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, Hansford, 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 hundred, 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, running 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 remained 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
afterwards 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 compatible with the
rules of chivalry. Sending out small parties of horse, he captured the
wives of several of the principal loyalists 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.[309:A]
Colonel Ludwell[309:B] 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,[309:C] 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 assisted by the
conspicuous white aprons of the ladies, now mounted a small battery of
two or three cannon, according to some commanding the shipping, but not
the town, according to others 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 numbers, 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 exposed, lying in
open trenches, to far more hardship and privation than themselves. At
the dawn of the following day, Bacon entered, 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 success, deserting their colors declared for
him, "resolving with the Persians, to go and worship the rising
sun."[310:A] 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 dysentery
brought on by exposure. Retiring to the house of a Dr. 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 Account, by that published in the
Virginia Gazette, and by the Report 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
minister 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."[311:A]
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 great Lord Bacon.[312:A] Nathaniel Bacon, Jr., came over to
Virginia 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 Ipswich, 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 disapprobation, 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."[312:B] 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,[312:C] 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,[312:D] and upon his death she became his
executrix, and in 1684 claimed her jointure out of the lands sold to
Jason, under a settlement thereof made by Bacon on his marriage, in
consideration of her portion.[312:E] Nathaniel Bacon, Jr., was cousin to
Thomas, Lord Culpepper,[312:F] subsequently governor of Virginia. Jervis
appears to have been owner of a vessel, 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.
FOOTNOTES:
[309:A] Mrs. Cotton's Letter.
[309:B] Letter in Chalmers' Annals, 349.
[309:C] Narrative of Indian and Civil Wars.
[310:A] Mrs. Cotton's Letter.
[311:A] 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.)
[312:A] Hist. Magazine, i. 216.
[312:B] Ibid., i. 125.
[312:C] Hening, ii. 374.
[312:D] Ibid., ii. 472.
[312:E] Vernon's Reports, i. 284.
[312:F] Va. Hist. Reg., iii. 190.