Thomas Morton
Thomas Morton was an English lawyer and early settler in New England, known for his unconventional lifestyle and clashes with Puritan authorities. After marrying Alice Miller in 1621, he relocated to the Plymouth Colony in 1624. Morton helped establish a community called Mount Wollaston, which later became known as Merry Mount, where he gained notoriety for erecting a maypole and hosting celebrations that included both settlers and Native Americans. His actions drew the ire of the Puritans, leading to his arrest in 1628 on charges of selling arms to Indigenous people. Although he escaped and returned to England, he was exiled again in 1630 after his maypole was destroyed. During his time in England, Morton wrote "New English Canaan," a work reflecting on the interactions between Puritans and other settlers, as well as the lives of Native Americans. He returned to the colonies in 1643, but was arrested again in 1644 for slander and ultimately settled in Agamenticus, Maine, where he died a few years later. Morton's legacy remains a complex blend of cultural celebration and conflict in early American history.
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Subject Terms
Thomas Morton
Colonist
- Born: c. 1575
- Died: c.1647
- Place of death: Maine
Biography
Thomas Morton spent his childhood and early adulthood in his native England, where he became a lawyer. He wed the widow Alice Miller in 1621, and the marriage pulled Morton into a string of property-rights disputes. After the legal proceedings concluded, Morton left with Captain Wollaston and other settlers for the Plymouth Colony in New England in 1624. The group clashed with Pilgrim authorities and therefore established their own community, called Mount Wollaston, where the modern-day Quincy, Massachusetts, now stands.
Most of the community left two years later to resettle in Virginia, but Morton, who had established a fur-trading post, remained behind, renaming the settlement Ma-re-Mount, or Merry Mount. He famously erected a maypole in 1627 and invited area settlers and Native Americans alike to a dancing celebration. The revelry offended the Puritans, who were already distrustful and resentful of Morton and his trading post.
Plymouth authorities sent Miles Standish to arrest Morton in the spring of 1628. Charged with selling arms to Native Americans, Morton was being held at a colony island, in wait for his transport to England, when he escaped with the help of American Indians. He returned to England on his own initiative and was acquitted there before traveling back to Merry Mount in 1629.
During Morton’s absence, John Endecott had chopped down the maypole and the same man arrested Morton again in 1630. His belongings confiscated and his house burned down, Morton was exiled again to England. During this stay in his native land, Morton worked alongside Anglican Archbishop William Laud from 1632 to 1637, in efforts to revoke Massachusetts Bay Company’s charter. The endeavor failed, but during the process, Morton penned his famous New English Canaan, which chronicled the tensions, sometimes humorously, between the Puritans and the less strict settlers and recounted the lives and traditions of local American Indians.
Morton returned to the colonies for the final time in 1643, thirteen years after his last banishment, and after a winter in Plymouth and time spent traversing the wilderness, he was arrested in September, 1644, on charges of slander. He was jailed during the winter of 1644 to 1645, and upon his release, he moved to Agamenticus, Maine, where he stayed until his death a few years later.