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of him, counselled the governor to accept the offer as the best alternative now left him, and gallantly undertook to engage in the enterprise at the hazard of his life. Sir William consenting, Ludwell, with twenty-six well-armed men, appeared at the ap- pointed time alongside of Laramore's vessel. Laramore was pre- pared to receive the loyalists, and Ludwell boarded her without the loss of a man, and soon after captured the other vessels. According to T. M.'s Account, Captain Carver was at this time, upon Sir William's invitation, holding an interview with him on shore. Bland, Carver, and the other chiefs were sent to the governor, and the rest of the prisoners secured on board of the vessels. Bland's expedition appears to have been very badly ma- naged, and the drunkenness of his men probably rendered his party so easy a prey .* The greater part of the prisoners screened themselves from punishment by entering into the governor's ser- vice. When Laramore waited on the governor, he clasped him in his arms, called him his deliverer, and gave him a large share of his favor. In a few days the brave old Carver was hanged on the Accomac shore. Sir William Berkley afterwards described him as "a valiant man and stout seaman, miraculously delivered into my hand." Sir Henry Chicheley, the chief of the council, who, with several other gentlemen, was a prisoner in Bacon's hands, afterwards exclaimed against this act of the governor as most rash and cruel, and he expected, at the time, to be executed in the same manner by way of retaliation. Bland was put in irons and badly treated, as it was reported.
Captain Gardner, sailing from the James River, went to the governor's relief with his own vessel, the Adam and Eve, and ten or twelve sloops, which he had collected upon hearing of Bland's expedition. Sir William Berkley, by this unexpected turn of affairs, raised from the abyss of despair to the pinnacle of hope, resolved to push his success still further. With Laramore's ves- sel and Gardner's, and sixteen or seventeen sloops, and a motley band of six hundred, or, according to another account, one thou- sand men in arms, "rogues and royalists," the governor returned in triumph to Jamestown, September 7th, 1676, where, falling
* Bacon's Proceedings, 20; Force's Hist. Tracts, i.
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on his knees, he returned thanks to God, and again proclaimed Bacon and his adherents rebels and traitors. There were now in Jamestown nine hundred Baconites, as they had come to be styled, under command of Colonel Hansford, commissioned by Bacon. Berkley sent in a summons for surrender of the town, with offer of pardon to all except Drummond and Lawrence. Upon this, all of them retired to their homes except Hansford, Lawrence, Drummond, and a few others, who made for the head of York River, in quest of Bacon, who had returned to that quarter.
During these events Bacon was executing his designs against the Indians. As soon as he had dispatched Bland to Accomac, he crossed the James River at his own house, at Curles, and sur- prising the Appomattox Indians, who lived on both sides of the river of that name, a little below the falls, (now Petersburg,) he burnt their town, killed a large number of the tribe, and dispersed the rest .* Burkt places this battle or massacre on Bloody Run, a small stream emptying into the James at Richmond, but he re- fers to no authority, and probably had none better than a loose tradition. The Appomattox Indians, it appears, occupied both sides of the river in question, and it is altogether improbable that Indians still inhabited the north bank of the James River near Curles. Besides, if they had still inhabited that side, it would have been unnecessary to cross the James before commencing the attack. Curles was a proper point for crossing the James with a view of attacking the Indians on the Appomattox.
From the falls of the Appomattox, Bacon traversed the country to the southward, destroying many towns on the banks of the Nottoway, the Meherrin, and the Roanoke. His name had be- come so formidable, that the natives fled everywhere before him, and having nothing to subsist upon, save the spontaneous produc- tions of the country, several tribes perished, and they who sur- vived were so reduced as to be never afterwards able to make any firm stand against the Long-knives, and gradually became tributary to them.
* History of Bacon's Rebellion, in Va. Gazette for 1769.
+ Burk, ii. 176.
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CHAPTER XXXVI.
1676.
Bacon Marches back upon Jamestown-Singular Stratagem-Berkley's Second Flight-Jamestown Burnt-Bacon proceeds to Gloucester to oppose Brent- Bacon dies-Circumstances of his Death and Burial-His Father an Author --- Marriage and Fortune of Nathaniel Bacon, Jr .- His Widow.
