Virginia Under the Stuarts

1607-1688

By

THOMAS J. WERTENBAKER

New York
RUSSELL & RUSSELL
1959

COPYRIGHT 1914 BY PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
COPYRIGHT 1958, 1959 BY THOMAS J. WERTENBAKER
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NUMBER 39-11229
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Dedicated
to my mother

PREFACE

It was in May, 1910, that the author came to Princeton for an interview with President Woodrow Wilson concerning an appointment as Instructor in the Department of History, Politics, and Economics. He was elated when President Wilson engaged him, though not happy over the $1,000 salary. Yet with this sum to fall back on he borrowed $200, and took a trip to England.

In London he went treasure hunting, the treasure of old documents relating to the history of colonial Virginia. He sought out the British Public Record Office, off Chauncery Lane, and was soon immersed in the mass of letters, official reports, journal of the Assembly, and other papers.

The author was prepared to find valuable historical materials in London, for he had spent the summer of 1908 studying the William Noel Sainsbury and the McDonald abstracts and transcripts of the documents in the Record Office deposited in the Virginia State Library. But he was staggered at the extent of the manuscript collection on Virginia history alone. Among the scores of volumes are thirty-two devoted to the correspondence of the Board of Trade, seventeen to the correspondence of the Secretary of State, twenty-two to entry books, letters, commissions, warrants, etc.

When the summer waned he left for America taking with him many pages of closely written notes. But what he had learned served to whet his appetite for more, so that in 1912 and again in 1914 he was back, going over volume after volume, searching eagerly for fear some important point would escape him. The mass of abstracts and notes which he accumulated formed the basis of this volume.

In fact, any political history of Virginia in the colonial period must be based on the documents in the Public Record Office, since most of the copies left in Virginia have been lost or destroyed. Today, however, colonial historians no longer have to visit London to consult them, since transcripts have been made and deposited in the Library of Congress.

In recent years the American Council of Learned Societies has made available other collections of manuscripts which have thrown new light on early Virginia history. The most important of these are the Coventry Papers at Longleat, the residence of the Marquess of Bath. Many of the letters deal with Bacon's Rebellion, and include the correspondence between Berkeley and Bacon, accounts of the Indian war, complaints of the misgovernment of Berkeley, the account of the evacuation of Jamestown written by Berkeley, accounts of Bacon's death and the collapse of the rebellion.

This new material adds new weight to the conclusions reached in this book—that the causes of Bacon's Rebellion were deep-seated, that it grew out of the discontent caused by the Navigation Acts, the heavy taxes, the corrupting of the Assembly by Berkeley, and the misuse of the courts. It in no way shakes the conviction expressed by Thomas Mathews, who himself was involved in the rebellion, that the Indian war was the excuse for it rather than the cause.

Yet certain recent historians have contended that this violent uprising was not a protest against injustice and misgovernment. One has gone so far as to call it merely a quarrel between a rash young man and an old fool. We could with equal justice call the American Revolution just a quarrel between George Washington and George III. Mathews tells us that it was the general opinion in Virginia at the time that it was not Bacon who was chiefly responsible for the uprising, but Thomas Lawrence. Bacon "was too young, too much a stranger there, and of a disposition too precipitate to manage things to that length they were carried," he pointed out, "had not thoughtful Mr. Lawrence been at the bottom."

But neither Lawrence's hatred of Berkeley, nor Bacon's rashness, nor Berkeley's folly, nor the Indian war suffice to explain the rebellion. When the news of the uprising reached Charles II, he thought it past belief that "so considerable body of men, without the least grievance or oppression, should rise up in arms and overthrow the government." He was quite right. Had there been no grievances and oppression there would have been no uprising.

That Bacon's Rebellion is explained in part by poverty and suffering is clear. Philip Ludwell said that the rebel army was composed of men "whose condition ... was such that a change could not make worse." The men who fought so valiantly against the Indians and Berkeley's forces, braved the King's anger, faced death on the gallows were called in contempt "the bases of the people," "the rabble," the "scum of the people," "idle and poor people," "rag, tag, and bobtail." The Council reported that there were "hardly two amongst them" who owned estates, or were persons of reputation. Berkeley complained that his was a miserable task to govern a people "where six parts of seven at least are poor, indebted, discontented, and armed."

So when Bacon sent out his agents to every part of Virginia to denounce the governor for not permitting an election for a new Assembly, accusing him of misgovernment, and complaining of the heavy and unequal taxes, they "infested the whole country." Berkeley stated that the contaigion spread "like a train of powder." Never before was there "so great a madness as this base people are generally seized with." When, in panic, he dissolved the Long Assembly and called for a new election, all except eight of those chosen were pro-Bacon men.

One cannot but ask why. Surely the voters would not have sided with this young man who had been in Virginia but a few months had he not taken the lead in protesting against the many wrongs to which they had been subjected. And had those who rushed to arms, risking their property, if not their necks, done so merely because of a quarrel between Bacon and Berkeley, they would have been more than base, they would have been fools.

What these wrongs were Bacon and his followers tell us in what they called the Declaration of the People. Berkeley and his favorites they denounced "for having upon specious pretences of public works raised great unjust taxes upon the commonalty for the advancement of private favorites and other sinister ends...; for having abused and rendered contemptible the magistrates of justice, by advancing to places of judicature scandalous and ignorant favorites...."

In a burning manifesto, denouncing the injustice and corruption of the ruling group, Bacon said: "We appeal to the country itself what and of what nature their oppressions have been, and by what cabal and mystery the design of many of those whom we call great men have been transacted and carried on.... See what sponges have sucked up the public wealth and whether it hath not been privately contrived away by unworthy favorites, by vile juggling parasites, whose tottering fortunes have been repaired and supported by the charge." The constant breach of laws, unjust prosecutions, excuses, and evasions, proved that the men in power were conducting public affairs "as if it were but to play a booty, game, or divide a spoil."

In view of these statements recent attempts to prove that Bacon was no true patriot and not interested in righting the people's wrongs seem strange indeed. It is hardly credible that he was merely pretending when he wrote these fiery words, that he posed as the champion of the people to further his personal ambitions, that he trumped up charges against Berkeley because of the disagreement over the Indian war.

But, it has been said, Bacon showed no interest in the passage of the reform laws enacted by the Assembly of June 1676, refused to have them read before his army, and complained that the Burgesses had not lived up to his expectations. Had he been really interested in reform, would he not have gloried in these laws and have praised the Assembly for passing them?

Any such conclusion falls flat when we consider the conditions under which this session was held. The Burgesses had hardly taken their seats when Bacon, who had been elected as one of the members to represent Henrico County, was captured. Though Berkeley pardoned him and restored him to his seat in the Council, he was a virtual prisoner during the first few days of the session. So he looked on with growing resentment as the governor overawed the Burgesses and reform measures were set aside.

Then, suddenly, the entire situation changed. Bacon got permission to return to Henrico because his wife was ill. Once there he placed himself at the head of his army of enraged frontiersmen and marched rapidly on Jamestown. When this news reached the little capital, the governor, his Council, and the Burgesses were panic stricken. Since resistance was useless, every thought was of appeasement. A series of reform laws, which struck at the very roots of Berkeley's system of rule through placemen, was introduced in the Assembly, rushed through, and signed by the governor.

Not knowing what had happened during his absence, on his arrival Bacon mounted the steps to the Long Room of the State House where the Assembly met, to urge them to right the people's wrongs. Thomas Mathews, who was present, says that "he pressed hard, nigh an hour's harangue on preserving our lives from the Indians, inspecting the revenues, the exorbitant taxes, and redressing the grievances and calamities of that deplorable country." It was only when he had finished that someone spoke up to tell him that "they had already redressed their grievances." To contend that Bacon was not interested in laws which he himself had so passionately urged and which had obviously been passed to conciliate him and his followers is merely to attempt to disprove the obvious.

Philip A. Bruce, in a statement published in 1893, in the Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, points out that Bacon's Rebellion "preceded the American Revolution by a century, an event which it resembled in its spirit, if not in its causes and results. Bacon is known in history as the Rebel, but the fuller information which we have now as to the motives of his conduct shows that he can with more justice be described as Bacon the Patriot. He headed a powerful popular movement in which the sovereignty of the people was for the first time relied upon on American soil by a great leader as the justification of his acts. The spirit breathing through the Declaration of the People is the spirit of the Declaration of Independence." Nothing which has been brought out in the sixty-four years since Dr. Bruce wrote these words has shaken or can shake their truth. Bacon was the torchbearer of the Revolution.

Attempts to defend Sir John Harvey are as unconvincing as those to belittle Bacon. Certainly the Sackville Papers, recently made available to historians, contain nothing to warrant any change in the conclusion, long accepted by Virginia historians, that Harvey's expulsion was richly deserved.

Charles Campbell, in his History of the Colony and Ancient Dominion of Virginia, thus describes Harvey's administration: "He was extortionate, proud, unjust, and arbitrary; he issued proclamations in derogation of the legislative powers of the Assembly; assessed, levied, held, and disbursed the colonial revenue without check or responsibility; transplanted into Virginia exotic English statutes; multiplied penalties and exactions and appropriated fines to his own use; he added the decrees of the court of high commission of England to the ecclesiastical constitutions of Virginia." Could we have a more perfect description of a despot?

It remains to point out a few errors which crept into the original manuscript. On page 21 "the falls of the Appomattox" should be "the first bend of the Appomattox"; on page 75 "John Pott" should be "Francis Pott"; on page 82 "Matthew Kemp" should be "Richard Kemp".

Thomas J. Wertenbaker

Princeton, New Jersey
August, 1957

CONTENTS

ABBREVIATIONS USED IN NOTES

Arb. Smith, Works of Captain John Smith, Edward Arber.
Scobell, Scobell's Collection of Acts and Ordinances of General Use.
F. R., The First Republic in America, Alexander Brown.
Gen., The Genesis of the United States, Alexander Brown.
Force, Tracts and Other Papers Relating to the Colonies in North America, Peter Force.
Nar. of Va., Narratives of Early Virginia, Lyon G. Tyler.
Va. Car., Virginia Carolorum, E. D. Neill.
Hen., The Statutes at Large, W. W. Hening.
Proceedings of Va. Co., Proceedings of the Virginia Company of London.
Cradle of Rep., The Cradle of the Republic, Lyon G. Tyler.
Bruce, Inst. Hist., Institutional History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century, P. A. Bruce.
Bruce, EC. Hist., Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century, P. A. Bruce.
Miller, The Legislature of the Province of Virginia, E. I. Miller.
P. R. O., British Public Record Office.
Stith, History of Virginia, William Stith.
Osg., American Colonies in the Seventeenth Century, H. L. Osgood.
Neill, Va. Co., History of the Virginia Company of London, E. D. Neill.
Fiske, Old Va., Old Virginia and her Neighbors, John Fiske.
Burk, History of Virginia, John Burk.
Va. Hist. Reg., Virginia Historical Register.
Beverley, History of Virginia, Robert Beverley.
Va. Mag., Virginia Magazine of History and Biography.
Wise, The Early History of the Eastern Shore of Virginia, J. C. Wise.
Southern Lit. Mess., Southern Literary Messenger.
Campbell, History of Virginia, Charles Campbell.
McD., McDonald Papers, Virginia State Library.
Jour. H. of B., Journals of the House of Burgesses. Manuscript copies in the Virginia State Library.
Justice in Virginia, Justice in Colonial Virginia, O. P. Chitwood.
Sains., Sainsbury Papers, Virginia State Library.
Mass. S. IV., Massachusetts Historical Collections, Series IV.
T. M., The Beginning, Progress and Conclusion of Bacon's Rebellion.
W. & M. Q., William and Mary Quarterly.
Inds' Pros., Indians' Proceedings.
Bac's Pros., Bacon's Proceedings.
Ing's Pros., Ingram's Proceedings.
Cotton, Our Late Troubles in Virginia, Mrs. A. Cotton.
Va. Vet., Virginia Vetusta, E. D. Neill.

