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235
THE HIDDEN FIRES.
them. In the spring of 1676 five hundred men were ready to march, when Governor Berkeley disbanded them, alleging that the frontier forts were sufficient protection for the people.
This action was received by the Virginians with sul- len indignation. The forts were utterly useless, they said, and his Honor was fearful that war with the In- dians would injure his monopoly in the trade in beaver- skins. But Berkeley was not thinking of his beaver- skins. He objected to commissioning an armed force on more serious grounds. The country was in a flame, and the Virginians were becoming desperate. After overthrowing the Indians it was probable that the res- tive planters would ask themselves whether there were not others to overthrow. What was plain to Sir Wil- liam Berkeley was that he was standing on a volcano : he was naturally indisposed to unloose the hidden fires ; and the Virginians, finding that they had friends no- where, began to look to themselves.
Such was the state of public feeling in May, 1676. Let us now glance at the stage of the approaching drama. Virginia was still the narrow strip of country between the Potomac and the Nottaway, from the bay to the head of Tidewater. From "James Cittie," the centre, a town of less than twenty houses, radiated the popula- tion growing ever sparser toward the extremities. Be- yond the Chesapeake was the " Kingdom of Accomack," a populous region of sand and surf, fertile fields and rich oyster-beds, of sailors and 'longshoremen who had seen Clayborne pass in his pinnaces, going to attack the Bal- timoreans. Across the peninsula from " James Cittie " were the rich counties of York and Gloucester, along the banks of the great river where Powhatan had held
236 VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
court in his "Chief Place of Council." He has gone away for a long time now, and Werowocomoco and the famous Uttamussac shrine have disappeared. The houses of the planters peep from the woods, and life has become easy and luxurious ; it was here, as we have seen, that the exiled Cavaliers were " feasting and carousing." This was indeed the heart of the col- ony ; Virginia, with her forty thousand people, was condensed there. Beyond, toward the Potomac, tho Nottaway, and the mountains, the dwellings grew grad- ually farther apart and were inhabited by borderers who watched, gun in hand, against the savages.
We may take in thus, at a glance, that old Virginia of 1676, a little garden spot cut out of the American wilderness between the ocean and the Blue Ridge. In the Lowland, well-to-do planters traveling to James- town on horseback, or going thithier in their sloops ; higher up "well-armed housekeepers " living in log- houses ; and on the border the pioneers in their stock- ade forts. It is everywhere an English society, swear- ing allegiance to the King upon every occasion, but ready in the same breath to swear revolution and fight for the latter oath against the former. They have en- dured the wretched state of affairs for a great many years now ; the general rejoicing at the King's return has quite disappeared ; and the Virginians are ready to rise against lıim.
This brief statement will indicate the situation of af. fairs in the spring of 1676. The country was ripe for rebellion : the slumbering fires ready to flame at the touch of a finger. At this moment a popular young man applied to Sir William Berkeley for a commission to march against the Indians ; the commission was re fused ; and Virginia rose in revolution.
237
THE OUTFLAME.
XIII
THE OUTFLAME.
VIRGINIA was warned of what was coming by three ominous presages : one, "a large comet streaming like a horse-tail westward ; " another, "fflights of wild pigeons nigh a quarter of the mid-hemisphere, and of their length was no visible end," which reminded old planters of the same phenomenon just before they were attacked by Opechancanough; and the third presage was " swarms of flies about an inch long, and as big as the top of a man's little finger, which ate the new-sprouted leaves from the tops of the trees." There could be no man- ner of doubt that these ominous apparitions of comets, pigeons, and locusts foretold disaster; and in 1676 the furies duly descended on unhappy Virginia.
The Great Rebellion which now flamed out is so curious and important an event that it deserves mi- nute attention. We may pass over whole decades of Virginia history without losing much. The wrangles of governors, and assemblies, and all the petty incidents of the times, are of no importance or interest. But here, every hour is crowded with events full of strong passion and shaping great issues. The figures are he- roic ; the denoûment tragic. This Rebellion is the most striking occurrence in American history, for the first century and a half after the settlement of the country. It was armed defiance of England, and bore a curiously close resemblance to the passionate struggle which had preceded it on English soil. Here, as there, the people rose against oppression, levied armies, chose a leader,
238 VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
fought battles, and succumbed at last, and were punished by shot or halter. Thus this singular American revo- lution of the seventeenth century, following its English prototype, is an event thrusting itself upon the atten- tion, and it is necessary to follow it in detail. Twenty years of the Commonwealth and the Restoration have been summed up in a general statement. Twenty weeks of this year, 1676, will contain more matter to instruct and interest.
