Lifestyle
Meet the American who gave the nation our Thanksgiving origin story: Pilgrim Edward Winslow
It is the first and greatest American adventure story.
A small band of Christian devotees, persecuted in their homeland, sought refuge in a forbidden wilderness across the vast ocean aboard a leaky ship in the autumn of 1620.
Against all odds, following near death at sea, amid privation, disease and frightening loss of life, they planted the seeds of a daring new society.
Within a few generations their descendants brazenly challenged the world monarchial order with the revolutionary statement that “all men are created equal” and fought to establish the first great constitutional republic.
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It became a haven for people just like them: the tired, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free.
They are the Pilgrims.
Portrait illustration of Plymouth Colony leader and Pilgrim Edward Winslow (1595-1655), Massachusetts, 17th century. Winslow had sailed on the Mayflower. This portrait, painted in London, is the only contemporary image we have of a Mayflower Pilgrim.
(Photo by Interim Archives/Getty Images)
Most everything we know about their first year in what’s now Plymouth, Massachusetts, from a contemporary, boots-on-the-ground, first-person source comes from one man.
His name is Edward Winslow.
“He’s a major figure in the Pilgrim story,” Tom Begley, director of collections at Plimoth Patuxet Museums (known until 2020 as Plimoth Plantation), told Fox News Digital.
It is the only account, written as it happened, of the Pilgrims’ first year in Plymouth.
“He had the foresight to write down their story and share it with others.”
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Winslow wrote a lengthy letter to a friend back in England that has gone down in history as “Mourt’s Relation.”
It is the only account, written as it happened, of the Pilgrims’ first year in Plymouth. It is still in print, available on Amazon or at your local bookstore.
A depiction of early settlers of the Plymouth Colony sharing a harvest Thanksgiving meal with members of the local Wampanoag tribe at the Plymouth Plantation, Plymouth, Massachusetts, 1621.
(Photo by Frederic Lewis/Archive Photos/Getty Images)
“Mourt’s Relation” includes Winslow’s brief, undated description of a three-day celebration in the autumn of 1621, after “our harvest being gotten in,” during which the English settlers and a much larger group of Wampanoag friends feast on fowl and deer.
It is the first Thanksgiving.
Winslow’s account is the only version of the origin story of our national holiday written by Somebody Who Was There.
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Winslow made many other contributions to the Pilgrim narrative.
He signed the Mayflower Compact, the first self-governing covenant among New World settlers, as the ship floated in Cape Cod Bay on Nov. 11, 1620.
He was the first Pilgrim to meet Wampanoag chief Ousamequin, better known in history as Massasoit.
The signatures on the Mayflower Compact of passengers on board the Mayflower in November 1620. The compact was the first governing document of Plymouth Colony. Included are the signatures of William Brewster, William Bradford, Myles Standish and, top left, Edward Winslow.
(Photo by Three Lions/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
“Winslow informed Massasoit that his people desired to have peace with him and engage in trading,” James and Patricia Scott Deetz wrote in their 2000 history, “The Times of Their Lives: Life, Love and Death in Plymouth Colony.”
The two men bridged a cross-cultural relationship that benefited both sides for several decades before the outbreak of King Phillip’s War in 1675.
Winslow sat for a portrait in London, offering our only look at the face of an actual Pilgrim.
Winslow also gives us our only look at the face of an actual Pilgrim.
He sat for a portrait in London in 1651 after returning to England to serve its government under Protestant Parliamentarian Oliver Cromwell following the English Civil War.
All other Pilgrim paintings and portraits were imagined after their time on Earth.
“History records no nobler venture for faith and freedom than that of this Pilgrim band,” reads the tomb on a hill overlooking Plymouth Harbor today.
A monument overlooking the harbor in Plymouth, Massachusetts, marks the site where the Pilgrims buried their dead the first winter of 1620-21, when nearly half of the 100 settlers died. “In hunger and cold they laid the foundations of a state wherein every man through countless ages should have liberty to worship God in his own way,” reads the monument.
(Kerry J. Byrne/Fox News Digital)
It’s the site where the settlers buried their many dead that first winter in the New World.
Winslow gave future generations our eyewitness account of that noble venture.