CHAPTER I

The Founding of Virginia

In December, 1606, three little vessels—the Sarah Constant, the Discovery and the Goodspeed—set sail from England under Captain Christopher Newport, for the distant shores of Virginia.[1] After a long and dangerous voyage across the Atlantic the fleet, on the sixth of May, 1607, entered the Chesapeake Bay.[2] The adventurers spent several days exploring this great body of water, landing parties to investigate the nature of the shores, and to visit the Indian tribes that inhabited them. They were delighted with the "faire meddowes, ... full of flowers of divers kinds and colours", and with the "goodly tall trees" of the forests with "Fresh-waters running" between, but they had instructions not to settle near the coast, lest they should fall victims to the Spaniards.[3] So they entered the broad mouth of a river which they called the James, and made their way cautiously up into the country. On the twenty-third of May they found a peninsula in the river, which afforded a convenient landing place and was easy to defend, both from the Indians and the Spaniards. This place they called Jamestown. Landing their men, they set immediately to work building houses and erecting fortifications. Thus did the English begin their first permanent settlement in the New World.

The bold band of adventurers that came thus hopefully into this beautiful and smiling country little realized that before them lay only dangers and misfortunes. Could they have foreseen the terrible obstacles to founding a colony in this land, they would have hesitated before entering upon the enterprise.

Four things conspired to bring misfortune and disaster upon Virginia. The form of government prescribed by the King and the Company was unsuited to the infant settlement, and its defects kept the colonists for many months in turmoil and disorder. The Indians proved a constant source of danger, for they were tireless in cutting off stragglers, ambushing small parties and in destroying the crops of the white men. Famines came at frequent intervals to weaken the colonists and add to their misfortunes. But by far the most terrible scourge was the "sicknesse" that swept over Virginia year after year, leaving in its wake horrible suffering and devastation.

The charter that James I granted to the London Company served as a constitution for Virginia, for it prescribed the form of government and made regulations that none could disregard. It provided for a Council, resident in England, to which was assigned the management of the colony and the supervision of its government.[4] This body was appointed by the King and was strictly answerable to him through the Privy Council for its every act.[5] The immediate government of the colony was entrusted to a local Council, selected by the Council in England, and responsible to it. The Virginia Council exercised extraordinary powers, assuming all administrative, legislative and judicial functions, and being in no way restrained by the wishes or demands of their fellow colonists.[6] Although they were restricted by the charter and by the instructions of the Council in England, the isolation of the settlement and the turbulent spirit of the adventurers made them reckless in enforcing their own will upon the colonists. More than once they were guilty of unpardonable harshness and cruelty.

The charter did not provide for the appointment of a Governor. The nominal leadership of the colony was entrusted to a President, chosen by the local Council from among its members. This officer had no duty distinct from that of the Councillors, other than to preside at their meetings and to cast a double or deciding vote in case of deadlock.[7] He was to serve but one year and if at any time his administration proved unsatisfactory to his colleagues, they could, by a majority vote, depose him. In like manner, any Councillor that had become obnoxious could be expelled without specific charges and without trial.[8] These unwise provisions led naturally to disorder and strife, and added much to the misfortunes of the infant colony.[9]

The selections for the Council were made some days before the fleet sailed, but the Company, fearing a conflict of authority during the voyage, thought it best that they should be kept secret until the colonists had reached Virginia. The names of the appointees were embodied in "several instruments" which were entrusted to the commanders of the vessels, with instructions that they should be opened within twenty-four hours after they had arrived off the coast of America.[10] Upon entering the Chesapeake Bay the adventurers read the papers, and found that Christopher Newport, the commander of the fleet, Edward Wingfield, Bartholomew Gosnold, George Kendall, John Ratcliffe, John Martin and John Smith were those that had been chosen.[11]

After the landing the Council met, were sworn to office, and then elected Wingfield President.[12] Captain John Smith, who had been accused of mutiny during the voyage, was not allowed to take his seat, and was kept under restraint until the twentieth of June.[13]

Hardly had the founding of Jamestown been effected when the weakness of the constitution became apparent. The meetings of the Council were discordant and stormy. The members were utterly unable to act with vigor and determination, or to agree upon any settled course of action in establishing the little colony. The President, because of the limitation of his powers, could do nothing to restore harmony or to enforce his own wishes and policies. Confusion and mismanagement resulted. In less than a month after the first landing the inefficiency of the government had created such discontent that the colonists petitioned the Council for redress.[14] It was only the tact and moderation of Captain Newport that appeased the anger of the settlers and persuaded them to submit to the decrees of the governing body.[15]

On the second of July, Newport, with his little fleet, sailed for England, leaving the ill-fated colonists to their own resources.[16] No sooner had he gone than the spirit of discord reappeared. The quarrels within the Council became more violent than ever, and soon resulted in the complete disruption of that body. Captain Kendall, who seems to have been active in fomenting ill feeling among his colleagues, was the first to be expelled. Upon the charge of exciting discord he was deprived of his seat and committed to prison.[17]

As Captain John Smith had, before the departure of Newport, been allowed to take his place in the Council, there were now five members of that body. The number was soon reduced to four by the death of Captain Gosnold, who fell a victim to the sickness.[18] One would imagine that the Council, thus depleted, would have succeeded in governing the colony in peace, but the settlers were given no respite from their wrangling and disputes. In September, Ratcliffe, Smith and Martin entered into an agreement to depose President Wingfield and to oust him from the Council. Before they proceeded against him, however, they pledged each other that the expulsions should then stop, and that no one of the three should be attacked by the other two.

The Councillors then appeared before Wingfield's tent with a warrant, "subscribed under their handes, to depose the President; sayeing they thought him very unworthy to be eyther President or of the Councell, and therefore discharged him of both".[19] They accused him of misappropriating funds, of improper division of the public stores, of being an atheist, of plotting to desert Virginia in the pinnace left at Jamestown by Captain Newport, of combining with the Spaniards for the destruction of the colony. Wingfield, when he returned to England, made a vigorous defense of his conduct, but it is now impossible to determine whether or not he was justly accused. After his expulsion from office, he was summoned before the court by the remnant of the Council to answer these numerous charges. It might have gone hard with him, had he not demanded a hearing before the King. As his enemies feared to deny him this privilege, they closed the court, and committed him to prison on board the pinnace, where he was kept until means were at hand to send him to England.[20]

The removal of the President did not bring peace to the colony. If we may believe the testimony of Wingfield, the triumvirate that now held sway ruled the settlers with a harsh and odious tyranny. "Wear," he says, "this whipping, lawing, beating, and hanging, in Virginia, known in England, I fear it would drive many well affected myndes from this honourable action."[21] One day Ratcliffe, who had been chosen to succeed Wingfield, became embroiled with James Read, the smith. Read forgot the respect due his superior, and struck the new President. So heinous a crime was this affront to the dignity of the chief officer of the infant colony, that the smith was brought to trial, convicted and sentenced to be hanged. But he saved his life, upon the very eve of his execution, by revealing to Ratcliffe a plot against the government, headed, he declared, by Captain Kendall.[22] Immediately Kendall, who had long been an object of suspicion, was tried for mutiny, found guilty and executed.[23]

In December, 1607, when the colony was suffering severely for the want of food, Captain Smith led an expedition into the territory of the Chickahominies in quest of corn.[24] During his absence the President, despite the protests of Martin, admitted Captain Gabriel Archer to the Council.[25] Archer, who seems to have been a bitter enemy of Smith, had no sooner attained this place of power, than he set to work to ruin the adventurous captain. "Being settled in his authority", he "sought to call Master Smythes lief in question, and ... indicted him upon a Chapter in Leviticus for the death" of two men under his charge, that had been murdered by the Indians. He was to have had his trial upon the very day of his return from his thrilling adventures with the savages. His conviction and immediate execution would doubtless have resulted, had not the proceedings against him been interrupted by the arrival of the First Supply from England.[26] Captain Newport, whose influence seems always to have been exerted in favor of moderation and harmony, persuaded the Council to drop the charges against Smith, to release him from restraint, and to restore him to his seat in the Council.

Of extraordinary interest is the assertion of Wingfield that the arrival of the fleet "prevented a Parliament, which ye newe Counsailour (Archer) intended thear to summon".[27] It is not surprising that the settlers, disgusted as they were with the violence and harshness of their rulers, should have wished to share in the government. But we cannot but wonder at their boldness in attempting to set aside the constitution given them by the King and the Company. Had they succeeded in establishing direct government by the people, it could not be supposed that James would have permitted it to continue. But the attempt is very significant, as indicating that they were desirous, even at this early date, of having a voice in the management of affairs.

Archer and the unfortunate Wingfield sailed with the fleet when Captain Newport returned to England, and a few months later Martin followed them.[28] Since, with the First Supply had come a new Councillor, Matthew Scrivener, the governing body once more numbered three.

During the summer of 1608 Smith was frequently away, chasing the phantom of the passage to the South Sea, but this did not prevent the usual quarrels. If we may believe the account in Smith's history, Ratcliffe was deposed from the Presidency because of "pride and unreasonable needlesse cruelty" and for wasting the public stores.[29] It is probable that for some weeks Scrivener conducted the government, while Ratcliffe was kept a prisoner.[30] In September, Captain Smith, returning from a voyage in the Chesapeake Bay, "received the letters patents, and took upon him the place of president".[31]

Smith was now supreme in the government, for the Council was reduced to two, and his casting vote made his will superior to that of Scrivener. But he was not long to enjoy this power. In October, 1608, Captain Newport, arriving with the Second Supply, brought with him two "antient souldiers and valient gentlemen"—Richard Waldo and Peter Wynne—both bearing commissions as Councillors.[32] Soon afterward Ratcliffe was restored to his seat. The Council, thus recruited, resumed its control over the colony, "so that although Smith was President yet the Council had the authority, and ruled it as they listed".[33]

Two months later, when Newport sailed again, Ratcliffe returned to England. Smith wrote the English Council, "Captaine Ratcliffe is ... a poore counterfeited Imposture. I have sent you him home, least the company should cut his throat."[34] The next spring Waldo and Scrivener, with nine others, were caught in a small boat upon the James by a violent gale, and were drowned.[35] As Captain Wynne soon succumbed to the sickness, Smith became the sole surviving Councillor.[36] During the summer of 1609 the colony was governed, not, as the King and Company had designed, by a Council, but by the will of this one man.

In the meanwhile the London Company was becoming aware that a mistake had been made in entrusting the government of the colony to a body of Councillors. The reports of Wingfield, Archer, Newport and Ratcliffe made it evident that the lack of harmony in the Council had been a serious hindrance to the success of the enterprise.[37] Feeling, therefore, that this "error in the equality of the governors ... had a little shaken so tender a body", the managers held an especial meeting to effect a change.[38] A new charter was drawn up by Sir Edwin Sandys, approved by the Company and assented to by the King.

In this document James relinquished into the hands of the Company not only the direct management of the colony, but the power of drawing up a new and more satisfactory system of government. Acting under this authority, Sandys and his associates abolished the Council and entrusted the entire control of the colony to an all-powerful Governor. The disorder that had so impeded the success of the enterprise was to be crushed under the iron hand of a despot. Doubtless Sandys would have attempted to establish representative government at once in Virginia, had conditions favored so radical a change. But the colony was too young and feeble, and James could hardly be expected to give his consent. Yet the many liberal members of the Company were deeply interested in Virginia and were determined, should a favorable opportunity occur, to establish there an Assembly similar in character to the English Parliament.

The granting of the new charter aroused extraordinary interest in the fortunes of the colony throughout England and stimulated the Company to renewed efforts.[39] Thousands of pounds were contributed to defray the expenses of another expedition, and hundreds of persons responded to the appeals for settlers. The first Governor was a man of ability and distinction—Thomas Lord De la Warr. Sir Thomas Gates was made Lieutenant-Governor, George Summers, Admiral, and Captain Newport, Vice-Admiral.[40] De la Warr found it impossible to leave at once to assume control of his government, but the other officers, with nine vessels and no less than five hundred colonists, sailed in June, 1609.[41] Unfortunately, in crossing the Gulf of Bahama, the fleet encountered a terrific storm, which scattered the vessels in all directions. When the tempest abated, several of the ships reunited and continued on their way to Jamestown, but the Sea Adventure, which carried Gates, Summers and Newport, was wrecked upon an island in the Bermudas.[42] As a result of this misfortune none of the leaders of the expedition reached Virginia until May, 1610, ten months later.

The other vessels, with most of the settlers, arrived at Jamestown in August, 1609. The newcomers told Captain Smith of the Company's new plan of government, and requested him to relinquish the old commission. This the President refused to do. All the official papers relating to the change had been aboard the Sea Adventure, and he would not resign until he had seen them.[43] A long and heated controversy followed, but in the end Smith gained his point.[44] It was agreed that until the arrival of the Sea Adventure the colony should remain under the old charter, and that Smith should continue to act as President until the twentieth of September, when he was to relinquish the government to Captain Francis West.[45]

This arrangement did not restore harmony. West felt aggrieved that Captain Smith should insist upon continuing the old order of affairs despite the known wishes of the Company, and took occasion to ignore and slight his authority. This so angered the President that he is said to have plotted with the Indians to surprise and cut off a party of men that his rival was leading up the James. Before this could be accomplished, however, Smith met with a serious accident, which led to his immediate overthrow. "Sleeping in his Boate ... accidentallie, one fired his powder-bag, which tore the flesh ... in a most pittifull manner; but to quench the tormenting fire ... he leaped over-board into the deepe river, where ever they could recover him he was neere drowned."[46] Three former Councillors—Ratcliffe, Archer and Martin—who had come over with the new fleet, availed themselves of the helplessness of their old foe to rid the colony of his presence. Claiming, with some justice, that if Smith could retain his office under the old charter, they were by the same power still members of the Council, they held a meeting, deposed him from the Presidency and sent him back to England.[47] Having thus disposed of the troublesome Captain, they looked about them for some man suitable to head the colony until the arrival of Gates. Neglecting the claims of West, whom they probably considered too inexperienced for the place, they selected Captain George Percy.[48]

In the meanwhile, the crew and passengers of the Sea Adventure were stranded in the Bermudas, upon what was called Devil's Island. Some of their number were daring enough to venture out into the ocean in the longboat, in an attempt to reach the colony, but they must have perished, for they were never heard from again.[49] The rest of the company, seeing no other way of escape, built two pinnaces and, in May, 1610, sailed away in them for Jamestown. A few days later, upon their arrival in Virginia, Gates received the old patent and the seal from the President and the period of the first royal government in Virginia came to an end.[50]

But the "faction breeding" government by the Council was by no means the only cause of trouble. Far more disastrous was the "sicknesse". When the first expedition sailed for Virginia, the Council in England, solicitous for the welfare of the emigrants, commanded them to avoid, in the choice of a site for their town, all "low and moist places".[51] Well would it have been for the colonists had they obeyed these instructions. Captain Smith says there was in fact opposition on the part of some of the leaders to the selection of the Jamestown peninsula, and it was amply justified by the event. The place was low and marshy and extremely unhealthful.[52] In the summer months great swarms of mosquitoes arose from the stagnant pools of water to attack the immigrants with a sting more deadly than that of the Indian arrow or the Spanish musket ball.

Scarcely three months had elapsed from the first landing when sickness and death made their appearance. The settlers, ignorant of the use of Peruvian bark and other remedies, were powerless to resist the progress of the epidemic. Captain George Percy describes in vivid colors the sufferings of the first terrible summer. "There were never Englishmen," he says, "left in a forreign country in such miserie as wee were in this new discouvered Virginia. Wee watched every three nights, lying on the bare-ground, what weather soever came;... which brought our men to bee most feeble wretches.... If there were any conscience in men, it would make their harts to bleed to heare the pitifull murmurings and outcries of our sick men without reliefe, every night and day for the space of sixe weekes; in the morning their bodies being trailed out of their cabines like Dogges, to be buried."[53] So deadly was the epidemic that when Captain Newport brought relief in January, 1608, he found but thirty-eight of the colonists alive.[54]

Nor did the men that followed in the wake of the Sarah Constant, the Discovery and the Goodspeed fare better. In the summer of 1608, the sickness reappeared and once more wrought havoc among the unhappy settlers. Captain Smith, who probably saved his own life by his frequent exploring expeditions, on his return to Jamestown in July, "found the Last Supply al sicke".[55] In 1609, when the fleet of Summers and Newport reached Virginia, the newcomers, many of whom were already in ill health, fell easy victims to malaria and dysentery. Smith declared that before the end of 1610 "not past sixtie men, women and children" were left of several hundred that but a few months before had sailed away from Plymouth.[56] During the short stay of Governor De la Warr one hundred and fifty, or more than half the settlers lost their lives.[57]

Various visitors to Virginia during the early years of the seventeenth century bear testimony to the ravages of this scourge. A Spaniard named Molina, writing in 1613, declared that one hundred and fifty out of every three hundred colonists died before being in Virginia twelve months.[58] DeVries, a Dutch trader to the colony, wrote, "During the months of June, July and August it is very unhealthy, then people that have lately arrived from England, die, during these months, like cats and dogs, whence they call it the sickly season."[59] This testimony is corroborated by Governor William Berkeley, who reported in 1671, "There is not now oft seasoned hands (as we term them) that die now, whereas heretofore not one of five escaped the first year."[60]

In 1623 a certain Nathaniel Butler, in an attack upon the London Company, called "The Unmasked Face of our Colony in Virginia", drew a vivid, though perhaps an exaggerated picture of the unhealthfulness of the climate. "I found the plantations," he said, "generally seated upon meer salt marshes, full of infectious bogs and muddy creeks and lakes, and thereby subjected to all those inconveniences and diseases which are so commonly found in the most unsound and most unhealthy parts of England, whereof every country and climate hath some." It was by no means uncommon, he declared, to see immigrants from England "Dying under hedges and in the woods", and unless something were done at once to arrest the frightful mortality Virginia would shortly get the name of a slaughter house.[61]

The climate of eastern Virginia, unhealthful as it undoubtedly was in the places where the first settlements were made, cannot be blamed for all the epidemics that swept the colony. Much of the ill health of the immigrants was due to unwholesome conditions on board the ships which brought them from England. The vessels were usually crowded far beyond their real capacity with wretched men, women and children, and were foul beyond description.[62] Not infrequently great numbers died at sea. One vessel is reported to have lost a hundred and thirty persons out of a hundred and eighty-five. On the ships that left England in June, 1609, both yellow fever and the London plague appeared, doing fearful havoc, and making it necessary to throw overboard from two of the vessels alone thirty-two unfortunate wretches.[63] The diseases, thus started, often spread after the settlers had reached their new homes, and under favoring conditions, developed into terrible epidemics.[64]

Less deadly than the "sicknesse", but still greatly to be dreaded, was the hostility of the Indians.[65] The natives, resentful at the attempt of the white men to establish themselves in their midst, proved a constant menace to the colony. Their superstitious awe of the strange newcomers, and their lack of effective weapons alone prevented untiring and open war. Jamestown was but a few days old when it was subjected to a violent assault by the savages. On the twentieth day of May, 1607, the colonists, while at work without their arms in the fields, were attacked by several hundred Indians. In wild dismay they rushed into the fort, while the savages followed at their heels. "They came up allmost into the ffort, shot through the tents, appeared in this Skirmishe (which lasted hott about an hower) a very valient people." The guns of the ships came to the aid of the English and their thunders struck dismay into the hearts of the savages. Yet they retired without panic, taking with them their dead and wounded. Four of the Council, standing in the front ranks, were wounded by the natives, and President Wingfield, while fighting valiently, had an arrow shot through his beard, "yet scaped hurte".[66]

A few days after this event a gentleman named Clovell came running into the fort with six arrows sticking in him, crying, "Arm, arm". He had wandered too far from the town, and the Indians, who were still prowling near, shot him from ambush. Eight days later he died.[67] Thus at the very outset, the English learned the nature of the conflict which they must wage against the Indians. In open fight the savages, with their primitive weapons, were no match for them, but woe to any of their number that strayed far from the fort, or ventured into the long grass of the mainland. So frequently were small parties cut off, that it became unsafe for the English to leave their settlements except in bodies large enough to repel any attack.[68]

The epidemics and the wars with the Indians conspired to bring upon the colony still another horrible scourge. The constant dread of attack in the fields and the almost universal sickness made it impossible for the settlers to raise crops sufficient for their needs. During the summer of 1607 there were at one time scarce five able men at Jamestown, and these found it beyond their power even to nurse the sick and bury the dead. And in later years, when corn was planted in abundance, the stealthy savages often succeeded in cutting it down before it could be harvested. There can be no surprise then that famines came at frequent intervals to add to the misery of the ill-fated colonists. The most terrible of these visited Virginia in the winter of 1609-10. Smith's Historie gives a graphic account of the suffering during those fearful months. Those that escaped starvation were preserved, it says, "for the most part, by roots, herbes, acornes, walnuts, berries, now and then a fish: they that had starch in these extremities, made no small use of it; yea, even the very skinnes of our horses. Nay, so great was our famine, that a Salvage we slew and buried, the poorer sort took him up againe and eat him; and so did divers one another boyled and stewed with roots and herbs: And one amongst the rest did kill his wife, powdered her, and had eaten part of her before it was knowne; for which hee was executed, as hee well deserved.... This was the time, which to this day we call the starving time; it were too vile to say, and scarce to be believed, what we endured."[69]

The misery of the wretched settlers in time of famine is vividly described in a letter written in 1623 by a servant to his parents. The people, he said, cried out day and night, "Oh that they were in England without their limbs ... though they begged from door to door". He declared that he had eaten more at home in a day than was now allowed him in a week, and that his parents had often given more than his present day's allowance to a beggar at the door. Unless the ship Sea Flower came soon, with supplies, his master's men would have but half a penny loaf each a day for food, and might be turned away to eat bark off the trees, or moulds off the ground. "Oh," he said, "that you did see my daily and hourly sighs, groans, tears and thumps that I afford mine own breast, and rue and curse the time of my birth and with holy Job I thought no head had been able to hold so much water as hath and doth daily flow from mine eyes."[70]

Thus was the immigrant to Virginia beset on all sides with deadly perils. If he escaped the plague, the yellow fever and the scurvy during his voyage across the Atlantic, he was more than apt to fall a victim to malaria or dysentery after he reached his new home. Even if he survived all these dangers, he might perish miserably of hunger, or be butchered by the savage Indians. No wonder he cursed the country, calling it "a miserie, a ruine, a death, a hell".[71]

It is remarkable that the enterprise, in the face of these stupendous difficulties, should ever have succeeded. The explanation lies in the great enthusiasm of all England for this attempt to extend the British domains to the shores of the New World, and in the devotion of a few brave spirits of the London Company, who would not be daunted by repeated failures. It mattered not to them that thousands of pounds were lost in the undertaking, that many hundreds of men perished, the English flag and the English religion must gain a foothold upon the American continent.

