Historical Context

Historical Context

The devastating impact on Native Americans of the British arrival at Plymouth Rock in 1620 was barely recognized by those outside of the Native community. The Europeans’ idyllic story of the “First Thanksgiving” in the New World portrayed the Pilgrims as heroes but failed to include the brutality they inflicted on the Wampanoag tribe, who were robbed of their land, exploited for their resources, and murdered by disease. The real Thanksgiving story was that the Wampanoag were forced to succumb to the power of the British settlers who invaded their land. The first Thanksgiving was held in November 1621 when the colonists invited the Wampanoags to share a feast. Earlier that year, in March 1621, the Wampanoags and the settlers entered into a peace treaty to establish an alliance (in part to strengthen the Wampanoag against the rival Narragansett tribe) but this friendly relationship did not endure. After years of expansion into Native lands by the settlers, in 1675  the Wampanoag, Nipmuck, Pocumtuck and Narragansett tribes united to rise up against the Europeans in King Philip’s War. The united tribes were ultimately defeated, with many Wampanoags killed, and by 1700 Natives were being forced to move onto reservations controlled by whites. In 1970, Wampanoag Frank Wamsutta James’s speech began a new tradition of commemorating the “National of Mourning” in Plymouth, as a time to reflect on and protest against the suffering endured by the Natives in the true Thanksgiving story.