BACON, having exhausted his provisions, had dismissed the greater part of his forces before Lawrence, Drummond, Hans- ford, and the other fugitives from Jamestown joined him. Upon receiving intelligence of the governor's return, Bacon, collecting a force variously estimated at one hundred and fifty, three hun- dred, and eight hundred, harangued them on the situation of affairs, and marched back upon Jamestown, leading his Indian captives in triumph before him. The contending parties came now to be distinguished by the names of Rebels and Royalists. Finding the town defended by a palisade ten paces in width, run- ning across the neck of the peninsula, he rode along the work, and reconnoitred the governor's position. Then, dismounting from his horse, he animated his fatigued men to advance at once, and, leading them close to the palisade, sounded a defiance with the trumpet, and fired upon the garrison. The governor re- mained quiet, hoping that want of provisions would soon force Bacon to retire; but he supplied his troops from Sir William Berkley's seat, at Greenspring, three miles distant. He after- wards complained that "his dwelling-house at Greenspring was almost ruined; his household goods, and others of great value, totally plundered; that he had not a bed to lie on; two great beasts, three hundred sheep, seventy horses and mares, all his corn and provisions, taken away."
Bacon adopted a singular stratagem, and one hardly compati- ble with the rules of chivalry. Sending out small parties of horse, he captured the wives of several of the principal loyalists
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then with the governor, and among them the lady of Colonel Bacon, Sr., Madame Bray, Madame Page, and Madame Ballard. Upon their being brought into the camp, Bacon sends one of them into Jamestown to carry word to their husbands that his purpose was to place their wives in front of his men in case of a
. sally .* Colonel Ludwellt reproaches the rebels with "ravishing of women from their homes, and hurrying them about the country in their rude camps, often threatening them with death." But, according to another and more impartial authority,¿ Bacon made use of the ladies only to complete his battery, and removed them out of harm's way at the time of the sortie. He raised by moonlight a circumvallation of trees, earth, and brush-wood, around the governor's outworks. At daybreak next morning the governor's troops, being fired upon, made a sortie; but they were driven back, leaving their drum and their dead behind them. Upon the top of the work which he had thrown up, and where alone a sally could be made, Bacon exhibited the captive ladies to the views of their husbands and friends in the town, and kept them there until he completed his works. The peninsula of Jamestown is formed by the James River on the south, and a deep creek on the north encircling it within ten paces of the river. This island, for it is so styled, is about two miles long, east and west, and one mile broad. It is low, consisting mainly of marshes and swamps, and in consequence very unhealthy. There are no springs, and the water of the wells is brackish. Jamestown stood along the river bank about three-quarters of a mile, containing a church, and some sixteen or eighteen well- built brick houses. The population of this diminutive metropolis consisted of about a dozen families, (for all of the houses were not inhabited,) "getting their living by keeping of ordinaries at extraordinary rates."
Bacon, after completing his works, in which he was much as- sisted by the conspicuous white aprons of the ladies, now mounted a small battery of two or three cannon, according to some com- manding the shipping, but not the town, according to others
* Mrs. Cotton's Letter. f Letter in Chalmers' Annals, 349.
į Narrative of Indian and Civil Wars.
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commanding both. Sir William Berkley had three great guns planted at the distance of about one hundred and fifty paces. But such was the cowardice of his motley crowd of followers, the bulk of them mere spoilsmen, "rogues and royalists," intent only on the plunder of forfeited estates promised them by "his honor," that although superior to Bacon's force in time, place, and num- bers, yet out of six hundred of them, only twenty gentlemen were found willing to stand by him. So great was their fear, that in two or three days after the sortie they embarked in the night with all the town people and their goods, and leaving the guns spiked, weighing anchor secretly, and dropping silently down the river; retreating from a force inferior in number, and which, during a rainy week of the sickliest season, had been ex- posed, lying in open trenches, to far more hardship and privation than themselves. At the dawn of the following day, Bacon en- tered, where he found empty houses, a few horses, two or three cellars of wine, a small quantity of Indian-corn, "and many tanned hides." It being determined that it should be burned, so that the "rogues should harbor there no more," Lawrence and Drummond, who owned two of the best houses, set fire to them in the evening with their own hands, and the soldiers, following their example, laid in ashes Jamestown, including the church, the first brick one erected in the colony. Sir William Berkley and his people beheld the flames of the conflagration from the vessels riding at anchor, about twenty miles below.
Bacon now marched to York River, and crossed at Tindall's (Gloucester) Point, in order to encounter Colonel Brent, who was marching against him from the Potomac, with twelve hundred men. But the greater part of his men, hearing of Bacon's suc- cess, deserting their colors declared for him, "resolving with the Persians, to go and worship the rising sun."* Bacon, making his headquarters at Colonel Warmer's, called a convention in Gloucester, and administered the oath to the people of that county, and began to plan another expedition against the Indians, or, as some report, against Accomac, when he fell sick of a dys- entery brought on by exposure. Retiring to the house of a Dr.