The central figure of the great military and polit- ical drama which now began was a young Englishman who had come to live in Virginia a few years before, - Nathaniel Bacon. He had "not yet arrived to thirty years," and when the rebellion began was prob- ably about twenty-eight. His family seem to have be- longed to the English gentry, as he was a cousin of Lord Culpeper, and married a daughter of Sir John Duke. He was said to have "run out his patrimony in England and exhausted the most part of what he brought to Virginia," whither he had come about 1672, and settled at "Curles" on upper James River, below Varina. One of his family had preceded him, and was a member of the King's Council, - Nathaniel Bacon, Sr., " a very rich, politick man and childless, who de- signed him for his leir."
The high estimate of Bacon's ability may be seen from his appointment to a place in the Council. This was a position of great dignity, rarely conferred upon any but men of mature age and large estate ; and Bacon was still young, and his estate only respectable. His personal character is seen on the face of his public career. He was impulsive and subject to fits of passion, or, as the old writers say, "of a precipitate disposition."
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THE OUTFLAME.
When he grew angry he was "impetuous (like deliri- ous)," and tossed his arms and stormed, as at James- town, where he cried violently : " Damn my blood ! I'll kill Governor, Council, Assembly, and all ; and then I'll sheathe my sword in my own heart's blood!" .When calm he was extremely courteous ; in an interview with one of the Burgesses, he "came stooping to the ground, and said, ' Pray, sir, do me the honor to write a line for me.'" His personal praises were sounded even by people who had no sympathy with his public proceed- ings. They described him as " a man of quality and merit, brave and eloquent, . . . but a young man, yet he was master and owner of those inducements which constitute a compleat man (as to intrinsecalls), wisdom to apprehend and discretion to chuse." This picture does not seem to have been overdrawn. Bacon soon became immensely popular, and was "crowned the Darling of the people's hopes and desires, as the only man fit in Virginia to put a stop to the bloody resolution of the Heathen," the Indian massacres.
This is the portrait, if not of a "compleat man," at least of a complete popular leader. Young, ardent, vio- lent when aroused, but amiable and cordial at other times, recklessly brave, extremely politic, of remarkable eloquence as a public speaker, this was a man fitted by his very faults to become the head of a popular move- ment, which always demands that its leader shall not be a person of negative traits. As to Bacon's motives, it is improbable that his reduced fortunes had anything to do with his career, since he had nothing to gain by the rising, which he must have seen would probably lead to the confiscation of his estate and the loss of his head. Add the further fact that men like himself rarely look
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VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
to profit, and nearly always to fame. Bacon, no doubt, acted under the spur of indignation, and with a natural enjoyment of the fact of leadership. And yet he was said not to be the real leader. He was compared to "a wheel agitated by the weight of thoughtful Mr. Law- rence," an astuter man. But if thoughtful Mr. Law- rence, or any one else, agitated the wheel, its momen- tum soon came to direct the whole machinery.
This is an outline of the man who is going to become the Virginia Cromwell. In May, 1676, Bacon is at his Curles plantation, just below the old City of Henri- cus, living quietly on his estate with Elizabeth, his wife. He has another estate in the suburbs of the present city of Richmond, the situation of which is pointed out by the name of " Bacon Quarter Branch," which is still used. Here his servants and an overseer live, and he can easily go thither in a morning's journey on horse- back or in his barge, unless he objects to being rowed seven miles around the Dutch Gap peninsula. Such is his position in the spring of this year. When not visit- ing his upper plantation, or attending the Council at Jamestown, he is at Curles living the life of a planter ; entertaining his neighbors; denouncing the trade-laws and the grants to Arlington and Culpeper, the Governor for his lukewarmness in defending the borderers from the Indians, with a word, perhaps, to the more trifling wrong of disfranchising the freedmen. On these grievances he no doubt enlarges, over the walnuts and the wine, to his visitors, his " precipitate impetuous disposition " lead- ing him to cry out especially at the Indian policy ; for he is "a gentleman with a perfect antipathy to In- dians." The report is that they mean to renew their outrages on the upper waters of the rivers ; if they as-
241
THE OUTFLAME.
sail him he will make war on them, with or without authority, " commission or no commission."
