1. New England Colonies

2. Puritans and Separatists
Many of the settlers who arrived in New England were searching for Religious freedom.
They did not agree with the Church of England (Anglican church)
There were two groups of people who did not like the church. The Puritans: they wanted to purify the church. Separatists: they wanted to be separate from the church.

3. It was illegal to worship apart form the Anglican Church.
A group of Englanders (The Separatists) decided to move to the Netherlands, where they had more religious freedom.
The only problem is that as the years went by their children started to lose their English culture. They started to speak Dutch, and do Dutch things. The parents didn’t want them to lose their culture. So they began to look for another way.

4. Pilgrims
The Separatists that we call the Pilgrims decided to leave the Netherlands and go to the New World.
They received a land grant (saying they can settler on the land) from the Virginia Company. The same company that settled Jamestown.
They boarded a ship called the Mayflower, in Plymouth, England. They were sailing to Virginia.

5. What happened?
A big storm blew them off course and they ended up in a part of the New World they hadn’t expected to be in, Massachusetts.
They tried and tried to get back to Virginia. But storms would come and winter was starting. So they started to stay where they were.
They called their colony Plymouth, after the port in England.
They had to set up a government in order to ensure people where treated fairly. So they set out to make the Mayflower Compact.

6. Mayflower Compact