* Mrs. Cotton's Letter.
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Pate, and, lingering for some weeks, he died. Some of the loyalists afterwards reported that he died of a loathsome disease, and by a visitation of God; which is disproven by T. M.'s Ac- count, by that published in the Virginia Gazette, and by the Re- port of the King's Commissioners. Some of Bacon's friends suspected that he was taken off by poison; but of this there is no proof. In his last hours he requested the assistance of a minis- ter named Wading, whom he had arrested not long before for his opposition to the taking of the oath in Gloucester, telling him that "it was his place to preach in the church, and not in the camp."
The place of Bacon's interment has never been discovered, it having been concealed by his friends, lest his remains should be insulted by the vindictive Berkley, in whom old age appears not to have mitigated the fury of the passions. According to one tradition, in order to screen Bacon's body from indignity, stones were laid on his coffin by his friend Lawrence, as was supposed; according to others, it was conjectured that his body had been buried in the bosom of the majestic York where the winds and the waves might still repeat his requiem :-
" While none shall dare his obsequies to sing In deserved measures; until time shall bring Truth crowned with freedom, and from danger free, To sound his praises to posterity."*
Lord Chatham, in his letters addressed to his nephew, the Earl of Camelford, advises him to read "Nathaniel Bacon's Historical and Political Observations, which is, without exception, the best and most instructive book we have on matters of that kind." This book, though at present little known, formerly enjoyed a high reputation. It is written with a very evident bias to the principles of the parliamentary party, to which Bacon adhered. It was published in 1647, again in 1651, secretly reprinted in 1672, and again in 1682, for which edition the publisher was indicted and outlawed. The author was probably related to the
* Extract from verses on his death, attributed to a servant, or attendant, who was with him in his last moments, and entitled " Bacon's Epitaph made by his Man." (Force's Hist. Tracts, i.)
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great Lord Bacon .* Nathaniel Bacon, Jr., came over to Virgi- nia about the year 1672, when the third edition of that work was secretly reprinted in England. In the quarto edition the author, Nathaniel Bacon, is said to have been of Gray's Inn. It was published during the Protectorate. He appears probably to have been, in Oliver Cromwell's time, recorder of the borough of Ips- wich, and to have lived at Freston, near Saxmundham, in Suffolk. His son, Nathaniel Bacon, Jr., styled the Rebel, married, against the consent of his father, who violently exhibited his disapproba- tion, Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Sir Edward Duke, and sister to Sir John Duke, of Benhill-lodge, near Saxmundham. Ray, who set out upon his travels into foreign parts in 1663, says he was accompanied by Mr. Willoughby, Sir Philip Skippon, and Mr. Nathaniel Bacon, "a hopeful young gentleman."} He owned lands in England of the yearly value of one hundred and fifty pounds; and after his marriage, being straitened for money, he applied to Sir Robert Jason for assistance, conveyed the lands to him for twelve hundred pounds sterling,t and removed with his wife to Virginia. Dying, he left Elizabeth a widow, and children. She afterwards married in Virginia Thomas Jervis, a merchant, who lived in Elizabeth City County, on the west side of Hampton River,§ and upon his death she became his execu- trix, and in 1684 claimed her jointure out of the lands sold to Jason, under a settlement thereof made by Bacon on his mar- riage, in consideration of her portion.|| Nathaniel Bacon, Jr., was cousin to Thomas, Lord Culpepper, T subsequently go- vernor of Virginia. Jervis appears to have been owner of a ves- sel, the "Betty," (so called after his wife,) in which Culpepper sailed from Virginia for Boston, August 10th, 1680. Elizabeth, relict of Jervis, married third a Mr. Mole. There are, at the present day, persons in Virginia of the name of Bacon, who claim to be lineal descendants of the rebel.
* Hist. Magazine, i. 216.
¿ Hening, ii. 374.
|| Vernon's Reports, i. 284.
Ibid., i. 125.
¿ Ibid., ii. 472.
T Va. Hist. Reg., iii. 190.
1
CHAPTER XXXVII.
1676.
Bacon succeeded by Ingram-Hansford and others executed-Ingram and others hold West Point-They surrender-Close of Rebellion-Proceedings of Court- Martial-Execution of Drummond-His Character-Mrs. Afra Behn-Richard Lawrence-His Character.