A frigid New World
Edward Winslow was born on Oct. 18, 1595 to Edward Sr. and Magdalene (Oliver) Winslow in Droitwich Spa, a town in western England that traces its history to Roman settlement.
The Mayflower in Plymouth Harbor, Massachusetts, 1620. Painting by William Halsall, 1882.
(Photo by Barney Burstein/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images)
He moved to Leiden, Holland, in 1617 to live among the English separatist colony that produced the Pilgrims.
He worked as a printer.
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He was just 24 when he departed Plymouth, England aboard the Mayflower with his wife Elizabeth (Barker) and younger brother Gilbert on Sept. 16, 1620.
After a harrowing trip across the ocean and a month spent exploring Cape Cod, the Pilgrims anchored in Plymouth Harbor in late December. They began the seemingly impossible work of carving a new society out of the frozen earth.
Winter on the New England coast is dark, windy and unforgiving even today, with the benefit of modern clothing, home heating systems, electricity and indoor plumbing.
Plymouth, Massachusetts, January 22: Ice-covered rocks frame the Mayflower ll at its berth in Plymouth Harbor, frozen in place by ice-covered waters as the wind was blowing over 25 mph over the water, with the temperature in the low teens. The Pilgrims landed in Plymouth in late December 1620, at the start of a typically brutal Massachusetts winter.
(Photo by John Tlumacki/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
Yet the Pilgrims landed in the middle of what’s known as The Little Ice Age — a 500-year period of unusually cold weather.
The Pilgrims “were probably suffering from scurvy and pneumonia caused by a lack of shelter in the cold, wet weather.”
England and Holland are north of Plymouth, but also far more temperate. The Pilgrims had never experienced anything as cold as a New England winter.
Death soon gripped the colony.
“They were probably suffering from scurvy and pneumonia caused by a lack of shelter in the cold, wet weather,” writes Plimoth Patuxet Museums.
“As many as two or three people died each day during their first two months on land.”
Only 52 of 102 people survived the first year in Plymouth. The Mayflower sailed back to England with only half its crew alive in April 1621.
People visit the 1627 Pilgrim Village at Plimoth Plantation where role-players portray Pilgrims seven years after the arrival of the Mayflower. The 17th century replica village was the site of the first Thanksgiving in 1621. Thanksgiving Day was established as a national holiday by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863; it’s celebrated on the last Thursday of November.
(Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
Elizabeth Winslow was among the first winter’s victims. She died on March 24 at age 27 or 28. Pilgrim Susanna White lost her husband, William, in February.
But new life, activity and hope emerged in the spring.
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Edward and Susanna married on May 12, the first wedding in the Plymouth Colony. They began having children the following year.
The Pilgrims in March met English-speaking Wampanoags Samoset and Squanto, who had learned the language from fishing boat captains seeking cod off the New England coast. Through Squanto, Winslow met chief Ousamequin.
“We have found the Indians very faithful in their covenant of peace with us.” — “Mourt’s Relation.”
The Pilgrims began planting spring crops with the help of the Natives. They enjoyed an abundant harvest that autumn. The relationship appeared to blossom.
“We have found the Indians very faithful in their covenant of peace with us,” reports “Mourt’s Relation.”
“We often go with them, and they come to us; some of us have been 50 miles by land in the country with them … We entertain them familiarly in our houses, and they as friendly bestowing their venison on us.”
Engraving depicting American colonial leader Edward Winslow visiting Massasoit, leader of the Wampanoag Native Americans, circa 1641.
(Photo by Archive Photos/Getty Images)
The Natives were also overcoming shocking tragedy, notes Begley. Plague was unknowingly carried upon the ships of European explorers. The people of the Americas had no immunity.
Up to 90% of the Native population of southern New England, according to expert estimates, was wiped out by disease from 1616 to 1619 — an apocalyptic tragedy.
The Wampanoags were likely seeking hope and a reason to give thanks for their survival, too, in the autumn of 1621.
The first Thanksgiving
The two sides cemented their friendly relations with a grand feast after the autumn harvest.
Winslow described the first Thanksgiving in just 115 words of an extended sentence.
A modern recreation of the first Thanksgiving in the autumn of 1621 at Plimoth Patuxet Museums (formerly Plimoth Plantation) in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Only half the Mayflower passengers, about 50, survived the first winter in Plymouth, while at least 90 Wampanoags attended the feast, according to Pilgrim Edward Winslow.