Sir Thomas Gates found the colony in a pitiable condition. The tomahawk of the Indians, famine and pestilence had wrought terrible havoc with the settlers. A mere handful of poor wretched men were left to welcome the newcomers and to beg eagerly to be taken away from the ill-fated country. The town "appeared rather as the ruins of some auntient fortification, then that any people living might now in habit it: the pallisadœs he found tourne downe, the portes open, the gates from the hinges, the church ruined and unfrequented.... Only the block house ... was the safetie of the remainder that lived: which yet could not have preserved them now many days longer from the watching, subtile, and offended Indians."[72]

Nor was it in the power of Gates to remedy these conditions, for he had brought with him from Devil's Island but a limited supply of provisions. So, with great reluctance, the Lieutenant-Governor decided to abandon Virginia rather than sacrifice his people. As the colonists climbed aboard the vessels which were to take them from the scene of their sufferings, they would have set fire to the town had not Gates prevented with his soldiers. He, himself, "was the last of them, when, about noon, giving a farewell with a peale of small shott, he set sayle, and that night, with the tide, fell down ... the river."[73]

But it was not destined that this enterprise, which was of such importance to the English nation, should be thus abandoned. In April, 1610, De la Warr, the Lord Governor, had sailed for Virginia with three vessels, about a hundred and fifty immigrants and supplies for the relief of the colony.[74] Reaching Cape Comfort June the sixteenth, he learned from a small party there of the intended desertion of Jamestown. Immediately he sent a pinnace up the river to meet Gates, advise him of his arrival and to order his return to the abandoned town. Upon receiving these welcome tidings, Gates bore "up the helm" for Jamestown, and the same night landed all his men.[75] Soon after, the Governor reached the town and took formal possession of the government.

De la Warr began his administration by listening to a sermon from the good pastor, Mr. Buck. He then made an address to the people, "laying some blames on them for many vanities and their idleness", and promising, if occasion required, to draw the sword of justice.[76]

The Governor was not unrestrained in his authority over the colonists, for he was to "rule, punish, pardone and governe according to such directions" as were given him by the London Company. In case of rebellion or mutiny he might put into execution martial law. In matters not covered by his instructions he was to "rule and governe by his owne discretion or by such lawes" as he should think fit to establish.[77] The Council, which had formerly been all-powerful, was now but an advisory body, appointed by the Governor and removable at his discretion. De la Warr chose for his Council Sir Thomas Gates, Sir George Somers, Captain George Percy, Sir Ferdinando Weinman, Captain Christopher Newport and William Strachey, Esquire.[78]

Forgetting their former quarrels and factions, the people united in a zealous effort to serve their noble Governor. "You might shortly behold the idle and restie diseases of a divided multitude, by the unity and authority of the government to be substantially cured. Those that knew not the way to goodnes before, but cherished singularity and faction, can now chalke out the path of all respective dutie and service."[79]

For a while peace and prosperity seemed to have come at last to the little colony. All set to work with a good will to build comfortable houses and to repair the fort. The chapel was restored. The Governor furnished it with a communion table of black walnut and with pews and pulpit of cedar. The font was "hewn hollow like a canoa". "The church was so cast, as to be very light within and the Governor caused it to be kept passing sweet and trimmed up with divers flowers." In the evening, at the ringing of the bell, and at four in the afternoon, each man addressed himself to prayer.[80] "Every Sunday, when the Lord Governor went to Church he was accompanied with all the Councillors, Captains, other officers, and all the gentlemen, and with a guard of fifty Halberdiers in his Lordships Livery, fair red cloaks, on each side and behind him. The Lord Governor sat in the choir, in a green velvet chair, with a velvet cushion before him on which he knelt, and the Council, captains, and officers, on each side of him."[81]

But the misfortunes of the colony were far from being at an end. The principal causes of disaster had not yet been removed. Before many weeks had passed the "sickly season" came on, bringing the usual accompaniment of suffering and death. "Not less than 150 of them died of pestilent diseases, of callentures and feavors, within a few months after" Lord De la Warr's arrival.[82] So universal was the sickness among the newcomers that all the work had to be done by the old settlers, "who by use weare growen practique in a hard way of livinge".[83]

The war with the Indians continued without abatement, causing constant alarm to the settlers and keeping them closely confined to their forts. At one time fourteen were treacherously massacred by the Queen of Appomattox. The English revenged themselves by attacking the savages, burning their villages and destroying their crops, but they could not force them into friendly relations.[84]

Lord De la Warr, himself, was assailed by a series of maladies, that came near costing him his life. "Presently after my arrival in James Town," he wrote, "I was welcomed by a hot and violent Ague, which held mee a time.... That disease had not long left mee, till ... I began to be distempered with other greevous sickness, which successively & severally assailed me: for besides a relapse into the former disease; ... the Flux surprised me, and kept me many daies: then the cramp assaulted my weak body, with strong paines; & afterward the Gout afflicted me in such sort, that making my body through weaknesse unable to stirre, ... drew upon me the disease called Scurvy ... till I was upon the point to leave the world."[85] Realizing that it would be fatal for him to remain longer in Virginia, the Lord Governor set sail with Captain Argoll for the West Indies, where, he hoped, he would recover his health.[86] As Gates had left the colony some months before, the government fell into the experienced hands of Captain George Percy.[87]

In the meanwhile the London Company, undismayed by their former failures, were preparing a new expedition, which they hoped would establish the colony upon a firm footing. Three hundred immigrants, carefully selected from the better class of working men, were assembled under the command of Sir Thomas Dale, and, on March the twenty-seventh, 1611, embarked for Virginia. Upon the arrival of the fleet at Jamestown, Dale received the letters patent from Captain Percy, and assumed command of the colony as Deputy for Lord De la Warr.[88]

The new Governor seems to have perceived at once that the chief source of disaster had been the location of the settlement upon the Jamestown peninsula. The small area which this place afforded for the planting of corn, and the unhealthfulness of the climate rendered it most undesirable as the site for a colony. Former Governors had refused to desert the peninsula because of the ease with which it could be defended against the Indians. But Dale at once began a search for a spot which would afford all the security of Jamestown, but be free from its many disadvantages. This he succeeded in finding up the river, some fifty miles from Jamestown.[89] "I have surveyed," he wrote, "a convenient strong, healthie and sweet seate to plant the new towne in, from whence might be no more remove of the principall Seate." This place, which he named Henrico, was located not far from the point of juncture of the James and the Appomattox, at what is now called Farrar's Island. Here the river makes a sweeping curve, forming a peninsula about one square mile in extent.

Dale's Settlements on the Upper James

In August, 1611, Sir Thomas Gates, returning to assume the command of the colony, pushed vigorously the work upon the new settlement.[90] Dale was sent up the river with no less than three hundred men, with directions to construct houses and fortifications. The settlers, working with new life and vigor in the more wholesome air of the upper James, soon rendered the place almost impregnable to attack from the Indians. They cut a ditch across the narrow neck of the peninsula, and fortified it with high palisades. To prevent a sudden raid by the savages in canoes from the other shore, five strong block houses were built at intervals along the river bank. Behind these defenses were erected a number of substantial houses, with foundations of brick and frame superstructures. Soon a town of three streets had been completed, more commodious and far more healthful than Jamestown.[91]

When this work had been completed, Dale led a force of men across to the south bank of the river and took possession of the entire peninsula lying between the Appomattox and the James. An Indian settlement just below Turkey Island bend was attacked and destroyed, and the savages driven away. The English built a palisade over two miles long and reinforced at intervals with forts and block houses, from the James at Henrico to the falls of the Appomattox. These fortifications secured from the attacks of the savages "many miles of champion and woodland", and made it possible for the English to lay out in safety several new plantations or hundreds. Dale named the place Bermuda, "by reason of the strength of the situation".

Here, for the first time, something like prosperity came to the colony. Although the "sicknesse" was not entirely eliminated even at Henrico, the percentage of mortality was greatly reduced. Soon there were in Virginia several hundred persons that had lived through the fatal months of June, July and August and were thoroughly "seasoned" or immune to the native disorders. Not until 1618, when the settlers, in their greed for land suitable for the cultivation of tobacco, deserted their homes on the upper James for the marshy ground of the lower country, and new, unacclimated persons began arriving in great numbers, did the pestilence again assume its former proportions.

Thus protected from the ravages of disease and from the assaults of the savages, Dale's men were able to turn their attention to the cultivation of the soil. Soon they were producing an annual crop of corn sufficient to supply their more pressing needs. And it was well for them that they could become, to some extent, independent of England, for the London Company, at last discouraged by continued misfortune, was often remiss in sending supplies. Clothing became exceedingly scarce. Not only were the gaudy uniforms of De la Warr's time lacking, but many persons were forced to imitate the savages by covering themselves with skins and furs.[92] The Company, however, succeeded in obtaining for them from the King many suits of old armor that were of great value in their wars with the savages. Coats of mail and steel that had become useless on the battlefields of Europe and had for years been rusting in the Tower of London, were polished up and sent to Virginia. Thus, behind the palisades of Henrico or in the fort at Jamestown one might have seen at this time soldiers encased in armor that had done service in the days of Richard III and Henry VII.[93]

The London Company, when they sent Sir Thomas Gates to Virginia with the letters patent of 1609, gave directions that the utmost severity should be used in putting an end to lawlessness and confusion. Gates, who had fought against the Spaniards in the Netherlands and had the soldier's dislike of insubordination, was well suited to carry their wishes into effect. No sooner had he arrived from Devil's Island in 1610 than he posted in the church at Jamestown certain laws, orders and instructions which he warned the people they must obey strictly.[94] These laws were exceedingly severe. It was, for instance, ordered that "every man and woman daly twice a day upon the first towling of the Bell shall upon the working daies repaire into the Church, to hear divine Service upon pain of losing his or her dayes allowance for the first omission, for the second to be whipt, and for the third to be condemned to the Gallies for six Months". Again, it was decreed that "no man shall give any disgracefull words, or commit any act to the disgrace of any person ... upon paine of being tied head and feete together, upon the guard everie night for the space of one moneth.... No man shall dare to kill, or destroy any Bull, Cow, Calfe, Mare, Horse, Colt, Goate, Swine, Cocke, Henne, Chicken, Dogge, Turkie, or any tame Cattel, or Poultry, of what condition soever, ... without leave from the Generall, upon paine of death.... There shall no man or woman ... dare to wash any unclean linnen ... within the Pallizadoes, ... nor rench, and make clean, any kettle, pot or pan ... within twenty foote of the olde well ... upon pain of whipping."[95]

During the administration of Gates and De la Warr these laws seem not to have been enforced vigorously, but were utilized chiefly in terrorem.[96] Under Dale and Argoll, however, not only were they put into merciless operation, but were reinforced with a series of martial laws, drawn from the code in use among the armies of the Netherlands.

The Divine, Moral and Martial Laws, as they were called, undoubtedly brought about good order in the colony, and aided in the establishment of prosperity, but they were ill suited for the government of free-born Englishmen. They were in open violation of the rights guaranteed to the settlers in their charters, and caused bitter discontent and resentment.

At times they were enforced with odious harshness and injustice. Molina declared that the Governors were most cruel in their treatment of the people, often using them like slaves.[97] The Virginia Assembly of 1624 gives a vivid, though perhaps an exaggerated, picture of the severity of the government. "The Colony ... remained in great want and misery under most severe and Cruell lawes sent over in printe," they said, "and contrary to the express Letter of the Kinge in his most gracious Charter, and as mercylessly executed, often times without tryall or Judgment." Many of the people fled "for reliefe to the Savage Enemy, who being taken againe were putt to sundry deathes as by hanginge, shooting and breaking uppon the wheele and others were forced by famine to filch for their bellies, of whom one for steelinge of 2 or 3 pints of oatmeale had a bodkin thrust through his tounge and was tyed with a chain to a tree untill he starved, if a man through his sicknes had not been able to worke, he had noe allowance at all, and soe consequently perished. Many through these extremities, being weary of life, digged holes in the earth and there hidd themselves till they famished."[98] In 1612, several men attempted to steal "a barge and a shallop and therein to adventure their lives for their native country, being discovered and prevented, were shot to death, hanged and broken upon the wheel".[99] There was some criticism in England of the harshness of the laws, but Sir Thomas Smith, then the guiding spirit of the London Company, declared that they were beneficial and necessary, "in some cases ad terrorum, and in others to be truly executed".[100]

As time passed and the population of the colony increased, it became necessary to extend beyond the confines of Jamestown and Henrico. The cultivation of tobacco, which was rapidly becoming the leading pursuit of the people, required more ground than was comprised within the fortified districts. Even the expansion of the settlement upon the upper James to other peninsulas along the "Curls of the River" could not satisfy the demand for arable land. At one time the very streets of Jamestown were planted with tobacco.[101] Soon the people, despite their dread of the savages, were deserting their palisades, and spreading out in search of fertile soil.