UPON Bacon's death, toward the end of 1676, the exact date of which can hardly be ascertained, he was succeeded by his lieutenant-general, Joseph Ingram, (whose real name was said to be Johnson,) who had lately arrived in Virginia. Ingram, sup- ported by George Wakelet, or Walklett, his major-general, who was very young, Langston, Richard Lawrence, and their ad- herents, took possession of West Point, at the head of York River, fortified it, and made it their place of arms. West Point, or West's Point, so called from the family name of Lord Dela- ware, was at one time known as "De la War," and is so laid down on John Henry's Map, dated 1770. There is still extant there* a ruinous house of stone-marl, which was probably occu- pied by Ingram and his confederates. A bake-oven serves to strengthen the conjecture.
As soon as Berkley heard of Bacon's death, he sent over Robert Beverley, with a party, in a sloop to York River, where they captured Colonel Hansford and some twenty soldiers, at the house where Colonel Reade had lived, which appears to have been at or near where Yorktown now stands. Hansford was taken to Accomac, tried, and condemned to be hanged, and was the first native of Virginia that perished in that ignominious form, and in America the first martyr that fell in defending the rights of the people. He was described by Sir William Berkley as "one Hansford, a valiant stout man, and a most resolved rebel." When he came to the place of execution, distant about
* 1847.
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a mile, from the place of his confinement, he appeared well re- solved to bear his fate, complaining only of the manner of his death. Neither during his trial before the court-martial, nor afterwards, did he supplicate any favor, save that "he might be shot like a soldier, and not hanged like a dog;" but he was told that he was condemned not as a soldier, but as a rebel. During the short respite allowed him after his sentence, he professed re- pentance and contrition for all the sins of his past life, but re- fused to acknowledge what was charged against him as rebellion, to be one of them; desiring the people present to take notice that "he died a loyal subject and lover of his country, and that he had never taken up arms but for the destruction of the Indians, who had murdered so many Christians." His execution took place on the 13th of November, 1676 .*
Captain Wilford, Captain Farloe, and several others of less note, were put to death in Accomac. Wilford, younger son of a knight who had lost his estate and life in defence of Charles the First, had taken refuge in Virginia, where he became an Indian inter- preter, in which capacity he was very serviceable to Bacon. Far- loe had been made an officer by Bacon, upon the recommendation of Sir William Berkley, or some of the council. He was a mathe- matical scholar, and of a peaceable disposition, and his untimely end excited much commiseration. Major Cheesman died in prison, probably from ill usage. His wife took to herself the entire blame for his having joined Bacon, and on her bended knees implored Sir William Berkley to put her to death in his stead. The governor answered by applying to her an epithet of infamy. Several other prisoners came to their death in prison in the same way with Cheesman.
Sir William Berkley now repaired to York River with four merchant-ships, two or three sloops, and one hundred and fifty men. According to another account,¿ he sent Colonel Ludwell with part of his forces to York River, while he himself with the rest repaired to Jamestown; but this appears to be erroneous. Sir William proclaimed a general pardon, excepting certain per-
* Ingram's Proceedings, 33; Force's Hist. Tracts, i.
+ T. M. and Mrs. Cotton.
į In Va. Gazette.
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sons named, especially Lawrence and Drummond. Greenspring, the governor's residence, still held out, being garrisoned with a hundred men under a captain Drew, previously a miller, the ap- proaches barricaded, and three pieces of cannon planted. A party of one hundred and twenty, dispatched by the governor to surprise at night a guard of about thirty men and boys, under Major Whaley, at Colonel Bacon's house on Queen's Creek, were defeated, with the loss of their commander, named Farrel. Colo- nel Bacon and Colonel Ludwell were present at this affair. Major Lawrence Smith, with six hundred Gloucester men, was likewise defeated by Ingram at Colonel Pate's house, Smith saving himself by flight, and his men being all made prisoners. The officer next in command under Smith was a minister. Cap- tain Couset with a party being sent against Raines, who headed the insurgents on the south side of James River, Raines was killed, and his men captured.
