Mayflower - Later History

Later History

On May 4, 1624, two years after Captain Jones’ death in 1622, an application was made to the Admiralty court for an appraisal of the Mayflower by three of her owners including Jones’ widow, Mrs. Josian (Joan) Jones. This appraisal probably was made to determine the valuation of the ship for the purpose of settling the estate of its late master. The appraisal was made by four mariners and shipwrights of Rotherhithe, home and burial place of Captain Jones, where the Mayflower was apparently then laying in the Thames at London. The appraisement is extant and provides information on ship’s gear on board at that time as well as equipment such as muskets and other arms. The ship may have been laid up since Jones’ death and allowed to get out of repair, as that is what the appraisal indicates.

What finally became of the Mayflower is an unsettled issue. Per Banks, an English historian of the Pilgrim ship, claims that this historic ship was finally broken up, with her timbers used in the construction of a barn at Jordans village in Buckinghamshire. At the present time, within the grounds of Old Jordan in South Buckinghamshire is what tradition calls the Mayflower Barn. In 1624 Thomas Russell supposedly added to part of a farmhouse already there with timbers from a ship, believed to be from the Pilgrim ship ‘Mayflower’, bought from a shipbreaker's yard in Rotherhithe. The well-preserved structure is a present-day tourist attraction, receiving visitors each year from all over the world and particularly from America.