"The abstract and brief chronicle of the time."
_Hamlet._
It is not our purpose to trouble the reader with a detailed account of
all the proceedings of the famous Rebellion, which forms the basis of
our story. We, therefore, pass rapidly over the stirring incidents which
immediately succeeded the flight of Sir William Berkeley. Interesting as
these incidents may be to the antiquary or historian, they have but
little to do with the dramatis personæ of this faithful narrative, in
whose fate we trust our readers are somewhat interested. Accomac is
divided from the mainland of Virginia by the broad Chesapeake Bay.
Although contained in the same grant which prescribed the limits to the
colony, and although now considered a part of this ancient commonwealth,
there is good reason to believe that formerly it was considered in a
different light. In one of the earliest colonial state papers which has
been preserved, the petition of Morryson, Ludwell & Smith, for a
reformed charter for the colony, the petitioners are styled the "agents
for the governor, council and burgesses of the country of Virginia _and
territory of Accomac_;" and although this form of phraseology appears in
but few of the records, yet it would appear that the omission was the
result of mere convenience in style, just as Victoria is more frequently
styled the Queen of England, than called by her more formal title of
Queen of the United Kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, by the Grace
of God, Defender of the Faith. It was, therefore, not without reason,
that Nathaniel Bacon, glad at least of a pretext for advancing his
designs, should have considered the flight of Sir William Berkeley to
Accomac as a virtual abdication of his authority, more especially as it
had been ordained but two years before by the council at Whitehall, that
the governor should be actually a resident of Virginia, unless when
summoned by the King to England or elsewhere. At least it was a
sufficient pretext for the young insurgent, who, in the furtherance of
his designs did not seem to be over-scrupulous in regard to the powers
with which he was clothed. But twelve years afterwards a similar pretext
afforded by the abdication of James the Second, relieved the British
government of one of the most serious difficulties which has arisen in
her constitutional history.
Without proceeding on his expedition against the Indians, Bacon had no
sooner heard of the abdication of the governor than he retired to the
Middle Plantation, the site of the present venerable city of
Williamsburg. Here, summoning a convention of the most prominent
citizens from all parts of the colony, he declared the government
vacated by the voluntary abdication of Berkeley, and in his own name,
and the name of four members of the council, proceeded to issue writs
for a meeting of the Assembly. It is but just to the memory of this
great man to say, that this Assembly, convened by his will, and acting,
as may well be conceived, almost exclusively under his dictation, has
left upon our statute books laws "the most wholesome and good," for the
benefit of the colony, and the most conducive to the advancement of
rational liberty. The rights of property remained inviolate--the reforms
were moderate and judicious, and the government of the colony proceeded
as quietly and calmly after the accomplishment of the revolution, as
though Sir William Berkeley were still seated in his palace as the
executive magistrate of Virginia. A useful lesson did this young
colonial rebel teach to modern reformers who would defame his name--the
lesson that reform does not necessarily imply total change, and that
there is nothing with which it is more dangerous to tamper than long
established usage. The worst of all quacks are those who would
administer their sovereign nostrums to the constitution of their
country.
The reader of history need not be reminded that the expedition of Bland
and Carver, designed to surprise Sir William Berkeley in his new
retreat, was completely frustrated by the treachery of Larimore, and its
unfortunate projectors met, at the hands of the stern old Governor, a
traitor's doom. Thus the drooping hopes of the loyalists were again
revived, and taking advantage of this happy change in the condition of
affairs, Berkeley with his little band of faithful adherents returned by
sea to Jamestown, and fortified the place to the best of their ability
against the attacks of the rebels.
Nor were the insurgents unwilling to furnish them an opportunity for a
contest. The battle of Bloody Run is memorable in the annals of the
colony as having forever annihilated the Indian power in Eastern
Virginia. Like the characters in Bunyan's sublime vision, this unhappy
race, so long a thorn in the side of the colonists, had passed away, and
"they saw their faces no more." But his very triumph over the savage
enemies of his country, well nigh proved the ruin of the young
insurgent. Many of his followers, who had joined him with a bona fide
design of extirpating the Indian power, now laid down their arms, and
retired quietly to their several homes. Bacon was thus left with only
about two hundred adherents, to prosecute the civil war which the harsh
and dissembling policy of Berkeley had invoked; while the Governor was
surrounded by more than three times that number, with the entire navy of
Virginia at his command, and, moreover, secure behind the fortifications
of Jamestown. Yet did not the brave young hero shrink from the contest.
Though reduced in numbers, those that remained were in themselves a
host. They were all men of more expanded views, and more exalted
conceptions of liberty, than many of the medley crew who had before
attended him. They fought in a holier cause than when arrayed against
the despised force of their savage foes, and, moreover, they fought in
self-defence. For, too proud and generous to desert their leader in his
hour of peril, each of his adherents lay under the proscriptive ban of
the revengeful Governor, as a rebel and a traitor. No sooner, therefore,
did Bacon hear of the return of Berkeley to Jamestown, than, with hasty
marches, he proceeded to invest the place. It is here, then, that we
resume the thread of our broken narrative.