I’ll get to William Brewster’s (1568-1644) Thanksgiving prayer in a moment, but first, some background. William and Mary Brewster had five children, two of whom traveled with them as young boys on the Mayflower. Their names were Love and Wrestling. The name Love, I can understand, but Wrestling is a new one for me. As near as I can tell, his name has some correlation to “wrestling with the devil.” Their other three children, Fear, Patience and Jonathan came to America on subsequent voyages. I wonder if Jonathan felt slighted by his pedestrian name.
We have only two first-hand accounts of the inaugural Thanksgiving in 1621, one of which originated from William himself. Thanksgiving was likely a carry-over from a fall festival in England. The fifty-three pilgrims in attendance (four married women, twenty-two men, five adolescent girls, nine adolescent boys and thirteen children)
joined with as many as ninety members of the Wampanoag tribe from a neighboring village. Whether the Native Americans were invited or just showed up isn’t clear from the record. Squanto was on hand in case an interpreter was needed. The menu for the festival is never mentioned. The first reference to turkey is a nineteenth century addition to the story. Elder Brewster would have undoubtedly offered prayer during the feast.
The tradition of observing Thanksgiving on the last Thursday in November was signed into law by George Washington in 1789 but the celebration gained added momentum when President Lincoln declared it a national holiday in 1863. William doesn’t record what he prayed that day but a thanksgiving pilgrim prayer from George Webb (1625) fits the occasion: