Editor’s note: Are the events of the past just an archival story of people and times long gone or do they continue to shape and affect the modern day? Can society learn from the past and use that information as current situations arise?
Living in a historically rich area, we can see many instances that show how time marches on — from fashion to politics. This series will explore the connections between our local history and today.
JAMESTOWN — A dispute between the citizenry and leaders in power regarding class, culture, race and place, beginning with an uproar and ending in distrust and destruction.
Does the event sound familiar?
Willie Balderson, Director of Living History and Historic Trades for the Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation, has developed a character based on historical information that educates the community about the events that led up to Bacon’s Rebellion.
The National Park Service tasked Balderson in 1997 with developing a walking tour, “the idea was to tap into a source that is oft quoted but no one had really brought this person to life. It’s a character named Thomas Matthew.”
Balderson explained that Matthew was in Virginia during Bacon’s Rebellion and in 1705 goes “back to England, and his health is failing, and there he will write a long narrative from notes that were very specific. Thomas Matthew offers the account (of Bacon’s Rebellion) as he lived through it.”
Obviously, in 1676, there were no fancy phones with cameras and the ability to upload your videos to social media. Word was spread through conversation and written accounts are all we have that preserve the story.
These letters help tell the story of the events that unfolded.
According to Balderson’s research, the rebellion began with a dying man’s last words.
“When they ask, ‘who perpetrated this horrible offence again you?’ The Doegs. The Doegs. The Doeg Indians. And, as it was revealed later, the attack was over some stolen hogs.” Balderson continued, “So then, a posse is raised — militia, footman as well as calvary.”
The situation became critical when, in a retaliatory strike by the colonists, they attacked the wrong Indians, the Susquehanaugs, which caused large-scale Indian raids to begin, according to the National Park Service.
“It was written at the time, that by the late winter of 1676, over 300 colonists had been killed. And, up at the curls of the James River, a newly arrived fella named Nathanial Bacon is on his plantation when it is attacked and his favorite overseer is killed,” explained Balderson.
Bacon, a young man who had only arrived in the colony a year prior, was seeking retribution against the Indian people, and looked to his cousin, Gov. Sir William Berkeley, a distinguished Englishman of highly regarded statue, for assistance.
Berkeley denied the request.
These actions helped lead to the rebellious power struggle that pitted two distinct factions — led by Berkeley and Bacon — against one another.
“In June, Bacon comes (to Jamestowne) with a mob of somewhere between 300 and 500 men. Where there’s a showdown in front of the state house,” said Balderson, who explains Bacon demanded a commission to fight the Indians.
Berkeley then bared his chest and dared Bacon to shoot him. Bacon did not.
After issuing a declaration of grievance calling for a new assembly to be chosen under his own authority, Bacon marched his men to the lower Rappahannock River and attacked the friendly Pamunkey Indians, according to Encyclopedia Virginia.
By late July, after getting word of Bacon’s attack on the Pamunkey tribe, Berkeley declares Bacon a rebel and negates the commission.
Balderson adds, “One salient point — in the summer of 1676 — Bacon released what he calls his ‘Declaration of the People,’ where he allowed — once the governor and his rule was overthrown and the people would prevail — he would see to it that all bondsman, indentured and enslaved that joined him would be freed.”
In September, Bacon, who had now amassed a huge following, decided to take the capitol and take charge.
Marching into Jamestown, they burned the city as Berkeley abandoned the colony.
On Sept. 21, you can witness a retelling of Bacon’s Rebellion from Thomas Matthew’s “eyewitness” point of view while standing on the land where the events took place as Historic Jamestown hosts ‘The Burning of Jamestown’ at 7 p.m.
“This violence — this civil war — created what? More death. More lawsuits. The destruction of Jamestowne. But, what really came out of it?” asks Mark Summers, Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation’s Director of Public and Youth Programs.
Part 2 of this story — Connections Present: Bacon’s Rebellion — will explore history’s tendency to repeat itself and the connections that can be drawn from this historical event to today. It will be available on Saturday, Sept. 21.