This recklessness brought upon the colony a renewal of the disastrous epidemics of the earlier period, and exposed the planters to imminent danger from the savages. Fortunately, however, at this very time the long sought peace with the Indians was brought about by the romantic marriage of Pocahontas, the daughter of the powerful chief Powhatan, with Captain John Rolfe.

In the spring of 1613 Sir Samuel Argoll, while cruising in the Rappahannock in quest of corn, learned from the natives that the princess was visiting Japazaws, a neighboring king, at his village upon the Potomac. Argoll at once resolved to capture the daughter of the greatest enemy of the white men, and to hold her until all the tools and weapons stolen by the Indians had been returned.[102] Hastening into the country of the Potomacs, he demanded the maid of Japazaws. The king, fearing the hostility of the English more than the anger of Powhatan, consented, although with great reluctance, and she was placed aboard Argoll's ship.

The news of the capture of his favorite child filled Powhatan with rage and grief. Imploring Argoll to do Pocahontas no harm, he promised to yield to all his demands and to become the lasting friend of the white men.[103] He liberated seven captives and sent with them "three pieces, one broad Axe, and a long whip-saw, and one canow of Corne".[104] Knowing that these did not constitute all the tools in the hands of the king, the English refused to relinquish Pocahontas, but kept her a prisoner at Jamestown.[105]

The young princess was treated with consideration and kindness by Governor Dale. Her gentle nature, her intelligence and her beauty won the respect and love of the sternest of her captors. Dale himself undertook to direct her education. "I was moved," he exclaimed, "by her desire to be taught and instructed in the knowledge of God, her capableness of understanding, her aptness and willingness to receive any good impression.... I caused her to be carefully instructed in the Christian religion, who, after she had made some good progress therein, renounced publicly her Country's idolatry; openly confessed her Christian faith; and was, as she desired, baptized."[106]

Before many months had passed the charm of this daughter of the American forest had inspired a deep love in the breast of Captain John Rolfe. This worthy gentleman, after struggling long against a passion so strange and unusual, wrote Dale asking permission to wed the princess. I am not ignorant, he said "of the inconvenience which may ... arise ... to be in love with one whose education hath bin rude, her manners barbarous, her generation accursed".[107] But I am led to take this step, "for the good of the plantation, for the honour of our countrie, for the glory of God, for my owne salvation, and for the converting to the true knowledge of God and Jesus Christ, an unbeleeving creature, like Pokahuntas. To whom my heartie and best thoughts are, and have a long time bin so intangled, and inthralled in so intricate a laborinth, that I was awearied to unwinde myselfe thereout."[108]

Dale, overjoyed at this opportunity to secure the friendship of the Indians, consented readily to the marriage. Powhatan, too, when he learned of his daughter's affection for Captain Rolfe, expressed his approval of the union, and sent Apachisco, an uncle of the bride, and two of her brothers to represent him at the ceremony.

Both English and Indians regarded this wedding as a bond of friendship between the two races. Apachisco, acting as deputy for Powhatan, concluded with Governor Dale a peace which lasted eight years and was fairly well kept by both parties.[109] "Besides this," wrote Captain Ralph Hamor, "we became in league with our next neighbors, the Chicahamanias, a lustie and daring people, free of themselves. These people, as soone as they heard of our peace with Powhatan, sent two messengers with presents to Sir Thomas Dale and offered ... their service."[110] Thus was one of the greatest menaces to the prosperity of the colony removed. Now the settlers could cultivate the soil, or hunt and fish without fear of the treacherous savage, and leave their cattle to range in comparative safety. John Rolfe himself wrote, "The great blessings of God have followed this peace, and it, next to him, hath bredd our plentie—everie man sitting under his fig tree in safety, gathering and reaping the fruits of their labors with much joy and comfort."[111]

In 1616 Sir Thomas Dale, who had been in command of the colony since the departure of Gates in 1614, returned to England, leaving the government in the hands of Captain George Yeardley. Despite the harshness and cruelty of Dale and Gates, they must be credited with obtaining the final success of the colony. These two stern soldiers of the Dutch wars had found the settlers dispirited, reduced in numbers, fighting a losing battle against pestilence, starvation and the savages. By their rigid discipline and able leadership they had brought unity and prosperity, had taught the people how to resist the sickness, and had secured a long peace with the Indians.[112] Dale left about three hundred and fifty persons in Virginia, most of them thoroughly acclimated and busily engaged in building up prosperity for the colony.

Tobacco was already becoming the staple product of Virginia. As early as 1612 Captain Rolfe had been experimenting with the native leaf, in an effort to make it suitable for the English market.[113] In 1613 he sent a part of his crop to London, where it was tested by experts and pronounced to be of excellent quality.[114] The colonists were greatly encouraged at the success of the venture, for the price of tobacco was high, and its culture afforded opportunities for a rich return. Soon every person that could secure a little patch of ground was devoting himself eagerly to the cultivation of the plant. It even became necessary for Dale to issue an order that each man should "set two acres of ground with corn", lest the new craze should lead to the neglect of the food supply.[115] In 1617 The George sailed for England laden with 20,000 pounds of tobacco, which found a ready market at five shillings and three pence a pound. John Rolfe's discovery was opening for Virginia a veritable gold mine.

Fortunately the King, in 1612, had granted the Company an exemption for seven years from custom duties upon goods brought from the colony. So, for a while, at least, the Crown could not appropriate to its own use the profits from the Virginia tobacco. Since, however, the exemption had only a few years more to run, the Company hastened to secure what immediate returns were available. They took from the planters the entire crop, giving them for it three pence per pound, while they themselves were able to obtain a much larger price from the English dealers.

The profits thus secured were at once utilized in new measures for increasing and strengthening the colony. Encouraged by the discovery in Virginia of so profitable a commodity, the Company became convinced that now at last success was at hand. "Broadsides" were sent out to the British people, depicting in glowing terms the advantages of the country, and asking for immigrants and for financial support. Once more a wave of enthusiasm for the enterprise swept over England. Money was contributed liberally. The clergy, interested in the spread of the Anglican Church, and in the conversion of the savages, worked ardently for the success of the colony. Soon vessel after vessel was being fitted out for the voyage across the Atlantic, and hundreds of artisans and laborers were preparing to risk their all in the New World.[116]

CHAPTER II

The Establishment of Representative Government

King James I, from the beginning of his reign, was deeply desirous of planting the English nation upon the shores of the New World. It was with envy and alarm that he witnessed the extension of the power of Spain and of the Roman Catholic church across the Atlantic, while his own subjects were excluded from a share in the splendid prize. He must have perceived clearly that if the English wished to maintain their position as a great naval and mercantile people, the establishing of colonies in America was imperative. Peru, Mexico and the West Indies added greatly to the wealth and power of the Spanish King; why should England not attempt to gain a foothold near these countries, before it became too late?

But James had no desire to arouse the hostility of Philip III. Despite religious differences, despite the hatred of the English for the Spaniards, he had reversed the policy of Elizabeth by cultivating the friendship of these hereditary enemies. And so wedded was he to this design, that later, when his son-in-law, Frederick of the Palatinate, was being overwhelmed by a coalition of Catholic nations, he refused to affront Spain by coming to his rescue. Yet he knew that Philip considered America his own, and would resent any attempt of the English to establish colonies on its shores. So the crafty James resolved to disguise the founding of a royal colony under the guise of a private venture.[117] If the Spaniards complained of the occupation of their territory, he could free himself from blame by placing the responsibility upon the London Company. "If it take not success," his advisors told the King, "it is done by their owne heddes. It is but the attempt of private gentlemen, the State suffers noe losse, noe disreputation. If it takes success, they are your subjects, they doe it for your service, they will lay all at your Majesty's feet and interess your Majesty therein."[118]

James was quite liberal in granting charters to those that had undertaken the settlement, and he encouraged them as much as was consistent with his friendship for Spain. It was truly written of him after his death, "Amongst the ... workes of the late Kinge, there was none more eminent, than his gracious inclination ... to advance and sett forward a New Plantation in the New World."[119] That he was deeply interested in the undertaking is shown most strikingly by his consent to the establishment of the Puritans in America. James hated the tenets of Calvin from the depths of his soul, and could have no desire to see them infect the English settlements in America, yet his solicitude for the welfare of the colony induced him to yield to the request of the Pilgrims for permission to settle there. How much greater was his foresight than that of Louis XIV, who, by refusing to allow the persecuted Huguenots to settle in any part of his domains, deprived the French colonies of what might have been their most numerous and valuable recruits! When some of the leading men of the London Company pleaded with James for the Puritans, the King lent a ready ear. He was asked to allow them "liberty of conscience under his ... protection in America; where they would endeavour the advancement of his Majesty's dominions, and the enlargement of the interests of the Gospel". James replied that it was "a good and honest motion". He refused to tolerate them by public authority and would not confirm under the broad seal their petition for leave to worship as they chose, but he let it be understood that they were not to be molested in their new homes in any way.[120] And in this promise they finally decided to put their trust, feeling that "if afterwards there should be a purpose or desire to wrong them, though they had a seale as broad as ye house flore, it would not serve ye turn; for ther would be means a new found to recall or reverse it".[121]

But the chief glory of the establishment of the English in America must be given to the patriotic and persevering men of the Virginia Company. It is erroneous and unjust to accuse them of mean and mercenary motives in founding and maintaining the colony at Jamestown. Some of them, perhaps, were dazzled with visions of a rich harvest of gold and silver, but most must have realized that there was small chance of remuneration. Many were merchants and business men of great foresight and ability, and it is quite evident that they were fully aware of the risks of the undertaking in which they ventured their money. What they did hope to gain from the colony was the propagation of the English Church, the extension of the English nation and its institutions, and the increase of British trade.

Over and over again it was asserted that the first object of the enterprise was to spread the Christian religion. In 1610 the London Company declared it their especial purpose "to preach and baptize ... and by propagation of the Gospell, to recover out of the armes of the Divell, a number of poore and miserable soules, wrapt up unto death, in almost invincible ignorance".[122] The first draft of the Virginia charter of 1606 declared that the leading motive of this "noble work", was "the planting of Christianity amongst heathens".[123] The charter of 1609 asserted that the "principle effect, which we can desire or expect of this action, is the conversion and reduction of the people in those parts unto the true worship of God".[124]

That they were also actuated by a desire to extend the British possessions and trade is attested by numerous documents and letters. The Company declared it their purpose to promote the "honor and safety of the Kingdome, the strength of our Navy, the visible hope of a great and rich trade".[125] One of the leading shareholders wrote that the colony should be upheld for "ye Honor and profitt to our Nation, to make provinciall to us a land ready to supply us with all necessary commodytyes wanting to us: In which alone we suffer ye Spanish reputation and power to swell over us."[126] The colonists themselves declared that one of the objects of the settlement of America was the extension of British territory and the enriching of the kingdom, "for which respects many noble and well minded persons were induced to adventure great sums of money to the advancement of so pious and noble a worke".[127]

The Company, in fact, did no more than take the lead in the work. It was really the English nation that had decided to second their King in gaining a foothold in America, and it was they that insisted that this foothold should not be relinquished. Again and again the London Company appealed to the people for support, and never without success, for all classes of Englishmen felt that they were interested in this new venture. The spirit of the nation is reflected in the statement of the Council for Virginia in 1610, that the Company "are so farre from yielding or giving way to any hindrance or impeachment ... that many ... have given their hands and subscribed to contribute againe and againe to new supplies if need require".[128]

But although James I and his people were agreed as to the necessity of extending the English nation to America, they were not in accord in regard to the form of government which should be established there. The King, who was always restive under the restraint placed upon him by the English Parliament, had no desire to see the liberal institutions of the mother country transplanted to Virginia. He wished, beyond doubt, to build a colonial empire which should be dependent upon himself for its government and which should add to the royal revenues. In this way he would augment the power of the Crown and render it less subject to the restraint of Parliament. But to found colonies that would set up little assemblies of their own to resist and thwart him, was not at all his intention.

