USA HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -In September 1620, during the reign of King James I, a group of around 100 English men and women-many of them members of the English Separatist Church later known to history as the Pilgrims-set sail for the New World aboard the Mayflower.

Detailed explanation-2: -The Separatists who founded the Plymouth Colony referred to themselves as “Saints, ” not “Pilgrims.” The use of the word “Pilgrim” to describe this group did not become common until the colony’s bicentennial.

Detailed explanation-3: -The 102 passengers on the Mayflower were divided into two groups. Only 41 of them were Pilgrims–religious dissenters called Separatists, who had fled England for Holland. Now they sought a new life in America where they could practice their religion in the manner they chose.

Detailed explanation-4: -They held many of the same Puritan Calvinist religious beliefs but, unlike most other Puritans, they maintained that their congregations should separate from the English state church, which led to them being labeled Separatists (the word “Pilgrims” was not used to refer to them until several centuries later).

Detailed explanation-5: -The Pilgrims weren’t called that in their day. Instead, they were known as “Separatists, ” for their desire to break completely from the Church of England, rather than cleanse and reform it from within-the approach urged by the more moderate Puritans.