'The hour was at hand when this resolution of Bacon's was to be tested. Suddenly intelligence reached him (May, 1676) that the Indians had attacked his estate at the Falls, killed his overseer and one of his servants, and were going to carry fire and hatchet through the frontier. The planters ran to arms, and hastened from house to house to combine against these dangerous ene- mies. All was confusion, and the chronicle sums up the chief difficulty, - they were " without a head." Who was to lead them ? It was a serious question, since it was doubtful if Governor Berkeley would commission anybody. But the Indians were still ravaging the coun- try ; a crowd of armed horsemen had assembled; and Bacon was clamorously called to take command. His energy was well known, and the savages had attacked his lands ; so he was offered the leadership, and at once accepted it. He made a speech full of " bold and ve- hement spirit," which one of the old historians is oblig- ing enough to reconstruct for us from his imagination ; enlarged on "the grievances of the times,"-an omi- nous indication of coming events ; and making publica- tion of the cause of the assemblage, sent to Governor Berkeley asking for a commission.
Thus, all things up to this moment were done decently and in order. They would await Sir William's reply, -to govern themselves accordingly or not. It came promptly. Berkeley did not refuse the commission, but, what amounted to the same thing, he did not send it. Mr. Bacon was notified in a "polite and complimentary " manner that the times were troubled ; that the issue of his business might be dangerous ; that, unhappily, the
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242 VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
character and the fortunes of Mr. Bacon might become imperiled if he proceeded. The commission was thus refused, and the Governor's action is concisely ex- plained by the old writers. He " doubted Bacon's tem- per, as he appeared popularly inclined, - a constitution not consistent with the times or the people's dispositions." This was the real explanation ; the complimentary ex- pressions went for nothing ; " the veil was too thin to impose on Mr. Bacon." He was at the head of a force, " most good housekeepers, well armed;" the Indians were still ravaging ; and having sent another messenger to Jamestown to thank the Governor for the promised commission, Bacon set out at the head of his well-armed housekeepers to attack the Indians.
Thus the game had begun between the man of twen- ty-eight and the man of seventy, - the popular leader and the representative of the King. The old Cavalier attempted to end it by striking a sudden blow at his adversary. Bacon and his men were marching through the woods of Charles City, when an emissary of the Governor's came in hot haste witli a proclamation. Nathaniel Bacon, Jr., and his deluded followers were denounced as rebels, and ordered to disperse. If they persisted in their illegal proceedings, it would be at their peril. The blow shook the resolutions of some of the armed housekeepers, and " those of estates obeyed." The number of these falterers is not known, since Ba- con's force is not. In the discordant chronicles it is estimated at from seventy to three hundred. The last number is improbable ; if it was the true number, the proportion of faint-hearted was immense. If the force was seventy, it was small, since fifty-seven horsemen re- mained steadfast.
243
THE OUTFLAME.
At the head of this force, Bacon advanced rapidly on the Falls, and found the Indians intrenched on a hill east of the present city of Richmond. A parley ensued, and the attack was delayed, but a shot was fired from Bacon's rear, which was followed by an assault on the hill. The Virginians " waded shoulder deep " through a stream in front ; stormed and set fire to the Indian stock- ade, blew up four thousand pounds of powder, which the savages had in some manner come into possession of; and completely routed them, killing one hundred and fifty, with a loss of only three of their own party. This was the famous " Battle of Bloody Run ; " so called, it is said from the fact that the blood of the Indians ran down into the stream beneath the hill. The historians fight over the event as Bacon fought over the palisade : one maintaining that he only fought here afterwards, and others that he never fought here at all, since this was the scene of the Ricahecrian combat. It is not very important, but the statement of Bacon himself, a week or two afterwards, seems to settle the controversy.