(Courtesy of Kathy Tarantola/Plimoth Patuxet Museums)
Winslow wrote, “Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after have a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors; they four in one day killed as much fowl, as with a little help beside, served the company almost a week, at which time amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest King Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain, and others.”
The celebrants ate fowl — plentiful in the area — and venison. The “harvest” certainly included corn, among other fruits and vegetables.
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We learn of Pilgrims eating turkey — later on — only from William Bradford’s history, “Of Plymouth Plantation.” The first governor of Plymouth began writing his history in 1630.
Hidden away for more than two centuries, Bradford’s account was not published until 1856. He does not mention the feast.
The entire Thanksgiving origin story comes from the one passage in “Mourt’s Relation.”
The first Thanksgiving at Plymouth in 1621, painting from 1914. Private Collection. Artist Brownscombe, Jennie Augusta (1850-1936).
(Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)
Winslow’s account indicates that the Wampanoags vastly outnumbered the Pilgrims. Massasoit brought 90 men and, historians assume, perhaps an equal number of women and children.
There were barely more than 50 English settlers in Plymouth at the time.
“Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after have a special manner rejoice together.” — Edward Winslow
Winslow, most prophetically, offers the passage that turns the harvest feast into a celebration of Thanksgiving.
“And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.”
The Pilgrims had gone from the brink of perishing to an abundance “far from want” in one growing season.
Pilgrim Edward Winslow, portrayed by Michael Hall, reads a passage from the Bible with Leah Pearl, 8, of Nantucket, as she visited his home at the Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth, Massachusetts.
(Photo by John Tlumacki/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
It must have felt like a miracle.
“The first Thanksgiving marked the conclusion of a remarkable year,” writes historian Nathaniel Philbrick in his gripping 2006 book, “Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community and War.”
“The Pilgrims had gone from the brink of perishing to an abundance ‘far from want’ in one growing season.”
“By all rights, none of the Pilgrims should have emerged from the first winter alive.”
‘God-fearing Pilgrim at heart’
Edward Winslow lived a life of more adventure after settling Plymouth and recording its dramatic story for posterity.
He died at sea in the Caribbean reportedly of yellow fever, on May 7, 1655.
Oliver Cromwell, the victorious Parliamentarian of the English Civil War, reportedly intended to have Winslow serve as governor of the colony in Jamaica.
Engraved portrait of separatist author Edward Winslow, with his signature, 1651.
(Photo by Archive Photos/Getty Images)
Before his death, Winslow gifted the American people with the miraculous story of the first Thanksgiving.
The survival of the story is itself something of a miracle.
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The letter that became “Mourt’s Relation” was sent by the ship Fortune back to England in December 1621.
It was captured on the open sea by French pirates, who brought the ship to a prison island.
“Winslow died a God-fearing Pilgrim at heart and with him went a very special set of skills.”
The local governor confiscated anything of value on board, including the clothing of the passengers, “not leaving some of them a hat to their heads, nor a shoe to their feet,” according to an account of the drama in the Public Records Office in London.
He also “sent for all their letters; opened and kept what he pleased.”
He did not please, apparently, of Winslow’s account of the first year in Plymouth. It made its way to London and was printed as “Mourt’s Relation” in 1622.
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Mayflower 400, an organization convened to celebrate the quadricentennial of the Pilgrim journey, paid homage to Winslow in 2020: “He died a God-fearing Pilgrim at heart and with him went a very special set of skills that built friendships, won negotiations and established a new way of life in a new land.”
To read more stories in this unique “Meet the American Who…” series from Fox News Digital, click here.
Source: https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/meet-american-gave-nation-thanksgiving-origin-story
Lifestyle
Black conservative father and faith leader homeschools 6 kids to ‘get God in’: ‘What could be more important?’
The Bible says the fear of the Lord, meaning a reverence for and an awe of God, is the beginning of knowledge and understanding.
So Abraham Hamilton III of the American Family Association, headquartered in Tupelo, Mississippi, says that begs a vital question about the public school system.
He asks, “What kind of system of instruction can you have, calling it education, but intentionally and systematically denies the knowledge of God?”
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Hamilton is general counsel and public policy analyst for the American Family Association. He’s an African-American conservative — which makes him a huge target for liberals.