On the other hand, many of the leading spirits of the London Company hoped "to establish a more free government in Virginia".[129] Some, perhaps, feared that the liberties of the English people might be suppressed by the King, and they looked hopefully to this new land as a haven for the oppressed. "Many worthy Patriots, Lords, Knights, gentlemen, Merchants and others ... laid hold on ... Virginia as a providence cast before them."[130] In the meetings of the Company were gathered so many that were "most distasted with the proceedings of the Court, and stood best affected to Religion and Liberty", that James began to look upon the body as a "Seminary for a seditious Parliament".[131]

The leader of these liberals was Sir Edwin Sandys. This man, who was widely known as an uncompromising enemy of despotism, was heartily detested by the King.[132] In his youth he had gone to Geneva to study the reformed religion and while there had become most favorably impressed with the republican institutions of the little Swiss state. He was afterwards heard to say that "he thought that if God from heaven did constitute and direct a forme of government on Earth it was that of Geneva".[133] Returning to England, he had entered Parliament, where he had become known as an eminent advocate of liberal principles. He had contended for the abolition of commercial monopolies; had demanded that all accused persons be given the assistance of counsel; had denounced many of the unjust impositions of the Crown; had raised "his voice for the toleration of those with whom he did not wholly agree"; and had aided in drawing up the remonstrance against the conduct of James towards his first Parliament.[134]

But Sandys and his friends were not without opposition in the London Company. Many of the "adventurers", as the stockholders were called, were by no means willing to permit the liberal party to utilize the Company as an instrument for propagating their political tenets. The great struggle between the forces of progress and reaction that was convulsing Parliament and the nation, was fought over again in the Quarter Courts. At times the meetings resounded with the quarrels of the contending factions. Eventually, however, Sandys was victorious, and representative government in America was assured.

Sandys seems to have planned to secure from the King successive charters each more liberal than its predecessor, and each entrusting more fully the control of the colony to the Company. This could be done without arousing the suspicions of James under the pretext that they were necessary for the success of the enterprise. When at length sufficient power had been delegated, Sandys designed to establish in Virginia a representative assembly, modelled upon the British Parliament.

Under the provisions of the charter of 1606 Virginia had been, in all but form, a royal colony. The King had drawn up the constitution, had appointed the Council in England, and had controlled their policies. This charter had granted no semblance of self-government to the settlers. But it was declared "They shall have and enjoy all the liberties, franchises, and immunities ... to all intents and purposes, as if they had been abiding and born, within ... this realm of England".[135] This promise was not kept by the Kings of England. Several of the provisions of the charter itself were not consistent with it. In later years it was disregarded again and again by the royal commissions and instructions. Yet it was of the utmost importance, for it set a goal which the colonists were determined to attain. Throughout the entire colonial period they contended for all the rights of native Englishmen, and it was the denial of their claim that caused them to revolt from the mother country and make good their independence. Provision had also been made for trial by jury. James had decreed that in all cases the Council should sit as a court, but in matters of "tumults, rebellion, conspiracies, mutiny, and seditions ... murther, manslaughter", and other crimes punishable with death, guilt or innocence was to be determined by a jury of twelve. To what extent the Council made use of the jury system it is impossible to say, but Wingfield states that on one occasion he was tried before a jury for slander, and fined £300.[136]

The second charter had been granted in 1609. This document is of great importance because through it the King resigned the actual control of the colony into the hands of the Virginia Company. And although this did not result immediately in the establishment of representative government, it strengthened the hands of Sandys and made it possible for him to carry out his designs at a future date. Under this charter the Company might have set up liberal institutions at once in Virginia, but conditions were not ripe, either in England or in America, for so radical a change.

In 1612 the third charter had been granted. This had still further strengthened the Company and made them more independent of the King. It gave them the important privilege of holding great quarterly meetings or assemblies, where all matters relating to the government of the colony could be openly discussed. Still Virginia remained under the autocratic rule of Dale and Gates.

In 1617 or 1618, however, when the liberals were in full control of the Company, it was decided to grant the colonists the privilege of a parliament.[137] In April, 1618, Lord De la Warr sailed for Virginia to reassume active control of affairs there, bringing with him instructions to establish a new form of government. What this government was to have been is not known, but it was designed by Sir Edwin Sandys, and beyond doubt, was liberal in form.[138] Possibly it was a duplicate of that established the next year by Governor Yeardley. Most unfortunately, Lord De la Warr, whose health had been shattered by his first visit to Virginia, died during the voyage across the Atlantic, and it became necessary to continue the old constitution until the Company could appoint a successor.[139]

In November, 1618, George Yeardley was chosen Governor-General of Virginia, and was intrusted with several documents by whose authority he was to establish representative government in the colony.[140] These papers, which became known as the Virginia Magna Charta, were the very corner-stone of liberty in the colony and in all America. Their importance can hardly be exaggerated, for they instituted the first representative assembly of the New World, and established a government which proved a bulwark against royal prerogative for a century and a half.

Governor Yeardley sailed from England January, 1619, and reached Virginia on the 29th of April. After some weeks of preparation, he issued a general proclamation setting in operation the Company's orders. It was decreed, "that all those who were resident here before the departure of Sir Thomas Dale should be freed and acquitted from such publique services and labors which formerly they suffered, and that those cruel laws by which we had so long been governed were now abrogated, and that now we were to be governed by those free laws which his Majesty's subjects live under in Englande.... And that they might have a hand in the governing of themselves, it was granted that a General Assembly should be held yearly once, whereat were to be present the Governor and Counsell, with two Burgesses from each plantation freely to be elected by the inhabitants thereof; this Assembly to have power to make and ordaine whatsoever lawes and orders should by them be thought good and proffittable for our subsistence."[141]

The exact date of the election for Burgesses is not known.[142] The statement that the representatives were to be "chosen by the inhabitants" seems to indicate that the franchise was at once given to all male adults, or at least to all freemen. "All principall officers in Virginia were to be chosen by ye balloting box." From the very first there were parties, and it is possible that the factions of the London Company were reflected at the polls in the early elections. The Magna Charta made provision for the establishment of boroughs, which were to serve both as units for local government and as electoral districts. No attempt was made to secure absolute uniformity of population in the boroughs, but there were no glaring inequalities. With the regard for the practical which has always been characteristic of Englishmen, the Company seized upon the existing units, such as towns, plantations and hundreds, as the basis of their boroughs. In some cases several of these units were merged to form one borough, in others, a plantation or a town or a hundred as it stood constituted a borough. As there were eleven of these districts and as each district chose two Burgesses, the first General Assembly was to contain twenty-two representatives.[143]

The Assembly convened at Jamestown, August 9th, 1619. "The most convenient place we could finde to sitt in," says the minutes, "was the Quire of the Churche Where Sir George Yeardley, the Governor, being sett down in his accustomed place, those of the Counsel of Estate sate nexte him on both hands excepte onely the Secretary then appointed Speaker, who sate right before him, John Twine, the clerk of the General Assembly, being placed nexte the Speaker, and Thomas Pierse, the Sergeant, standing at the barre, to be ready for any service the Assembly shoulde comand him. But forasmuche as men's affaires doe little prosper where God's service is neglected, all the Burgesses tooke their places in the Quire till a prayer was said by Mr. Bucke, the Minister.... Prayer being ended,... all the Burgesses were intreatted to retyre themselves into the body of the Churche, which being done, before they were fully admitted, they were called in order and by name, and so every man tooke the oathe of Supremacy and entered the Assembly."[144]

The body at once claimed and made good its right to exclude Burgesses who they thought were not entitled to seats. The Speaker himself raised an objection to admitting the representatives of Warde's plantation, because that settlement had been made without a commission from the London Company. But Captain Warde promised to secure a patent as soon as possible, and the objection was waived. The Assembly refused absolutely, however, to seat the Burgesses from Martin's Hundred. Captain Martin had been one of the first Council for Virginia, and as a reward for his long services had been granted privileges that rendered him almost independent of the government at Jamestown. He was summoned before the Assembly and requested to relinquish these extraordinary rights, but he refused to do so. "I hold my patent," he said, "for my service don, which noe newe or late comer can meritt or challenge."[145] So the Assembly, feeling that it would be mockery to permit the Burgesses from Martin's Hundred to assist in the making of laws which their own constituents, because of their especial charter, might with impunity disobey, refused to admit them.[146]

The legislative powers granted the Virginia Assembly in the Magna Charta, and continued with slight alterations after the revocation of the charter of the London Company, were very extensive. The Assembly could pass laws dealing with a vast variety of matters appertaining to the safety and welfare of the colony. Statutes were enacted in the session of 1619 touching upon Indian affairs, the Church, land patents, the relations of servants and landlords, the planting of crops, general morality in Virginia, the price of tobacco, foreign trade, etc. The collected laws of the entire colonial period fill many volumes, and cover a vast variety of subjects. But there were three things which limited strictly the Assembly's field of action. They must pass no statutes contravening first, the laws of England; secondly, the charters; thirdly, the instructions sent them by the London Company. When the colony passed into the hands of the King, all statutes were forbidden that conflicted with the charters, or with the instructions of the Crown. These restrictions lasted during the entire colonial period, but they were not always carefully regarded. The Company, and later the King, retained two ways of nullifying legislation which was unauthorized, or was distasteful to them. First, there was the veto of the Governor. As the guardian of the interests of England and his monarch, this officer could block all legislation. Secondly, the Company, and later the King, could veto laws even though the Governor had consented to them.

But the most important power exercised by the Assembly was its control over taxation in Virginia. In the very first session it made use of this privilege by ordering, "That every man and manservant of above 16 years of age shall pay into the handes and Custody of the Burgesses of every Incorporation and plantation one pound of the best Tobacco".[147] The funds thus raised were utilized for the payment of the officers of the Assembly.

The levy by the poll, here used, was continued for many years, and became the chief support of the government. As the colony grew, however, and the need for greater revenues was felt, customs duties and other forms of taxation were resorted to. Large sums were raised by an export duty upon tobacco. At times tariffs were placed upon the importation of liquors, slaves and other articles. But these duties had to be used with great care, for the carrying of the colony was done chiefly by English merchants, and Parliament would permit nothing detrimental to their interests.

The Assembly claimed the exclusive right to levy general taxes. The Governor and Council time and again tried to wrest this privilege from them, but never with success.[148] The Burgesses, realizing that their hold upon the exchequer was the chief source of their power, were most careful never to relinquish it. From time to time the Governors sought to evade this restraint by levying taxes under the guise of fees. But this expedient invariably excited intense irritation, and yielded a revenue so small that most Governors thought it best to avoid it entirely. Of more importance were the quit-rents, a tax on land, paid to the King by all freeholders. But this was frequently avoided, and, except at rare intervals, the funds raised by it were left in Virginia to be expended for local purposes. The greatest blow to the power of the Burgesses was struck by the King in 1680, when he forced through the Assembly a law granting to the government a perpetual income from the export duty on tobacco. This revenue, although not large, was usually sufficient to pay the Governor's salary, and thus to render him less dependent upon the Assembly. Finally, it must not be forgotten that the English government, although it refrained from taxing the colony directly, imposed an enormous indirect tax by means of a tariff upon tobacco brought into England. These duties were collected in England, but there can be no doubt that the incidence of the tax rested partly upon the Virginia planters. Despite these various duties, all levied without its consent, the Assembly exercised a very real control over taxation in Virginia, and used it as an effective weapon against the encroachments of the Governors.

From the very first the General Assembly showed itself an energetic and determined champion of the rights of the people. Time and again it braved the anger of the Governor and of the King himself, rather than yield the slightest part of its privileges. During the decade preceding the English Revolution only the heroic resistance of this body saved the liberal institutions of the colony from destruction at the hands of Charles II and James II.

