The ships Anne and Little James facts for kids

In 1623, two important ships, the Anne and the Little James, sailed to Plymouth Colony in America. They were sent by a group of investors in London called the Merchant Adventurers. These ships followed the famous Mayflower in 1620 and the Fortune in 1621, bringing more people and supplies to the new colony.

The Anne was bigger and carried most of the new settlers. The Little James was much smaller and mainly carried goods, though it also had a few passengers. After a long, stormy three-month journey from London, the Anne arrived at New Plymouth in early July 1623. The Little James arrived about a week later.

Together, these ships brought over 90 new settlers. Some of these new people would help the colony grow and succeed. Others found the tough life in the colony too hard and were sent back to England.

The Ship Anne

The Anne was a supply ship that weighed about 140 tons. It arrived in 1623 with the Little James to bring many new settlers to Plymouth Colony. The Anne was the larger of the two ships, and most of the passengers traveled on her.

The captain of the Anne was William Peirce. He was a young man from London and a member of the Adventurers investment group. Captain Peirce had sailed across the Atlantic Ocean many times before. William Bradford, who was the governor of Plymouth Colony, wrote that the Anne arrived on July 10, 1623. The Little James arrived about a week after that. Soon after arriving, the crew of the Anne loaded timber and beaver skins onto the ship. Then, they sailed straight back to England.

The Ship Little James

The Little James was a pinnace, which is a small ship that uses sails or oars. It weighed about 44 tons and was brand new when it sailed to America. Governor Bradford said it was "a fine new vessel" built to stay in the colony. It was much smaller than the Anne, about a quarter of its size. It probably had a crew of no more than fifteen men.

The captain of the Little James was Emmanuel Altham, a young Adventurer who was 23 years old. He was from a wealthy family in England but was new to sailing. For the actual sailing, the ship had an experienced sailor named John Bridges. The main goal of the Little James's trip to New Plymouth was to carry company goods. However, it also carried about fifteen known passengers. Later, Governor Bradford wrote that the investors might have been too proud of the ship because "she had ill success."

When the crew of the Little James joined the voyage, they agreed to stay in Plymouth Colony for six years. They were supposed to be shareholders, not paid workers. This meant they hoped to earn money from a share of the ship's profits from fishing and trading. The ship's investors were supposed to pay for the crew's food, drinks, and clothes.

The Little James had six small cannons and six muskets for its armament. The cannons could fire a ball weighing a few pounds. Because the ship was armed, the crew thought they could capture enemy ships from countries like France or Spain. They hoped to find these ships as far south as the West Indies. But the crew was disappointed. They learned that to capture enemy ships, they needed special permission from the King, called "letters of marque." The Little James did not have these. On the way to Plymouth, Captain Altham refused to capture a French ship. This made his crew very upset.

Two crewmen on the Little James caused a lot of trouble: a gunner named William Stephens and a carpenter named Thomas Fell. Both knew how much the ship needed their skills. After arriving at New Plymouth, they saw that the colony looked poor and the colonists seemed lazy. The crew felt they had been tricked. Stephens and Fell then led the crew to refuse to work, demanding an immediate cash payment. Governor William Bradford managed to calm them down by offering to pay them himself.

While working along the New England coast, the Little James faced two big problems. First, the investment company (Adventurers) did not give the ship any goods to trade. This made it almost impossible to get valuable furs to send back to England. Second, the ship was "rudely manned" by a crew unhappy with their pay. They were paid in company shares instead of regular wages.

The Merchant Adventurers had hoped the Little James would earn back their money by trading furs. Furs were the only truly profitable item. But finding furs turned out to be very difficult. By late 1623, things were not going well for the Little James's purpose. It sailed around Cape Cod and as far as modern Rhode Island to trade with Native Americans. But Captain Altham did not have the good quality trade items the natives wanted for furs. He also could not compete with the Dutch traders, who offered better prices.

When the Little James returned from Rhode Island, the weather was calm. So, the captain anchored the ship at the entrance to Plymouth harbor. But a strong windstorm, called a gale, suddenly started. The ship lost its anchors. It was heading towards a dangerous sandbank. To save the ship, the crew cut down the main mast and cut away the ropes. With its mast and ropes gone, the ship anchored again. The anchors held until the wind changed, allowing the ship to enter the harbor. The company had to give the Little James a new mast, anchors, and ropes. The ship spent the rest of the winter of 1623 in Plymouth Harbor. It was freezing, and the crew had very little food, mostly wild birds, and only cold water to drink. During that long, harsh winter, discipline on the Little James completely broke down.

The Wreck of the Little James

In the spring of 1624, Captain Altham took the Little James east to Maine. The crew was still unhappy, hungry, and refusing to obey orders. While anchored at Pemaquid for fishing and trading, the crew openly rebelled. They threatened Captain Altham and master Bridges with destroying the ship. The crew forced Altham to go back to New Plymouth in a small boat to find food.

With help from a senior Pilgrim named Edward Winslow, Altham quickly returned to Pemaquid with some bread and peas. They were only a day's sail from the Little James when they found that another storm had damaged the ship. It was in the harbor at Damariscove Island (now in Maine), where English sailors had a small fishing station. On the night of April 10, 1624, during another storm, the ship lost its anchors again. The wind and waves forced it to crash onto rocks and tip over.

