XV.

CHAPTER concludes with an act of general and total pardon and oblivion of all treasons, felonies, contempts, crines, and 1676. misdemeanors done or counseled since the first day of March last past, to the four and twentieth day of June, except breaches of the act against trade with the Indians.

The Assembly adjourned, the general appointed by it undertook an expedition against the Pamunkeys, whom, according to the governor's partisans, he frightened from their lands, and made hostile, if they were so. While Bacon was thus employed, Berkeley was encouraged by a loyal petition from Gloucester county, got up by Philip Ludwell, one of the council, to proceed thither, and to July 29. issue a new proclamation, again denouncing Bacon as a rebel. But the projects of the governor were counterworked by the activity of Drummond and Lawrence. Bacon, in reply, put forth a declaration, in which he arraigned the governor, justified himself, and called a conA vention of delegates from the several counties to meet at Middle Plantation (now Williamsburg). This convention, attended by many of the principal men of the colony, agreed upon an oath to be imposed on the inhabitants, and an "engagement" to be signed by them, promising to support Bacon even against troops from England till the matters in dispute could be referred to the king.

As even the loyal inhabitants of Gloucester seemed cold to his cause, Berkeley presently retired to Accomac, on the eastern shore, accompanied by Beverley, Ludwell, and a few others. This withdrawal was treated as an abdication of office, and Bacon, with four members of the council, issued writs for electing a new Assembly.

Bacon's party had been joined by Giles Bland, the collector of the customs, "a gentleman newly arrived from England to possess the estate of his deceased uncle, late of the council." Bland seized the ship of one Lori

XV.

more, increased her armament to sixteen guns, and sail- CHAPTER ed with a force of two hundred and fifty men to attack Berkeley, in company with Captain Barlow, "one of 1676 Cromwell's soldiers," and Carver, "a good seaman, and a stout, resolute fellow," who commanded a bark of four guns. But by the contrivance of Lorimore, supported by the courage of Ludwell, the large ship was betrayed into the governor's hands. The other vessel was also taken.

Bland was put in irons; Carver and Barlow were hanged-a rash act, it was thought, since Bacon had Sir Henry Chicheley and other counselors in his power, and might, perhaps, retaliate. Most of the men, on the offer of pardon, were induced to enter the governor's service. By liberal promises of pay and free plunder, Berkeley collected a force of near a thousand Accomacians. With two ships and some sixteen sloops, he presently entered James River, and proceeded to occupy Jamestown.

Bacon's men were already dispersed, but he soon collected a new force, and, though far inferior in numbers to the governor, laid close siege to Jamestown. The peninsula or island, for so it was called, on which that ancient town was situated, two miles in length, and about a mile in breadth, washed on the south by the James River, was encompassed on the north by a deep creek, which united with the river on the east, and ranged westward, in a semicircle, till within a few paces of the river bank. This peninsula, as described by one of the original historians of this insurrection, "is low ground, full of marshes and swamps, which make the air, espécially in the summer, insalubrious, not at all replenished with springs of fresh water, and that which they have in their wells brackish, ill scented, penurious, and not grateful to the stomach, which renders the place improper to endure the commencement of a siege."

Sept. 7

APTER
XV.

While completing his intrenchment across the neck of the peninsula, Bacon resorted to a curious sort of 7 stratagem to cover his unfinished works from attack. "He was no sooner arrived at town," so writes Mrs. Anne Cotton to her friends at Yardley, in Northamptonshire, "but by several small parties of horse, two or three in a party, for more he could not spare, he fetcheth into his little leagure all the prime men's wives whose husbands were with the governor, as Colonel Bacon's lady, Madam Bray, Madam Page, Madam Ballard, and others, which the next morning he presents to the view of their husbands and friends in town upon the top of the small work he had cast up in the night, where he caused them to tarry till he had finished his defense against his enemies' shot, it being the only place, as you do know well enough, for those in town to make a sally at."

The works being finished, and the ladies removed, the besieged made a sally, but were repulsed with loss. Finding himself in an awkward predicament, and his troops not to be depended upon, the governor made a hasty retreat by night, taking with him the town's people and their goods, "leaving all the great guns nailed up, and the houses empty, for Bacon to enter at his pleasure, which he did the next morning before day, where, contrary to his hopes, he met with nothing that might satisfy either himself or his soldiers, except a few horses, two or three cellars of wine, and some small quantity of Indian corn, with a great many tanned hides." The governor anchored some twenty miles below the town. To prevent his return, Bacon's party set it on fire, not sparing even the church, "the first that ever was in Virginia." It consisted, besides the church and state house, of some sixteen or eighteen houses," most.

XV.

as the church, built of brick, fair and large, and ir. CHAPTER
them about a dozen families, for all were not inhabit-
ed, getting their livings by keeping ordinaries at most 1676.
extraordinary rates." The legislative attempts to build

up Jamestown seem not to have been attended with
much success.
Drummond and Lawrence were accused
of having counseled this conflagration, and of giving the
example by each setting fire to his own house, the best
in the town next to the governor's.

Jamestown burned, Bacon marched to meet Colonel Brent, who was advancing fast upon him from Potomac, at the head of twelve hundred men, to raise the siege of Jamestown. Brent was presently deserted by his soldiers, and Berkeley having again retired to Accomac, Bacon marched to Green Spring, the governor's estate, where he "feasted his men at the governor's cost;" after which he crossed York River into Gloucester, and succeeded, though not without a good deal of difficulty, in inducing the inhabitants of that county to take the engagement.

The whole western shore thus subjected to his authority, just as Bacon was purposing to cross over to Accomac, he was seized with a violent disorder, contracted among the marshes of Jamestown, by which he was soon carried off. He had taken the most prominent Oct. part in the late commotions, known, from him, as BACON'S REBELLION, but, as often happens in such cases, others less forward had exerted perhaps a greater influence. The governor considered Drummond and Lawrence as the prime movers, and, as such, had specially excepted them from all offers of pardon. Drummond was a "sober Scotch gentleman of good repute." He had formerly been appointed by Berkeley governor of the infant settlements of North Carolina, but was at this time, prob

XV.

CHAPTER ably from a long course of opposition, an object of great rancor on the part of the governor, who stigmatized him, 1676. indeed, as "the original cause of the whole rebellion." Lawrence was "formerly of Oxford University, and for wit, learning, and sobriety, equaled there by few." Some years before, "he had been partially treated at law" by the governor and council "on behalf of a corrupt favorite." "I myself have heard him," says our historical burgess from Stafford county, "in his familiar discourse, insinuate as if his fancy gave him prospect of finding, at one time or other, some expedient not only to repair his great loss, but therewith to see those abuses rectified that the country was oppressed with, through, as he said, the frowardness, avarice, and French despoti methods of the governor. And likewise I knew him to be a thinking man, and, though nicely honest, affable, and without blemish in his conversation and dealings, yet did he manifest abundance of uneasiness in the sense of his hard usages, which might prompt him to improve that Indian quarrel to the service of his animosities. And for this the more fair and frequent opportunities offered by his dwelling at Jamestown, where was the concourse from all parts to the governor; and besides that, he had married a wealthy widow, who kept a large house of public entertainment, unto which resorted those of the best quality, and such others as business called to that town; and his parts, with his even temper, made his converse courted by persons of all ranks; so that, being subtile, and having all these advantages, he might with less difficulty discover men's inclinations, and instill his notions where he found they would be imbibed with greatest satisfaction." "As for Mr. Bacon, fame did lay to his charge the having run out his patrimony in England, except what he brought to Virginia, and of