An account
In the cabin, before they came ashore.
The Compact was signed in the cabin of the ship, on the eleventh day of November, 1620 — off the tip of Cape Cod, in the colder weather of the new world. Its language is plain. Its work is durable.
The descendants of its signers have kept its memory in dinner rooms and parlors for the four hundred and six years that have followed.
In the name of God, Amen. We whose names are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, &c.
Having undertaken for the Glory of God, and Advancement of the Christian Faith, and the Honour of our King and Country, a Voyage to plant the first Colony in the northern Parts of Virginia — do by these Presents solemnly and mutually, in the Presence of God and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil Body Politick, for our better Ordering and Preservation, and Furtherance of the Ends aforesaid; and by Virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts, Constitutions, and Officers, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general Good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due Submission and Obedience.
In witness whereof we have hereunder subscribed our names at Cape Cod the eleventh of November, in the Reign of our Sovereign Lord King James of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth. Anno Domini, 1620.The Mayflower Compact · 11 November 1620
From the signers
Some of the lines we keep.
John Alden · Isaac Allerton · William Bradford · William Brewster · Francis Cooke · Stephen Hopkins · John Howland · William Mullins · Myles Standish · Richard Warren · William White · Edward Winslow.
The Maryland Chapter descends from the signers above and others — through the generations that crossed the Atlantic again, settled the Eastern Shore, the Western Shore, and the towns in between.