Background
William Peirce was born circa 1590 in England, United Kingdom.
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William Peirce
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Pierce's name first appears in the colonial records in 1623, his ship, the Paragon, having been wrecked in February of that year. In the summer of 1623 he was given command of the Anne. Bradford mentions his coming to Plymouth in 1625 in company with Edward Winslow on one of the latter's return trips to America. During the next four years Peirce made constant trips between New England, Virginia, and England conveying emigrants and earning the reputation of having made the largest number of such voyages of his day. He was "for a long period the most noted sail-master that came into the New England waters". In May 1629 he took over the command of the Mayflower, described as "of Yarmouth, " which was possibly the Mayflower of earlier fame. Peirce was in Virginia at Christmas 1632 on which date he wrote to Boston describing conditions in the southern colony. It appears that a short time before that date he was shipwrecked near Feake Isle off the Virginia shore, where presumably he lost the ship Lyon. Early in 1633 we find him in command of the Desire.
During 1634 William Peirce explored the island of Nantucket and the shores of Narragansett Bay. On September 3, 1635, he was chosen by the General Court commissioner of military affairs of Massachusetts Bay Colony but served only six months, when he was replaced by Henry Vane. In May 1637 he was chosen, with others, to start a fishery at Cape Ann and the same year was granted two hundred acres of land. At the close of the Pequot War he was sent to the West Indies with a group of Indians, who were sold as slaves. He returned with "cotton, tobacco, and negroes. " These were probably the first negroes brought to New England.
In 1641 William Peirce set out from New England with a party of colonists for Providence in the Caribbean. He found the colony in the possession of the Spanish, who fired upon the ship. Peirce was struck by a bullet and died shortly afterward. Peirce compiled the first almanac in English America, An Almanac for the year of our Lord, 1639. Calculated for New England, By Mr. William Pierce, Mariner. It was a small broadside, printed at Cambridge by Stephen Day.
Achievements
Personality
Quotes from others about the person
Winthrop describes William Peirce as "a godly man and most expert mariner. "
Connections
William Pierce had a wife, Jane. They had three children.
