Squanto the helper fit a national story about peaceful beginnings.

Tisquantum the political operator did not.

Recovering the omitted material does not require rejecting Bradford entirely.

It requires reading him closely enough to notice what later retellings left behind.

A Death Without A Certain Diagnosis

Tisquantum’s final illness has inspired speculation because Bradford described fever and a nosebleed.

Modern readers naturally want a diagnosis.

Was it smallpox?

Was it another infection?

Was he poisoned?