Plymouth Colony Service issued a three hundred and fiftieth-year commemorative stamp recognizing the English dissenters first landing at the modern day settlement of Provincetown, Massachusetts in 1620. Each year, the United States celebrates a holiday known as Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday of November. It is a federal holiday and frequently involves a family gathering with a large feast, traditionally featuring a turkey. Civic recognitions of the holiday typically include parades and football games. The holiday is meant to honor the First Thanksgiving, which was a harvest feast held in Plymouth in 1621, as first recorded in the book "New England's Memorial"
Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony) how weakened the settlement had actually become. Between the landing and March, only 47 colonists had survived the diseases that they contracted on the ship. During the worst of the sickness, only six or seven of the group were able to feed and care for the rest. In this time, half the "Mayflower" crew also died. William Bradford became governor in 1621 upon the death of John Carver. On March 22, 1621, the Pilgrims of Plymouth Colony signed a peace treaty with Massasoit of the Wampanoags. The patent of Plymouth Colony was surrendered by Bradford to the freemen in 1640,