He’s a husband and father of six, all of whom he homeschools, because in researching the history and intent of the public school system, he discovered what should scare any parent who’s trying to mold and shape their child spiritually and intellectually.
Abraham Hamilton of the American Family Association shared his story of how and why he and his wife have chosen to homeschool their six children. It’s not just the indoctrination today that worries Hamilton. (AFA)
Says Hamilton, “The thing that led us to start homeschooling was first my wife and I began delving into a more solidified biblical worldview — and we began to learn a bit about the history of the modern public education system.”
It was a history that looked at the intent of such lauded educators as Horace Mann and John Dewey, who crusaded for a public school system to bring education to the masses to strengthen the nation.
This has been a centuries-long effort to transform the United States of America, said Hamilton.
But Hamilton said there was a more fundamental intention lurking behind the “good of the nation.”
On a recent episode of “Lighthouse Faith” podcast, Hamilton talked about how education by its very nature is a form of discipleship. And that the public school system was designed to disciple young minds into the faith of secular humanism. It’s a man-centered religion.
Secular humanism refers to a philosophy that “replaces a worship of the transcendent or supernatural deity with the deification of man and humankind,” according to an article in the Loyola Law Journal.
So secular humanism is the very definition of what the Bible calls sin — man putting himself in the place of God, believing that humanity is the measure of all things rather than God.
Hamilton said this has been a centuries-long effort to transform the United States.
Students are shown arriving at a public high school in Apr. 19, 2021. It’s no sudden occurrence, writes Lauren Green, that parents today are seeing their kids subject to indoctrination of liberal group think on gender ideology, the environment and critical race theory. (Carlos Delgado/AP Images for Portland Public Schools)
“We did not just arrive where we are accidentally,” he said. “It has been the product of an intentional plan using the school system, by and large as a primary mechanism to accomplish it.”
The book by Fox News’ Pete Hegseth, “Battle for the American Mind,” wholeheartedly affirms Hamilton’s accusations.
The book is an exegesis of how secular, Enlightenment-based and Marxist forces took hold of and promoted the idea of public schools for the purpose of controlling the country.
Writes Hegseth, “American progressives knew that social control was far more powerful than economic control. As such, they set out to gain direct national control of the ‘commanding heights’ of American schools. A project set in motion more than 100 ago is today leveraged through 16,000 hours of government instruction.”
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So it’s no sudden occurrence that parents are seeing their kids subject to indoctrination of liberal group think on gender ideology, the environment and critical race theory.
The COVID-19 shutdown that forced millions of children to receive class instruction via Zoom also let parents see and hear what their children were being taught. The backlash resulted in parents showing up at school board meetings in protest.
Public school students are denied the knowledge that “the reason why Isaac Newton experimented was because of what he read in the Bible.”
But it’s not just indoctrination that worries Hamilton. If the Bible is true, that knowing God is the beginning of all knowledge, then millions of children sitting in public school classrooms for six to eight hours a day, five days a week, are not getting the full breadth of education.
For example, regarding the great scientist Isaac Newton, the 17th century physicist, astronomer and mathematician whose laws of universal gravitation transformed the scientific landscape and our understanding of the motion of the planets, Hamilton says, “What most children don’t realize is that Isaac Newton was a passionate Christian. He could be rightly described as a theologian who dabbled in science.”
He says that what public school students are denied is the knowledge that “the reason why Isaac Newton experimented was because of what he read in the Bible.”
A woman and her daughter pray together over a Bible. While Abraham of the American Family Association says that we do have “godly teachers, wonderful teachers, wonderful administrators, wonderful principals — the system itself has been calcified in opposition to God” to the point where you have to figure out a way to get God in. (iStock)
So they are denied the ability to connect the dots of what makes this world the way it is.
Newton and other scientists of his ilk like Copernicus were inspired by Scriptures such as Psalm 19, which says, “The heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge.”
Says Hamilton, “Mathematics is an opportunity to peer into the mind of God. The discipline of mathematics only exists because we have a creator who is immutable. He doesn’t change, and he has established a fixed universe that creates an environment for us to be able to have the disciplines of science, the discipline of mathematics.”
But why not try to fix the public school system, like those parents showing up for board meetings and running for the school board themselves?
Hamilton applauds their efforts.