As the ship tipped, two large holes opened in its structure. Master John Bridges drowned in the wreck. Two crewmen, John Vow and Peter Morrett, died when their escape boat flipped over and was hit by the Little James's falling main mast. Stephens and Fell again refused to help save the ship.

Luckily, the captains of several other ships in Damariscove harbor were there. They inspected the Little James wreck and found it could be saved. They contacted William Bradford, offering to save the ship if the Colony paid them in beaver skins. Bradford sent the furs, and work began. Ship carpenters made large, watertight barrels. These barrels were tied to the Little James. As the water rose, the barrels helped lift the ship off the rocks. Everyone worked to pull the ship to a safe place. Craftsmen then made repairs, which cost the Company a lot of money. Within six weeks of the shipwreck, the Little James was ready to sail again.

However, by this time, the investors were very frustrated. The Little James's problems had become very expensive to fix, instead of making a good profit as planned. At this point, William Bradford decided to send the ship and its crew back to England.

The wreck was a tragedy not just for the ship but also for its captain. In the wreck, the ship lost its four small boats, which were very important for coastal trading. It also lost its salt, codfish, and all its supplies and trading goods. Captain Altham lost all his valuable books and most of his belongings.

When the ship finally reached London, Fell and Stephens left it "in a very unruly way." They also quickly sued the investor group and Plymouth Colony for forty pounds. This was for wages that William Bradford had supposedly promised but not paid. The money they demanded was equal to 4-6 years of wages. This was despite the fact that they had refused to help the ship and other crew when they were most needed.

Court Cases in November 1624

Disagreements about the Little James began as soon as the ship arrived back in England. The High Court of Admiralty, which handled matters at sea, took control of the ship and all its goods. This was done while the lawsuits were decided. Two of the biggest investors in the Pilgrim's company, Thomas Fletcher and Thomas Goffe, had put most of the money into building and equipping the Little James. They now wanted to own the ship to cover that debt. On top of this, crewmen Stephens and Fell wanted their unpaid wages.

Caleb Johnson, a well-known author who writes about the Mayflower, researched English records about the Little James situation. He found many official statements and other court records from the case of Stephens and Fell against the Little James. These records included statements from Edward Winslow.

People who gave statements to the Court included:

• Edward Winslow, a Mayflower passenger and sometimes governor of Plymouth Colony.
• William Peirce, the captain of the Anne.
• Benedict Morgan, a passenger on the Fortune.
• Robert Cushman, a leader of the Leiden group.
• James Sherley, an investor in the company.

In his statements, Edward Winslow confirmed that when the Little James arrived in New England, Edmund Altham was captain and John Bridges was master. He also confirmed that the captain and master complained about the troublesome crewmen Stephens and Fell. Winslow knew about their dispute over wages. He also heard that the two men did not help during the wreck at Pemaquid. This wreck caused the loss of the ship's equipment and supplies worth a lot of money. He also spoke about the loss of four small boats and another boat due to the crew's carelessness. He also mentioned an instance of Stephens behaving badly in Plymouth.

In another statement, Edward Winslow said he was an investor in the colony. He confirmed that Stephens was the gunner and Fell was the carpenter when the Little James arrived. He also confirmed their wage dispute. He stated that when the ship sank, all the ship's food supplies were lost. But the crew members who stayed with the ship were given necessary food by nearby fishermen. Winslow also heard that when the ship sank, some people nearby wished the crew members would "go into the Country and work for their passage." Some did, while others stayed and helped save the ship.

By the trading season of 1625, the Little James was sailing the Atlantic again to help Plymouth Colony. Investors had sent her and another ship to fish for cod. At that time, the Colony owed a lot of money. To pay these debts, they needed to send three thousand beaver pelts to England. This was far more than they could collect. But the Colony did arrange for the Little James to carry about five hundred beaver furs back to England to help pay their debts.

However, the Little James's bad luck continued. The cargo never reached its port in England. Somewhere in the English Channel, almost within sight of the English coast, the Little James was captured by pirates. All its cargo was taken. The valuable beaver pelts were sold very cheaply in the pirate markets of Algiers or Tunis in North Africa.

The Little James was built to stay in New England and could have helped the colonists greatly with trade and fishing. But it seemed to have endless bad luck. This included a lack of support from investors, a crew that refused to obey orders, a shipwreck, being taken by a court in England, and finally being captured by pirates. Losing the ship hurt the Pilgrims a lot. Their harvests were good, but their trade was not. They lacked ships to carry on trade with England and could only send small amounts of fur pelts home.

The Passengers

Governor Bradford later remembered that about 60 people, including men, women, and children, were on the Anne and Little James combined. However, the actual number of passengers was much higher. There are no separate lists for the Anne and the Little James. Those who came on these ships were grouped together in official records when land was divided for them in 1623. Author Charles Banks identified at least four men, three with families, who were passengers on the Little James. Banks also suggested that the Little James might have had more passengers, but its small size limited how many it could carry.