The main point is that the Indians were routed and driven toward the mountains. The frontier was for the time safe from their further depredations, and Gen- eral Bacon marched back at his leisure, - " slowly " is the adjective used in the chronicle, - at the head of his well-armed housekeepers, toward lower James River, fol- lowed by a picturesque procession of "Indian captives."
Such was the first act of the drama of Bacon's Re- bellion, - a fight that was to lead to more fighting. The curtain descended upon one scene, only to rise ab- ruptly on the next.
244 VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
XIV.
BACON'S ARREST.
SIR WILLIAM BERKELEY had not remained quiet dur- ing these audacious proceedings. He had been openly defied. Rebellion had suddenly burst forth in his good kingdom of Virginia, as it had burst forth in England against his royal master, thirty years before.
There was nothing to do but fight it, and the aged knight was not wanting in courage. He raised a force of horsemen, and set out from Jamestown in pursuit of Bacon ; but suddenly news reached him that there were enemies in his rear. The alarming intelligence came that the whole lower country had risen in revolt. The news of Bacon's application for a commission and his subsequent proceedings had flown on the wings of the wind ; the people rose to support him ; and to meet this new danger, Berkeley countermarched his horsemen and hurried back to Jamestown.
Here he found all in tumult. The whole tier of counties along lower James River and the York were in rebellion. A civil war was imminent; and Sir William met it like a statesmen ; that is to say, he did not defy it, but quietly controlled it. Were the border forts so great a subject of complaint? The said forts should be dismantled. Had the planters conceived the singular idea that the then House of Burgesses did not represent the people, since the same House had been con- tinued by prorogation since 1660, and had become the Virginia Long Parliament? Well, the House should be dissolved and writs issued for a new election. Ile
245
BACON'S ARREST.
kept all his promises. Orders were issued for disman- tling the obnoxious forts, and the writs were at once sent out.
Bacon, who had returned to his manor of Curles, was now going to repeat his defiance of the Governor. He offered himself as one of the candidates to repre- sent Henrico in the Burgesses, and was " unanimously chosen," freedmen illegally voting for him along with the freeholders. In some of the counties freedmen were even elected Burgesses, which indicates the popular aversion to the restriction of suffrage.
The Burgesses were to meet early in June, for the necessity of their assemblage was urgent. The mem- bers hurried to the capital on horseback, fording the bridgeless streams, or in their "sloops," like the mem- ber from distant Stafford County, Mr. "T. M.," who afterwards wrote a stirring narrative of what followed. Bacon also came in his sloop. Embarking at Curles with "about thirty gentlemen besides," who had been prominent in the up-country rising, he sailed down James River, and arrived at Jamestown. Bad fortune awaited him. His presence as a Burgess was an open defiance. The cannon of a ship lying at anchor in front of the capital were trained on liis sloop, and the high sheriff, who was in the ship, sent an order to Bacon to come on board. Another account says that his sloop was " shot at and forced to fly up the river,"' when he was pursued and taken prisoner ; but this is less reliable.1 In either case, he was arrested, with his companions, some of whom were put in irons; and the
1 It is the statement of the " Breviarie and Conclusion," but that was written from hearsay. "T. M." of Stafford was present at James- town when Bacon was arrested.
246 VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
sheriff conducted him to Governor Berkeley, in the State House.
The interview between the hardy adversaries is de- scribed by the chronicle in a very few words ; but these give us a sufficient idea of it. The two men were equally restive and haughty, but controlled their tem- pers. Berkeley said coldly, -
" Mr. Bacon, have you forgot to be a gentleman ?"
" No, may it please your honor," Bacon replied as briefly.
" Then I'll take your parole," said Berkeley. And that is all we know of the interview.
The moderation of the aged Cavalier was due to a very simple circumstance. Jamestown was in turmoil. The Burgesses, almost all of whom were in sympathy with Bacon, were hourly arriving ; and a great crowd of people from the surrounding counties which had just revolted, as well as friends of the cause from above, were flocking into the town. The House of Burgesses, to meet on the instant, would probably have something to say about the arrest of one of their number. Thus the fiery old ruler, having uttered his taunt to Bacon, " Have you forgot to be a gentleman," ended by tak- ing his parole, which was virtually his release from arrest.