Meanwhile Ingram, Wakelet, and their companions in arms, foraged with impunity on the estates of the loyalists, and bade defiance to the aged governor. They defended themselves against the assaults of Ludwell and others with such resolution and gal- lantry, that Berkley, fatigued and exhausted, at length sent, by Captain Grantham, a complaisant letter to Wakelet-or, as some say, to Ingram-offering an amnesty, on condition of surrender. This was agreed to, and in reward for his submission, Berkley presented to Wakelet all the Indian plunder deposited at West Point. Greenspring was also surrendered by Drew upon terms offered by Sir William Berkley. A court-martial was held on board of a vessel in York River, January the 11th, 1676-7 .* Four of the insurgents were condemned by this court: one of them, by name Young, had, according to Sir William Berkley, held a commission under General Monk long before he de- clared for the king; another, a carpenter, who had formerly
* Consisting of the Right Honorable Sir William Berkley, Knight, Governor and Captain-General of Virginia; Colonel Nathaniel Bacon, Colonel William Clayborne, Colonel Thomas Ballard, Colonel Southy Littleton, Colonel Philip Ludwell, Lieutenant-Colonel John West, Colonel Augustine Warner, Major Law- rence Smith, Major Robert Beverley, Captain Anthony Armistead, Colonel Mat- thew Kemp, and Captain Daniel Jenifer.
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been a servant of the governor, but had been made a colonel in Bacon's army; one, Hall, was a clerk of a county court, but, by his writings, "more useful to the rebels than forty armed men."
When West Point was surrendered, Lawrence and Drummond were at the Brick-house in New Kent, on the opposite side of the river. On the nineteenth day of January, Drummond was taken in the Chickahominy Swamp, half famished, and on the following day was brought in a prisoner to Sir William Berkley, who was then on board of a vessel at Colonel Bacon's, on Queen's Creek. The governor, who, through personal hostility, had vowed that Drummond should not live an hour after he fell into his power, upon hearing of his arrival, immediately went on shore and saluted him with a courtly bow, saying, "Mr. Drummond, you are very unwelcome; I am more glad to see you than any man in Vir- ginia. Mr. Drummond, you shall be hanged in half an hour." He replied, "What your honor pleases." A court-martial was immediately held, in time of peace, at the house of James Bray, Esq., whither the prisoner was conveyed in irons. He was stripped; and a ring-a pledge of domestic affection-was torn from his finger before his conviction; he was condemned without any charge being alleged, and although he had never borne arms ; and he was not permitted to defend himself. Condemned at one o'clock, he was hurried away to execution on a gibbet at four o'clock, at Middle Plantation, with one John Baptista, "a common Frenchman, that had been very bloody." Drummond was a sedate Scotch gentleman, who had been governor of the infant colony of North Carolina, of estimable character, unsullied integrity, and signal ability. He had rendered himself extremely obnoxious to the governor's hatred by the lively concern which he had always evinced in the public grievances. Sir William Berkley mentions him as "one Drummond, a Scotchman, that we all suppose was the original cause of the whole rebellion." When afterwards the petition of his widow, Sarah Drummond, depicting the cruel treat- ment of her husband, was read in the king's council in England, the lord chancellor, Finch, said: "I know not whether it be law- ful to wish a person alive, otherwise I could wish Sir William
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Berkley so, to see what could be answered to such barbarity; but he has answered it before this."*
Mrs. Afra Behn celebrated Bacon's Rebellion in a tragi-comedy, entitled "The Widow Ranter, or the History of Bacon in Vir- ginia." Dryden honored it with a prologue. The play failed on the stage, and was published in 1690; there is a copy of it in the British Museum. It sets historical truth at defiance, and is replete with coarse humor and indelicate wit. It is probable that Sarah Drummond may have been intended by "The Widow Ranter." It appears that one or two expressions in the Decla- ration of Independence occur in this old play.
On the 24th of January, 1677, six other insurgents were con- demned to death at Greenspring, and executed. Henry West was banished for seven years, and his estate confiscated, save five pounds allowed him to pay his passage. William West and John Turner, sentenced to death at the same time, escaped from prison. William Rookings, likewise sentenced, died in prison. Richard Lawrence, with four companions, disappeared from the frontier, proceeding on horseback and armed, through a deep snow, pre- ferring to perish in the wilderness rather than to share Drum- mond's fate. Lawrence was educated at Oxford, and for wit, learning, and sobriety, was equalled by few there. He had been one of the commissioners for adjusting the boundary line between Maryland and Virginia in 1663. He had been defrauded of a handsome estate by Berkley's corrupt partiality in behalf of a favorite. The rebellion, as it was called, was by most people mainly attributed to Lawrence; and it is said that he had before thrown out intimations that he hoped to find means by which he not only should be able to repair his own losses, but also see the country relieved from the governor's "avarice and French des- potic modes." Lawrence had married a rich widow, who kept a large house of entertainment at Jamestown, which gave him an extensive influence. Nathaniel Bacon, Jr., probably had lodged
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