No, Of Plymouth Plantation Was Not Bradford’s Diary

One of the most common errors that I have encountered in researching William Bradford and his magnum opus, Of Plymouth Plantation, is that historians refer to it as his journal or diary. This includes academic publications, Wikipedia, and museums dedicated to the Pilgrims.¹ Yet you need only turn a few pages of the book to see that it is not organized as a day by day account as a diary would be, but rather (mostly) year by year. And a closer reading will show you that Bradford was usually writing about events 20 years after they took place!²

What Bradford was writing was not a journal but a chronicle – a history of the colony in chronological order, organized by years. Chronicles had their heyday in the middle ages, when monks and historians wrote accounts of events that happened, year by year. Sometimes they wrote only of the past, sometimes they kept them up to date with the new events that occurred each year. Of Plymouth Plantation could also be called a history, since Bradford was writing the story of the colony, or a memoir, since he had personal involvement in the events of which he wrote.

But does it really matter what Bradford’s book is called? To many people it will not. But there is a vast difference between a journal or diary and a chronicle, memoir or history. Those two types of sources should be treated quite differently. All writers, even those doing their best to be thoroughly honest, write with their own biases and perspectives and for their own purposes. Memoirs are useful because they are written with the advantage of hindsight, but their account is weakened by the way that memories fail over the years. Diaries are written right after the events described took place, and they also have the advantage of reflecting what the author thought at the time. (Or at least what he wanted you to think he thought at the time). Later events often shift our opinions and even memories about our own experiences, and a journal does not include any of that, but stays true to the time in which it was written.

For cursory readers it makes little difference, but for those with more than a surface level interest, whether Of Plymouth Plantation is a journal or a memoir has a great impact on understanding why he included what he did, and what he chose to leave out.

1. Rebecca Beatrice Brooks, “The Lost History of William Bradford’s Journal, Of Plymouth Plantation”, Historical Journal of Massachusetts, vol. 47, no. 2, summer 2019, pp. 2+. Gale Academic OneFile, http://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A616318177/AONE?u=anon~edc536f4&sid=googleScholar&xid=d7755cba. Accessed August 6, 2024; “Of Plymouth Plantation.” in Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Of_Plymouth_Plantation. Accessed August 6, 2024; “Of Plymouth Plantation: The Journal of William Bradford”, Pilgrim Hall Museum, https://pilgrimhall.org/pdf/Bradford_Journal_Intro_Of_Plymouth_Plantation.pdf, Accessed August 6, 2024.

2. As a sample, he began writing in 1630 about events of 1606, in 1644 he was writing of 1620, in 1648 of 1628, and in 1650 of 1646. (History of Plymouth Plantation: 1620-1647. edt. Worthington C. Ford et al., 2 vols. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1912) vol. 1, p. 44; Ibid, vol. 1, p. 201; Ibid, vol. 2, p. 44; Ibid, vol. 2, p. 394)