Mayflower Compact was a written agreement for self-government signed by 41 members of the Plymouth Colony. On Nov. 21 (then Nov. 11), 1620, the ship Mayflower anchored off Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The Pilgrim leaders persuaded 41 male adults aboard to sign the Mayflower Compact, and set up a government in Plymouth Colony. The original compact has since disappeared. The version below follows the spelling and punctuation in Of Plimoth Plantation, written between 1630 and 1651 by William Bradford, second governor of the colony, and published in 1856 as History of Plymouth Plantation.