Emigration
Restrictions and pressures applied by the authorities convinced the congregation of a need to emigrate to the more sympathetic atmosphere of Holland, but leaving England without permission was illegal at the time, so that departure was a complex matter. On its first attempt, in 1607, the group was arrested at Scotia Creek, but in 1608 Brewster and others were successful in leaving from The Humber. In 1609, he was selected as ruling elder of the congregation.
In Leiden, the group managed to make a living. Brewster taught English and later, in 1616–1619, as the partner of one Thomas Brewer, printed and published religious books for sale in England, though they were proscribed there. In 1619, Brewster and Edward Winslow published a religious tract critical of the English king and his bishops. James ordered Brewster’s arrest, and when the king’s agents in Holland came to seize the Pilgrim elder, Brewster was forced into hiding just as preparations to depart for America entered the most critical phase. The printing type was seized by the authorities from the English ambassador, Sir Dudley Carleton, and Brewster's partner was arrested. Brewster escaped and, with the help of Robert Cushman and Sir Edwin Sandys, obtained a land patent from the London Virginia Company on behalf of himself and his colleagues.
With Brewster in hiding, the Separatists looked to their deacon John Carver and to Robert Cushman to carry on negotiations with the appropriate officials in London. In 1620 when it came time for the Mayflower departure, Elder Brewster returned to the Leiden congregation. He had been hiding out in Holland and perhaps even England for the last year. The return of Brewster, the highest-ranking layperson of the congregation and their designated spiritual leader in the New World.
Brewster joined the first group of Separatists aboard the Mayflower on the voyage to North America. Brewster was accompanied by his wife, Mary Brewster, and his sons: Love Brewster and Wrestling Brewster.
Among children boarding the Mayflower were four children from Shipton in Shropshire placed as indentured servants with senior Separatists with William Brewster, John Carver and Robert Cushman, on behalf of Samuel More, husband of the children’s mother Katherine More. The children were placed without their mother’s permission after four rancorous years between the More adults over charges of adultery against Katherine More with her longtime lover, the children’s alleged father. Two children were placed with William and Mary Brewster - Mary More, age four and Richard More, age five. Mary was to die in the winter of 1620 as did two other siblings. Only Richard survived and lived with them until approximately 1627. The event has become a bizarre 17th century historic incident. It is not known what Brewster knew about the More children.
Read more about this topic: William Brewster (Mayflower Passenger)