It is necessary to notice these minuti@ ; the events are framed in them. It was a striking picture, this confrontation of two remarkable men : one a youth, the leader of revolution ; the other a graybeard, sworn to crush it. This narrative will therefore follow, step by step, what took place in these days; rejecting nothing, not even the undignified historic fact that Bacon lodged at the hostelry of "thoughtful Mr. Lawrence." Much seems to have come of that.
BACON'S ARREST. 247
The vital question now was what was to be done with the impetuous youth. He had defied the govern- ment, and some course must be taken in reference to him. If he would confess that he had sinned, and prom- ise to behave better in future, he might be pardoned. His crime was great ; but then he was a member of the intractable House of Burgesses now, and it was neces- sary to be forgiving. If he humbly acknowledged his offense, he should be restored to liis seat in the Council (not the Burgesses), a commission should be given him to go and fight the Indians, and all would be harmony again. The only trouble was to make the erect youth bend his back. He must get down on his knees, and the idea of that was quite hateful to him. But he was brought to consent to it at last, through the persuasion of his old cousin, the " very rich, politic man," Colonel Nathaniel Bacon, Sr., member of the Council. This lover of peace, who was fond of his " uneasy cousin," the young rebel, prevailed on him, " not without much pains," to make a written recantation, and read it on his knees. Bacon consented, but it must not be to the Governor, but at the bar of the Assembly. This under- stood, the politic elder " compiled it ready to his hand," and the ceremony followed. It took place in the State House : the date (June 5, 1676) shows the hurry of events. In about one week all these shifting scenes had passed in Virginia. Between the last days of May and these first days of June Bacon had been denounced as a rebel ; had marched and defeated the savages ; had stood for the Burgesses and appeared at Jamestown; had been arrested and as quickly paroled ; and now was about to confess on his knees that he was a great of- fender. The old Cavalier Berkeley was going to make
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248 VIRGINIA: A HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE.
an imposing scene of it. Bacon was not to go up-stairs to the room where the House sat, and make his confes- sion only to the Burgesses. Berkeley sent them a mes- sage to attend him in the Council Chamber below, on public business ; and when they came made them an address on the Indian troubles, specially denouncing the murder of the six chiefs in Maryland, though Colo- nel Washington, who had commanded the forces there, was present. Of the murdered chiefs Sir William said, " with a pathetic emphasis," that " if they had killed my grandfather and grandmother, my father and mother and all my friends, yet if they had come to treat of peace, they ought to have gone in peace ; " when he abruptly sat down. But this was not the great business of the day. A short silence followed, when the Governor again rose, and said with grim humor, -
" If there be joy in the presence of the angels over one sinner that repenteth, there is joy now, for we have a penitent sinner come before us. Call Mr. Bacon."
Bacon came in, with a paper in his hand, and knelt down at the bar of the Assembly. He then read aloud from the paper a confession that he had been guilty of " unlawful, mutinous, and rebellious practices," and promised that if he were pardoned he would " demean himself dutifully, faithfully, and peaceably," under a penalty of two thousand pounds sterling ; and would bind his whole estate for his good behavior for one year. When he had finished, Sir William Berkeley said, -
" God forgive you; I forgive you," -repeating the words three times.
" And all that were with him," said Colonel Cole, of the Council, referring, it is said, to the thirty gentlemen in the sloop, twenty or more of whom were still in irons.
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BACON'S ARREST.
" Yes, and all that were with him," Berkeley replied. He then rose suddenly to his feet and addressed Bacon, who had probably gotten up already from his knees.
" Mr. Bacon," he exclaimed, " if you will live civilly but till next quarter-day, - but till next quarter day," repeating the words, "I'll promise to restore you to your place there !" pointing to the seat which Bacon generally occupied during the sessions of the Council. What reply Bacon made is not recorded. He probably agreed to " live civilly," for he was permitted to return at once to his accustomed chair. The Assembly went back to its room up-stairs, but Bacon did not go with them. He was not one of that body now, since he was restored to his place in the Council ; and "T. M.," Bur- gess from Stafford, passing by the door, "saw Mr. Bacon on his quondam seat with the Governor and Coun- cil, which seemed a marvellous indulgence to one whom he had so lately proscribed as a rebel."
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