The General Assembly was not only a legislative body, it was also a court of justice, and for many years served as the highest tribunal of the colony. The judicial function was entrusted to a joint committee from the two houses, whose recommendations were usually accepted without question. Since this committee invariably contained more Burgesses than Councillors, the supreme court was practically controlled by the representatives of the people. During the reign of Charles II, however, the Assembly was deprived of this function by royal proclamation, and the judiciary fell almost entirely into the hands of the Governor and Council.

The General Assembly consisted of two chambers—the House of Burgesses and the Council. In the early sessions the houses sat together and probably voted as one body.[149] Later, however, they were divided and voted separately. The Burgesses, as time went on, gradually increased in numbers until they became a large body, but the Council was always small.

The Councillors were royal appointees. But since the King could not always know personally the prominent men of the colony, he habitually confirmed without question the nominations of the Governor. The members of the Council were usually persons of wealth, influence and ability. As they were subject to removal by the King and invariably held one or more lucrative governmental offices, it was customary for them to display great servility to the wishes of his Majesty or of the Governor. It was very unusual for them to oppose in the Assembly any measure recommended by the King, or in accord with his expressed wishes. Although the Councillors were, with rare exceptions, natives of Virginia, they were in no sense representative of the people of the colony.

As the upper house of the Assembly, the Council exercised a powerful influence upon legislation. After the separation of the chambers their consent became necessary for the passage of all bills, even money bills. Their legislative influence declined during the eighteenth century, however, because of the growing spirit of liberalism in Virginia, and the increasing size of the House of Burgesses.

The executive powers entrusted to the Council were also of very great importance. The Governor was compelled by his instructions to secure its assistance and consent in the most important matters. And since the chief executive was always a native of England, and often entirely ignorant of conditions in the colony, he was constantly forced to rely upon the advice of his Council. This tendency was made more pronounced by the frequent changes of Governors that marked the last quarter of the seventeenth century. So habitually did the Council exercise certain functions, not legally within their jurisdiction, that they began to claim them as theirs by right. And the Governor was compelled to respect these claims as scrupulously as the King of England respects the conventions that hedge in and limit his authority.

Before the end of the seventeenth century the Council had acquired extraordinary influence in the government. With the right to initiate and to block legislation, with almost complete control over the judiciary, with great influence in administrative matters, it threatened to become an oligarchy of almost unlimited power.

But it must not be supposed that the influence of the Council rendered impotent the King's Governor. Great powers were lodged in the hands of this officer by his various instructions and commissions. He was commander of the militia, was the head of the colonial church, he appointed most of the officers, attended to foreign affairs, and put the laws into execution. His influence, however, resulted chiefly from the fact that he was the representative of the King. In the days of Charles I, in the Restoration Period and under James II, when the Stuarts were combating liberal institutions, both in England and in the colonies, the Governor exercised a powerful and dangerous control over affairs in Virginia. But after the English Revolution his power declined. As the people of England no longer dreaded a monarch whose authority now rested solely upon acts of Parliament, so the Virginians ceased to fear his viceroy.

The powers officially vested in the Governor were by no means solely executive. He frequently made recommendations to the Assembly, either in his own name or the name of the King, and these recommendations at times assumed the nature of commands. If the Burgesses were reluctant to obey, he had numerous weapons at hand with which to intimidate them and whip them into line. Unscrupulous use of the patronage and threats of the King's dire displeasure were frequently resorted to. The Governor presided over the upper house, and voted there as any other member. Moreover, he could veto all bills, even those upon which he had voted in the affirmative in the Council. Thus he had a large influence in shaping the laws of the colony, and an absolute power to block all legislation.

Such, in outline, was the government originated for Virginia by the liberal leaders of the London Company, and put into operation by Sir George Yeardley. It lasted, with the short intermission of the Commonwealth Period, for more than one hundred and fifty years, and under it Virginia became the most populous and wealthy of the English colonies in America.

The successful cultivation of tobacco in Virginia, as we have seen, put new life into the discouraged London Company. The shareholders, feeling that now at last the colony would grow and prosper, exerted themselves to the utmost to secure desirable settlers and to equip them properly. Soon fleets of considerable size were leaving the English ports for America, their decks and cabins crowded with emigrants and their holds laden with clothing, arms and farming implements.[150] During the months from March 1620 to March 1621 ten ships sailed, carrying no less than 1051 persons.[151] In the year ending March, 1622, seventeen ships reached Virginia, bringing over fifteen hundred new settlers.[152] And this stream continued without abatement until 1624, when disasters in Virginia, quarrels among the shareholders and the hostility of the King brought discouragement to the Company. In all, there reached the colony from November, 1619, to February, 1625, nearly five thousand men, women and children.[153]

Although tobacco culture was the only enterprise of the colony which had yielded a profit, it was not the design of Sandys and his friends that that plant should monopolize the energies of the settlers. They hoped to make Virginia an industrial community, capable of furnishing the mother country with various manufactured articles, then imported from foreign countries. Especially anxious were they to render England independent in their supply of pig iron. Ore having been discovered a few miles above Henrico on the James, a furnace was erected there and more than a hundred skilled workmen brought over from England to put it into operation. Before the works could be completed, however, they were utterly demolished by the savages, the machinery thrown into the river, all the workmen slaughtered,[154] and the only return the Company obtained for an outlay of thousands of pounds was a shovel, a pair of tongs and one bar of iron.[155] Efforts were made later to repair the havoc wrought by the Indians and to reëstablish the works, but they came to nothing. Not until the time of Governor Spotswood were iron furnaces operated in Virginia, and even then the industry met with a scant measure of success.

The Company also made an earnest effort to promote the manufacture of glass in Virginia. This industry was threatened with extinction in England as a result of the great inroads that had been made upon the timber available for fuel, and it was thought that Virginia, with its inexhaustible forests, offered an excellent opportunity for its rehabilitation. But here too they were disappointed. The sand of Virginia proved unsuitable for the manufacture of glass. The skilled Italian artisans sent over to put the works into operation were intractable and mutinous. After trying in various ways to discourage the enterprise, so that they could return to Europe, these men brought matters to a close by cracking the furnace with a crowbar. George Sandys, in anger, declared "that a more damned crew hell never vomited".[156]

In order to show that they were sincere in their professions of interest in the spiritual welfare of the Indians, the Company determined to erect a college at Henrico "for the training up of the children of those Infidels in true Religion, moral virtue and civility".[157] The clergy of England were enthusiastic in their support of this good design, and their efforts resulted in liberal contributions from various parts of the kingdom.[158] Unfortunately, however, the money thus secured was expended in sending to the college lands a number of "tenants" the income from whose labor was to be utilized in establishing and supporting the institution.[159] As some of these settlers fell victims to disease and many others were destroyed in the massacre of 1622, the undertaking had to be abandoned, and of course all thought of converting and civilizing the savages was given up during the long and relentless war that ensued.

Even more discouraging than these failures was the hostility of the King to the cultivation of tobacco in Virginia, and his restrictions upon its importation into England. Appeals were made to him to prohibit the sale of Spanish tobacco, in order that the Virginia planters might dispose of their product at a greater profit. This, it was argued, would be the most effective way of rendering the colony prosperous and self sustaining. But James, who was still bent upon maintaining his Spanish policy, would not offend Philip by excluding his tobacco from England. Moreover, in 1621, he issued a proclamation restricting the importation of the leaf from Virginia and the Somers Isles to fifty-five thousand pounds annually.[160] This measure created consternation in Virginia and in the London Company. The great damage it would cause to the colony and the diminution in the royal revenue that would result were pointed out to James, but for the time he was obdurate.[161] Indeed, he caused additional distress by granting the customs upon tobacco to a small association of farmers of the revenue, who greatly damaged the interests of the colony. In 1622, James, realizing that his policy in regard to tobacco was injuring the exchequer, made a compromise with the Company. The King agreed to restrict the importation of Spanish tobacco to 60,000 pounds a year, and after two years to exclude it entirely. All the Virginia leaf was to be admitted, but the Crown was to receive one third of the crop, while the other two thirds was subjected to a duty of six pence a pound.[162] This agreement proved most injurious to the Company, and it was soon abandoned, but the heavy exactions of the King continued. Undoubtedly this unwise policy was most detrimental to Virginia. Not only did it diminish the returns of the Company and make it impossible for Sandys to perfect all his wise plans for the colony, but it put a decided check upon immigration. Many that would have gone to Virginia to share in the profits of the planters, remained at home when they saw that these profits were being confiscated by the King.[163]

Yet the strenuous efforts of the London Company would surely have brought something like prosperity to the colony had not an old enemy returned to cause the destruction of hundreds of the settlers. This was the sickness. For some years the mortality had been very low, because the old planters were acclimated, and few new immigrants were coming to Virginia. But with the stream of laborers and artisans that the Sandys régime now sent over, the scourge appeared again with redoubled fury. As early as January, 1620, Governor Yeardley wrote "of the great mortallitie which hath been in Virginia, about 300 of ye inhabitants having dyed this year".[164] The sickness was most deadly in the newly settled parts of the colony, "to the consumption of divers Hundreds, and almost the utter destruction of some particular Plantations".[165] The London Company, distressed at the loss of so many men, saw in their misfortunes the hand of God, and wrote urging "the more carefull observations of his holy laws to work a reconciliation".[166] They also sent directions for the construction, in different parts of the colony, of four guest houses, or hospitals, for the lodging and entertaining of fifty persons each, upon their first arrival.[167] But all efforts to check the scourge proved fruitless. In the year ending March, 1621 over a thousand persons died upon the immigrant vessels and in Virginia.[168] Despite the fact that hundreds of settlers came to the colony during this year, the population actually declined. In 1621 the percentage of mortality was not so large, but the actual number of deaths increased. During the months from March, 1621, to March, 1622, nearly twelve hundred persons perished. It was like condemning a man to death to send him to the colony. Seventy-five or eighty per cent. of the laborers that left England in search of new homes across the Atlantic died before the expiration of their first year. The exact number of deaths in 1622 is not known, but there is reason to believe that it approximated thirteen hundred.[169] Mr. George Sandys, brother of the Secretary of the London Company, wrote, "Such a pestilent fever rageth this winter amongst us: never knowne before in Virginia, by the infected people that came over in ye Abigall, who were poisoned with ... beer and all falling sick & many dying, every where dispersed the contagion, and the forerunning Summer hath been also deadly upon us."[170] Not until 1624 did the mortality decline. Then it was that the Governor wrote, "This summer, God be thanked, the Colony hath very well stood to health".[171] The dread sickness had spent itself for lack of new victims, for the immigration had declined and the old planters had become "seasoned".

History does not record an epidemic more deadly than that which swept over Virginia during these years. It is estimated that the number of those that lost their lives from the diseases native to the colony and to those brought in from the infected ships amounts to no less than four thousand.[172] When the tide of immigration was started by Sir Edwin Sandys in 1619, there were living in Virginia about nine hundred persons; when it slackened in 1624 the population was but eleven hundred. The sending of nearly five thousand settlers to Virginia had resulted in a gain of but two hundred. It is true that the tomahawk and starvation accounts for a part of this mortality, but by far the larger number of deaths was due to disease.

Yet hardly less horrible than the sickness was the Indian massacre of 1622. This disaster, which cost the lives of several hundred persons, struck terror into the hearts of every Englishman in Virginia. The colonists had not the least intimation that the savages meditated harm to them, for peace had existed between the races ever since the marriage of Rolfe and Pocahontas. Considering the protection of their palisades no longer necessary after that event, they had spread out over the colony in search of the most fertile lands. Their plantations extended at intervals for many miles along both banks of the James, and in the case of a sudden attack by the Indians it would obviously be difficult for the settlers to defend themselves or to offer assistance to their neighbors.

