John Winthrop ~ Puritan Winthrop grew up in England on an estate that his father purchased from King Henry VIII. It was a prosperous farm and afforded Winthrop all the advantages from his father’s social and economic position. Winthrop attended Cambridge for two years and married at 17. More than likely, it was at Cambridge that Winthrop was exposed to Puritan ideas.

John Winthrop ~ Puritan Winthrop was not a separatist. Unlike Bradford and the Pilgrims, he wished to reform the church from within – especially the hierarchy of the clergy and all the traditional Catholic rituals. Realizing this was not possible, Winthrop and others managed to get the king’s (Charles I) permission to emigrate and in 1629, he and other believers were able to get a charter from the Council for New England for land in the New World. They called themselves “The Company of Massachusetts Bay in New England.”

John Winthrop ~ Puritan Out of four candidates, Winthrop was chosen governor in October 1629. For the next 20 years, most of the responsibility for the colony rested in his hands. On April 8th, 1630, an initial group of approximately 700 emigrants sailed from England to the New World. Winthrop was on a ship named The Arbella. It is on this ship that Winthrop was believed to deliver his sermon “A Model of Christian Charity.”