This refusal to participate in Anglican church ceremonies indicated very early his Puritan views.

At Easter in 1612, Martin and his wife refused to kneel at the Easter Service and to take Holy Communion. In 1611 Martin was appointed churchwarden at Great Burstead, a position of which he may have been appointed on an involuntary basis. In 1609 Christopher Martin was one of those men with property holdings who were selected to appear at the archdeacons Visitation of that year. To their marriage Mary also brought a son from her prior marriage, Solomon Prowe, probably a young child. Martin and his wife Mary had their only child together, Nathaniel, born probably in 1609 in Great Burstead. The result of the suit is not known, but Martin did manage to build his estate significantly over the following years. He was a merchant by trade, but without the required seven year apprenticeship, which caused him problems when he was sued, probably in 1607 in Quarter Sessions Court, by another merchant George Hilles. Burstead) in Essex, from which parties came sundrie others to go with them.' Per Banks, according to Bradford he 'came from Billirike ( Billericay was then a hamlet in Gt. Early life Ĭhristopher Martin first appears in the records of Great Burstead, Essex, England, with his 1607 marriage to a widow by the name of Mary Prowe. He and his family all perished in the first winter at Plymouth Colony. He was a signatory to the Mayflower Compact. He was initially the governor of passengers on the ship Speedwell until that ship was found to be unseaworthy, and later on the Mayflower, until replaced by John Carver. 1582–1621) and his family embarked on the historic 1620 voyage of the Pilgrim ship Mayflower on its journey to the New World. Signing the Mayflower Compact 1620, a painting by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris 1899Ĭhristopher Martin (c.

Mayflower nathaniel