frageelay explains what this is all about in this post…
Whilst I live in a wonderful city steeped in history… some of that history has been warped by time and memory. The need to grasp at something that might attract visitors to Plymouth or raise it’s profile abroad was… many years ago… pounced upon by the councilmen of the city… and resulted in the erection (snigger) of the commemorative monument known as “The Mayflower Steps”.
Plymouth loves to boast that America was colonised by people who set sail from Plymouth. A little bit of research doesn’t exactly de-bunk the information.. it just puts it in perspectve. The only reason that Plymouth was the last landfall for the Pilgrim Fathers was because one of the ships (Speedwell) was sabotaged by the crew and… rather than make the journey alone… The Mayflower turned back with Speedwell to land in Plymouth for repairs. It soon became obvious that Speedwell wasn’t up to the journey across the Atlantic so The Mayflower set sail again… and two months later landed in Cape Cod. And there you have it…. America would not be the America it is today (getting drunk and eating too much at Thanksgiving) if it wasn’t for my little city… at least that’s what my little city would would love the tourists to think.
Note… in reality the spot where The Mayflower set sail from is about 100 yards north of the current commemorative monument being in about the exact same spot as the toilets in the Admiral McBride pub….