But while he says we do have “godly teachers, wonderful teachers, wonderful administrators, wonderful principals, the system itself has been calcified in opposition to God” to the point where you have to figure out a way to get God in.
Lauren Green of Fox News Channel, the network’s chief religion correspondent, recently spoke with Abraham Hamilton of the American Family Association in Mississippi, who says he cannot entrust the intellectual development of his six children to America’s public school system. (Fox News)
In other words, the system is geared to exclude God.
The recent court battles are evidence.
A high school coach is fired for praying on the football field and a substitute teacher is fired for opposing a same-sex themed book; a school board in Maine rejects a church’s application to hold worship services at a high school because of the church’s beliefs on abortion and gay marriage; and a Utah School district removes the King James Bible from its elementary and middle school shelves because a parent complained it contained “vulgarity and violence.”
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For Hamilton, the bottom line is that he cannot entrust the intellectual development of his children to a system whose aim is to disconnect God from knowledge.
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Says Hamilton, “We are endeavoring to disciple our children in a holistic sense and doing so from our home as a basis for it for that endeavor. What could be more important than that when it comes to our children?”
Lifestyle
Ohio firefighters find 118-year-old time capsule buried in fire station: Here’s what was inside
A team of firefighters has uncovered treasure hidden in their fire department that’s nearly 12 decades old.
Captain Ryan Redmon and a group of six firefighters from the City of Marion Ohio Fire Department were on a mission to retrieve an old department cornerstone from a retired fire station that was about to be demolished, but they ended up finding something truly unexpected.
The Marion Fire Department (MFD) has recently been researching the history of their department, going back to 1848, by digging up some information — both figuratively and literally, Captain Redmon told Fox News Digital.
On May 25, Redmon and the firefighters went down to the old Marion Fire Department Station No. 2, which was built in 1905, to excavate their department’s cornerstone for preservation purposes before the building was scheduled to be torn down.
Captain Ryan Redmon and a team of six firefighters from the Marion Fire Department in Marion, Ohio, discovered a hidden time capsule dating back to 1905. Firefighter Andrew Niles is pictured above removing a brick. (City of Marion Ohio Fire Department)
After spending nearly 30 minutes on the excavation, Redmon and his men quickly realized the cornerstone was deeper into the building than anticipated, so they called in professionals to complete the removal.
As Redmon and his team were about to leave, they pulled out one last brick and saw a copper box fall out of the sandstone, Redmon shared.
Redmon and the other firefighters on the scene took it back to the station excited to show everyone their new discovery.
“Obviously, everybody wanted us to open it right away, and we wanted to, trust me. It was killing us to see what was in there,” Redmon commented.
The 118-year-old time capsule was hidden near the cornerstone of the retired fire station building that was set to be demolished. (City of Marion Ohio Fire Department)
The MFD has been working on the written history of their department, but nothing in their prior research led them to believe there would be a time capsule hidden in the 1905 fire station.
“We’ve done so much history work around the station and I feel like we’ve got a pretty good grasp on our past and where we’ve been, and [to] discover something like [this], there’s no written record of it,” Redmon stated.
“We scoured newspapers, we scoured old records [and] there was never any mention of a time capsule in there, so it was very exciting,” he added.
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The time capsule was placed near the cornerstone of the old MFD station on July 20, 1905, according to a letter found in the capsule written by the fire chief at the time, Redmon added.
Chief Chuck Deem (left) looks on as Captain Redmon (center) and Andrew Niles (far right) pry open the time capsule during a public ceremony on May 31. (City of Marion Ohio Fire Department)
“Firemen aren’t exactly known for being gentle, delicate creatures with things,” Redmon joked. “So we took it to the historical society in town.”
The copper box had been soldered shut on the edge and wasn’t easy to pry open, according to Redmon.
On May 31, the MFD invited the residents of Marion to be a part of a public opening of the time capsule.
Inside the 118-year-old copper box were dozens of well-preserved memorabilia referencing the department including: nine MFD badges from the “turn of the century,” an invitation to the 1878 “Northwestern Ohio Volunteer Fireman’s Association Fireman’s Games” (which is still held today), four newspapers from July 1905 and so much more, according to the City of Marion Ohio Fire Department Facebook page.
