John Alden, b. 1599?, d. Sept. 12, 1687, was one of the Pilgrim Fathers who came to America in the Mayflower, signed the Mayflower Compact, and founded Plymouth Colony in 1620. Thereafter he held various public offices, including that of deputy governor of Massachusetts (1664-65, 1667). The unfounded details of his wooing of fellow Pilgrim Priscilla Mullens (or Molines) whom he did marry were the subject of the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem "The Courtship of Miles Standish."