in a well-researched re-telling of colonial history.

Many thanks to Juliet Graemes at Bloomsbury Publishing for sending me an ARC in return for a review.