Hopkins, Stephen

 

                Stephen Hopkins sailed on the Mayflower in 1620, one of the "Londoners" or "strangers" recruited for the voyage.  He was called "Master", and only two others of the 17 free men on the voyage were so styled.

 

                He seems to have originated from the family of Hopkins, alias Seborne, located for several generations at Wortley, Wooton Underedge, Gloucester Co., England.  The Wortley historian conjectured, after a thorough study of the family, that Stephen of the Mayflower may well have been son of Stephen Hopkins, a clothier of Wortley, who also had a son Robert Hopkins of London.

 

                Stephen Hopkins was probably the young man of that name who served as minister's clerk on the vessel “Sea Venture” which sailed from London June 2, 1609, bound for Virginia.  The ship was severely damaged in a hurricane and the company was washed ashore on the Bermuda "Isle of the Divels" on July 28, 1609.

 

                The 150 survivors were marooned on the island for nine months, building two vessels  which ultimately took them to Virginia.

 

          During the sojourn, Stephen Hopkins encouraged an uprising by his fellows upon the grounds that the Governor's authority pertained only to the voyage and the regime in Virginia, not to the forced existence in Bermuda.  For his remarks, he was placed under guard, brought before the company in manacles and sentenced to death by court-martial.

 

                "But so pentent hee was and made so much moane, alleadging the ruine of his Wife and Children: in this his trespasse", according to William Starchey's record of the voyage, that friends among his cohorts procured a pardon from the Governor.

 

                The two newly built vessels, Patience and Deliverance, arrived at Jamestown on May 24, 1610, but no evidence has been found of Hopkins' residence there, and it is presumed he soon returned to his family in England .  Starchey noted that while Hopkins was very religious, he was contentious and defiant of authority and possessed enough learning to undertake to wrest leadership from others.

 

                Stephen was called a tanner or leathermaker at the time of the Mayflower voyage. He, second wife Elizabeth ( probably Elizabeth Fisher, married February 19, 1617/8 at St. Mary Matfellon, Whitechapel, London,) and children Giles and Constance by his first wife, daughter Damaris by his second wife, and two men servants (Edward Doty and Edward Lister) came on the Mayflower.

 

                Son Oceanus was born during the voyage.

 

                Stephen was among the men signing the Mayflower Compact and was one of three men designated to provide counsel and advice to Captain Myles Standish on the first land expedition of the Pilgrims on the New World, probably because of his experiences at Jamestown.

 

                During the third day out, the company chanced upon an Indian deer trap, and Stephen was able to explain its function and danger to his fellows.

 

                In February of 1620/1, when Indians appeared on a neighboring hilltop, Captain Standish took Stephen Hopkins with him to negotiate with the savages.  Thereafter, Stephen was invariably deputized to meet the Indians and act as interpreter.  In July of 1621 he served as an envoy to friendly Chief Massasoit, and he made a friend for the colonists of Samoset, another Indian whom Stephen entertained in his home.

 

                Stephen Hopkins was referred to as a merchant and a planter in Plymouth records, also as a "Gentleman" and as "Master".  He received a six-acre lot in the division of the land in 1623, and later had other lots by grant or purchase.  It is stated that he kept for his home throughout his life at Plymouth the lot on the easterly corner of Main and Leyden streets that had been assigned to him after arrival.  He built and owned the first wharf in Plymouth Colony of which there is a record, selling it for sixty pounds in July of 1637.  He built a house at Yarmouth on Cape Cod, but returned to Plymouth and gave the Yarmouth dwelling to son Giles, who remained there.

 

                Probably because of his status in the Colony as a "stranger", Stephen Hopkins found himself, on occasion, in official difficulty.  In June of 1636, while serving as "Assistant", he was fined for battery of John Tisdale.  In 1637 and in 1638 he was charged with various indiscretions involving the sale of intoxicants and other items at his dwelling.  In 1638/9 he was found in contempt of court for refusing to deal fairly with Dorothy Temple, an apprentice girl, and in December of 1639 he was charged with selling a looking glass at an excessive price.

 

 

 

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