Bacon's Rebellion

Bacon's Rebellion was an uprising in 1676 in the Virginia Colony, led by Nathaniel Bacon. It was the first rebellion in the American colonies in which discontented frontiersmen took part; a similar uprising in Maryland occurred later that year. The uprising was a protest against the governor of Virginia, William Berkeley.

Effects

Bacon's Rebellion was the result of discontent among back-country farmers against corruption in the government. Rather than adhere to the law, they chose to push it aside. Many Virginians were debtors. Borrowing on the strength of paper money was stopped by the British Government, leading to more discontent against the merchant classes bryans.

Historians have pointed out that one of the most important reforms made during Bacon's government was the recognition of the right to keep and bear arms, so that the common man could defend himself from hostile Indians but also to oppose a despotic regime. After Berkeley's resumption of power, this right was one of the first he repealed. Miller suggests it was Bacon's Rebellion that may have served as one of the motives for later colonists' insistence for the right to bear arms. Historian Stephen Saunders Webb suggests that Bacon's Rebellion was a revolution, with roots in the English Civil War and with consequences including the American Revolutionary War.

It was largely the indentured servants and poor farmers (most of whom were former indentured black servants or their descendants) who rebelled. Before the rebellion, black African slaves were rare in Virginia, chiefly due to their expense and the lack of slave traders bringing Africans to Virginia. Africans were often brought as indentured servants, becoming free after serving their term of labor. Indentured servants from Europe continued to play a role in Virginia after the rebellion. Due to the demand for labor and a decrease in immigrants from England, African slave imports grew rapidly. New Virginia laws made slavery lifelong and a status inherited by one's children, creating a racially based class system with Africans at the bottom. Even the poorest European indentured servants were above them. This broke the common interest between the poor English and Africans of Virginia which had existed during Bacon's Rebellion.

The rebellion strengthened the ties between Virginia south of the James River and the Albemarle Settlements in present-day North Carolina, while creating a long-lasting animosity between the two colonies' governments. The Albemarle region offered refuge for rebels in the aftermath. In the long term, North Carolina offered an alternative to colonists disenchanted with Virginia.

ee also

*Queen Anne (Pamunkey chief)

Footnotes

References

*Frantz, John B. "Bacon's Rebellion: Prologue to the Revolution?" (1969)
*Johnson, Paul. "A History of the American People". (1997), 77-78
*Lovejoy, David S. "The Virginia Charter and Bacon's Rebellion," in "The Glorious Revolution in America" (1972), 32-52.
*Morgan, Edmund Sears. "Rebellion," in "American Slavery, American Freedom:The Ordeal of Colonial Virginia" (New York: Norton, 1975), 250-70.
*Takaki, Ronald T. "A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America". Back Bay Books (2004), pp. 62-67. ISBN 0316831115.
*Washburn, W. E. "The Governor and the Rebel" (1957, repr. 1967).
*Webb, Stephen Saunders, "1676 - The End of American Independence". (New York: 1984).
*Wertenbaker, T. J. "Torchbearer of the Revolution" (1940, rpt. 1965)
*Wertenbaker, T. J. "Bacon's Rebellion, 1676" (1957)

External links

* [http://www.greattradingpath.com/native-american-indian-history/index.htm Great Trading Path] original source documents pertaining to Bacon's Rebellion
* [http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/etas/45/ "The Widow Ranter; or, The History of Bacon in Virginia"] , by Aphra Behn presents a romanticized version of the story.