Profile of a Mayflower Pilgrim: John Howland
From Servant to Assistant Governor of Plymouth Colony
Aug 23, 2008
During the treacherous voyage, Howland was swept overboard during a storm, but grabbed a trailing halyard and was pulled in by a boat hook.
Howland's Leadership Roles
This experience, reported in Gov. William Bradford’s manuscript, Of Plimoth Plantation, was characteristic of John Howland, a man of action, courage and competency.
Despite his humble origins and his arrival as John Carver’s servant, Howland was later chosen as assistant governor of the colony and was an undertaker for 14 years.
Howland was put in charge of Plymouth’s trading post on the Kennebec River in Maine. It was an important role. Furs received from Indians helped the pilgrims pay their debt to the merchant adventurers who had financed their crossing to America.
The 13th signer of the Mayflower Compact, Howland served several terms in the General Court of Plymouth, followed by numerous terms as deputy.
Howland's Descendants Include Poets and Presidents
Howland married Elizabeth Tilley, daughter of John Tilley and the former Joan (Hurst) Rogers, Mayflower passengers who died the first winter. John and Elizabeth (Tilley) Howland had 10 children; both died at nearby Swansea, MA, he in 1672 at about age 80, and she in 1687 at age 81. It is believed that at his death Howland was the last male Mayflower passenger still living in the Plymouth area. In 1897, his descendants formed The Pilgrim John Howland Society.
John Howland is believed to have been born near Fenstanton, England, about 1592/3.
His famous descendants include both Bush presidents, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, poets Emerson and Longfellow, Joseph Smith, founder of the Mormon religion, and film stars Humphrey Bogart and Lillian Russell. Both the elder George Bush and his wife, the former Barbara Pierce, descend from Howland.
Howland House Tours and Book Titles
The Howland House at 33 Sandwich St. in Plymouth belonged to John’s son, Jabez Howland, a blacksmith. His parents spent a winter there and his mother lived there after she was widowed. The house has undergone many changes, including restoration by the Howland Society, its owner since 1913. It is open to the public from Memorial Day to Columbus Day.
Nearby is Plimoth (sic) Plantation, a small village made to replicate the setting of the first Plymouth pilgrims.
The Mayflower Society, as part of its Five Generations Project, has recently published the genealogies of the last six children of John and Elizabeth Howland for four generations. The children are Lydia, Hannah, Joseph, Jabez, Ruth, and Isaac. This book, plus two other volumes on John Howland descendants, these by Elizabeth Pearson White, can be ordered online from the Mayflower Society bookstore. In the works are more editions authored by White and another volume under the aegis of the Mayflower Society project.
SOURCES: Records of The Mayflower Society, Plymouth, MA; records of the Pilgrim John Howland Society, Plymouth, MA; Plymouth Colony, Its History & People, 1620-1691, by Eugene A. Stratton (1986: Salt Lake City)
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