Redmon took note of the differences between the “turn of the century era” badges that had been found in the time capsule, detailing the difference in style and size.
“There has been talk about trying to back to that style now that we know that’s our history and that’s kind of where we came from. In the future, maybe we can go back to that,” Redmon commented.
One of Redmon’s favorite discoveries in the box was the letter from Chief McFarland, the department’s fire chief for almost 40 years, he added.
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“He has kind of got his touch on everything. To have an actual letter from him was very [exciting].”
Redmon is looking forward to making a new time capsule for the new fire station which will include an item from the newly found 1905 capsule. (City of Marion Ohio Fire Department)
Redmon gave a lot of credit to Andrew Niles, a firefighter on his team, who has been heading up the department’s historical research and was the one to open the time capsule.
One of the biggest takeaways for Redmon is knowing that he now has a tangible place in the history of the MFD.
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“I was becoming a part of history because I was involved in this opening and this finding,” he shared.
The MFD is planning on taking an item from the 1905 time capsule, most likely one of the badges, and placing it in a new time capsule that will be buried in the construction of the new fire station, Redmon added.
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The hope is that another 118 years will pass by before the new capsule is opened and someone will be able to discover a 236-year-old badge, paying homage to the history and legacy of the Marion Fire Department, Redmon said.
Lifestyle
On this day in history, June 7, 1942, Battle of Midway ends in decisive US victory
On this day in history, June 7, 1942, the Battle of Midway — regarded as one of the most decisive U.S. victories in its war against Japan — came to an end.
The Battle of Midway was an Allied naval victory and a major turning point in World War II.
The battle was fought between Japanese and American carrier forces near the Midway Atoll, a territory of the United States in the central Pacific, from June 4-7, 1942.
On June 4, 1942, the Battle of Midway began.
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Midway Island is a fairly isolated atoll, so named because it is midway between North America and Asia in the North Pacific Ocean, according to National Geographic.
Midway’s importance grew for commercial and military planners, says the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
In this June 4, 1942, file photo provided by the U.S. Navy, the USS Astoria (CA-34) steams by USS Yorktown (CV-5), shortly after the carrier had been hit by three Japanese bombs in the Battle of Midway. (William G. Roy/U.S. Navy via AP, File)
In the 1930s, Midway became a stopover for Pan American Airways’ “flying clippers” — seaplanes crossing the ocean on their five-day transpacific passage, the same source indicates.
Midway was an incredibly strategic location, multiple sources say.
“The Imperial Japanese Navy planned to use it to secure their sphere of influence in the Pacific theater of the war,” according to National Geographic.
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“The Japanese had not lost a naval battle in more than 50 years, and had nearly destroyed the American fleet just six months earlier in a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.”
The American success at Midway was a major victory over the Imperial Japanese Navy.
Pearl Harbor is about 1,300 miles east of Midway, says the same source.
In preparation, American military and intelligence forces worked together to defeat the Japanese.
The Battle of Midway Island, which resulted in a major victory for the U.S. fleet. The USS aircraft carrier ‘Yorktown’ received a direct hit from a Japanese plane, which got through despite the heavy barrage put up by American destroyers. (Keystone/Getty Images)
Code breakers were able to decipher Japanese naval code, allowing American leaders to anticipate Japanese maneuvers, notes National Geographic.
Because of this, the U.S. Navy was then able to launch a surprise attack on the larger Japanese fleet in the area and the Battle of Midway turned the tide of the war, says the same source.
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The American success at Midway was a major victory over the Imperial Japanese Navy as all four Japanese carriers — Akagi, Hiryu, Kaga and Soryu — had participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor, says the National WWII Museum.
The Battle of Midway is often referred to as the turning point of the war in the Pacific.
“Sinking those Japanese carriers represented a resounding defeat over the enemy fleet which had wrought such destruction only six months before,” the same source says.
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The Imperial Japanese Navy would not be capable of overcoming the loss of four carriers and over 100 trained pilots — and with the loss at Midway, the Japanese offensive in the Pacific was overturned and the United States began offensive action in the Pacific, says the National WWII Museum.
The Battle of Midway is widely considered the most decisive U.S. victory of that period.
It is often referred to as the turning point of the war in the Pacific.
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Midway Atoll has since been designated as a National Memorial to the Battle of Midway, says the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
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