The apparent friendship of the Indians had created such great intimacy between the two races, that the savages were received into the homes of the white men and at times were fed at their tables.[173] At the command of the London Company itself some of the Indian youths had been adopted by the settlers and were being educated in the Christian faith. So unsuspecting were the people that they loaned the savages their boats, as they passed backward and forward, to formulate their plans for the massacre.[174]

The plot seems to have originated in the cunning brain of Opechancanough. This chief, always hostile to the white men, must have viewed with apprehension their encroachment upon the lands of his people. He could but realize that some day the swarms of foreigners that were arriving each year would exclude the Indians from the country of their forefathers. Perceiving his opportunity in the foolish security of the English and in their exposed situation, he determined to annihilate them in one general butchery.

His plans were laid with great cunning. Although thousands of natives knew of the design, no warning reached the white men until the very eve of the massacre. While Opechancanough was preparing this tremendous blow, he protested in the strongest terms his perpetual good will and love, declaring that the sky would fall before he would bring an end to the peace.[175] In order to lull the suspicions of the planters, "even but two daies before the massacre", he guided some of them "with much kindnesse through the woods, and one Browne that lived among them to learne the language", he sent home to his master. The evening before the attack the Indians came as usual to the plantations with deer, turkeys, fish, fruits and other provisions to sell.[176]

That night, however, a warning was received, which although too late to save the most remote settlements, preserved many hundreds from the tomahawk. Chanco, an Indian boy who had been adopted by an Englishman named Race, revealed the entire plot to his master. The man secured his house, and rowed away before dawn in desperate haste to Jamestown, to give warning to the Governor. "Whereby they were prevented, and at such other plantations as possibly intelligence could be given."[177]

The assault of the savages was swift and deadly. In all parts of the colony they fell upon the settlers, and those that had received no warning were, in most cases, butchered before they could suspect that harm was intended. Sometimes the Indians sat down to breakfast with their victims, "whom immediately with their owne tooles they slew most barbarously, not sparing either age or sex, man woman or childe".[178] Many were slain while working in the fields; others were trapped in their houses and butchered before they could seize their weapons. The savages, "not being content with their lives,... fell againe upon the dead bodies, making as well as they could a fresh murder, defacing, dragging, and mangling their dead carkases into many peeces".[179]

That the plot was so successful was due to the completeness of the surprise, for where the English made the least resistance the savages were usually beaten off. A planter named Causie, when attacked and wounded and surrounded by the Indians, "with an axe did cleave one of their heads, whereby the rest fled and he escaped; for they hurt not any that did either fight or stand upon their guard. In one place where they had warning of it, (they) defended the house against sixty or more that assaulted it."[180]

At the plantation of a Mr. Harrison, where there were gathered seven men and eighteen or nineteen women and children, the savages set fire to a tobacco house and then came in to tell the men to quench it. Six of the English, not suspecting treachery, rushed out, and were shot full of arrows. Mr. Thomas Hamor, the seventh man, "having finished a letter he was writing, followed after to see what was the matter, but quickly they shot an arrow in his back, which caused him to returne and barricade up the dores, whereupon the Salvages set fire to the house. But a boy, seizing a gun which he found loaded, discharged it at random. At the bare report the enemy fled and Mr. Hamor with the women and children escaped."[181] In a nearby house, a party of English under Mr. Hamor's brother, were caught by the Indians without arms, but they defended themselves successfully with spades, axes and brickbats.[182]

One of the first to fall was Reverend George Thorpe, a member of the Virginia Council, and a man of prominence in England.[183] Leaving a life of honor and ease, he had come to Virginia to work for the conversion of the Indians. He had apparently won the favor of Opechancanough, with whom he often discoursed upon the Christian religion. At the moment of his murder, his servant, perceiving the deadly intent of the savages, gave him warning, but his gentle nature would not permit him to believe harm of those whom he had always befriended, and he was cut down without resistance.[184]

The barbarous king failed in his design to destroy the English race in Virginia, but the massacre was a deadly blow to the colony. No less than three hundred and fifty-seven persons were slaughtered, including six Councillors. The news of the disaster brought dismay to the London Company. For a while they attempted to keep the matter a secret, but in a few weeks it was known all over England. Although the massacre could not have been foreseen or prevented, it served as a pretext for numerous attacks upon Sandys and the party which supported him. It discouraged many shareholders and made it harder to secure settlers for the colony. Even worse was the effect in Virginia. The system of farming in unprotected plantations, which had prevailed for some years, had now to be abandoned and many settlements that were exposed to the Indians were deserted. "We have not," wrote the Assembly, "the safe range of the Country for the increase of Cattle, Swyne, etc; nor for the game and fowle which the country affords in great plentye; besides our duties to watch and warde to secure ourselves and labor are as hard and chargeable as if the enemy were at all times present."[185]

The massacre was followed by a venomous war with the Indians, which lasted many years. The English, feeling that their families and their homes would never be safe so long as the savages shared the country with them, deliberately planned the extermination of all hostile tribes in Virginia. Their conversion was given no further consideration. "The terms betwixt us and them," they declared, "are irreconcilable."[186] Governor Wyatt wrote, "All trade with them must be forbidden, and without doubt either we must cleere them or they us out of the Country."[187]

But it soon became apparent that neither people would be able to win an immediate or decisive victory. The Indians could not hope to destroy the English, now that their deeply laid plot had failed. In open battle their light arrows made no impression upon the coats of plate and of mail in which the white men were incased, while their own bodies were without protection against the superior weapons of their foes. On the other hand, it was very difficult for the colonists to strike the savages, because of the "advantages of the wood and the nimbleness of their heels".[188] Even though they "chased them to and fro", following them to their villages and burning their huts, they found it very difficult to do them serious harm.

Finally the English hit upon the plan of bringing distress upon the savages by destroying their corn. Although the Virginia tribes subsisted partly upon game, their chief support was from their fields of maize, and the entire failure of their crop would have reduced hundreds of them to the verge of starvation.[189] Each year the white men, in small companies, in various parts of the country, brought ruin to the corn fields. Sometimes the savages, in despair at the prospect of famine, made valiant efforts to defend their fields, but were invariably beaten off until the work of destruction was done.

The natives retaliated with many sudden raids upon the more exposed parts of the colony, where they burned, pillaged and murdered. The planter at work in his fields might expect to find them lurking in the high grass, while their ambushes in the woods made communication from plantation to plantation very dangerous. "The harmes that they do us," wrote the Assembly, "is by ambushes and sudden incursions, where they see their advantages."[190] In 1625 Captain John Harvey declared that the two races were "ingaged in a mortall warre and fleshed in each others bloud, of which the Causes have been the late massacre on the Salvages parte.... I conceive that by the dispersion of the Plantations the Salvages hath the advantage in this warre, and that by their suddaine assaults they do us more harme than we do them by our set voyages".[191]

When the English had recovered from the first shock of the massacre, they planned four expeditions against the tribes living on the river above Jamestown. Mr. George Sandys attacked the Tappahatomaks, Sir George Yeardley the Wyanokes, Captain William Powell the Chickahominies and the Appomatocks, and Captain John West the Tanx-Powhatans. The savages, without attempting to make a stand, deserted their villages and their crops and fled at the approach of the English. Few were killed, for they were "so light and swift" that the white men, laden with their heavy armor, could not overtake them.[192] In the fall Sir George Yeardley led three hundred men down the river against the Nansemonds and against Opechancanough. The natives "set fire to their own houses, and spoiled what they could, and then fled with what they could carry; so that the English did make no slaughter amongst them for revenge. Their Corne fields being newly gathered, they surprised all they found, burnt the houses (that) remained unburnt, and so departed."[193]

It is remarkable that the colonists could continue this war while the sickness was raging among them. At the very time that Yeardley was fighting Opechancanough, hundreds of his comrades were dying "like cats and dogs". "With our small and sicklie forces," wrote Mr. George Sandys, "we have discomforted the Indians round about us, burnt their houses, gathered their corn and slain not a few; though they are as swift as Roebucks, like the violent lightening they are gone as soon as perceived, and not to be destroyed but by surprise or famine."[194]

How bitter was the war is shown by an act of treachery by the English that would have shamed the savages themselves. In 1623, the Indians, discouraged by the destruction of their crops, sent messengers to Jamestown, asking for peace. The colonists determined to take advantage of this overture to recover their prisoners and at the same time to strike a sudden blow at their enemy. Early in June, Captain William Tucker with twelve well armed men was sent "in a shalope under colour to make peace with them". On the arrival of this party at the chief town of Opechancanough, the savages thronged down to the riverside to parley with them, but the English refused to consider any terms until all prisoners had been restored. Assenting to this, the savages brought forth seven whites and they were placed aboard the vessel. Having thus accomplished their purpose, the soldiers, at a given signal, let fly a volley into the midst of the crowd, killing "some 40 Indians including 3 of the chiefest".[195]

In 1624 the English won a great victory over the most troublesome of the Indian tribes, the Pamunkeys. Governor Wyatt, in leading an expedition against this people had evidently expected little resistance, for he brought with him but sixty fighting men. The Pamunkeys, however, had planted that year a very large crop of corn, which they needed for the support of themselves and their confederates, and they determined to protect it at all hazards. So Wyatt and his little band were surprised, on approaching their village to find before them more than eight hundred warriors prepared for battle. The English did not falter in the face of this army, and a fierce contest ensued. "Fightinge not only for safeguards of their houses and such a huge quantity of corn", but for their reputation with the other nations, the Pamunkeys displayed unusual bravery. For two days the battle went on. Whenever the young warriors wavered before the volleys of musketry, they were driven back into the fight by the older men. Twenty-four of the English were detached from the firing line and were employed in destroying the maize. In this they were so successful that enough corn was cut down "as by Estimation of men of good judgment was sufficient to have sustained fower thousand men for a twelvemonth". At last the savages in despair gave up the fight and stood nearby "rufully lookinge on whilst their Corne was cutt down". "In this Expedition," wrote the colonists, "sixteene of the English were hurte our first and seconde day, whereby nyne of the best shott were made unserviceable for that tyme, yett never a man slayne, nor none miscarried of those hurtes, Since when they have not greatly troubled us, nor interrupted our labours."[196]

The series of misfortunes which befel the London Company during the administration of Sir Edwin Sandys culminated in the loss of their charter. For some time King James had been growing more and more hostile to the party that had assumed control of the colony. It is highly probable that he had had no intimation, when the charter of 1612 was granted, that popular institutions would be established in Virginia, and the extension of the English parliamentary system to America must have been distasteful to him. The enemies of Sandys had been whispering to the King that he "aymed at nothing more than to make a free popular state there, and himselfe and his assured friends to be the leaders of them".[197] James knew that Sandys was not friendly to the prerogative of the Crown. It had been stated "that there was not any man in the world that carried a more malitious heart to the Government of a Monarchie".[198]

In 1621 the controlling party in the London Company was preparing a new charter for Virginia. The contents of this document are not known, but it is exceedingly probable that it was intended as the preface to the establishment of a government in the colony far more liberal than that of England itself. It was proposed to have the charter confirmed by act of Parliament, and to this James had consented, provided it proved satisfactory to the Privy Council.[199] But it is evident that when the Councillors had examined it, they advised the King not to assent to it or to allow it to appear in Parliament. Indeed the document must have stirred James' anger, for not only did he end all hopes of its passage, but he "struck some terrour into most undertakers for Virginia", by imprisoning Sir Edwin Sandys.[200]

Even more distasteful to the King than the establishment of popular institutions in the little colony was the spreading of liberal doctrines throughout England by the Sandys faction of the Company. James could no longer tolerate their meetings, if once he began to look upon them as the nursery of discontent and sedition. The party that was so determined in its purpose to plant a republican government in Virginia might stop at nothing to accomplish the same end in England. James knew that national politics were often discussed in the assemblies of the Company and that the parties there were sometimes as "animated one against the other" as had been the "Guelfs and Gebillines" of Italy.[201] He decided that the best way to end these controversies and frustrate the designs of his enemies was to annul the charter of the Company and make Virginia a royal colony.

The first unmistakable sign of his hostility came in June 1622, when he interfered with the election of their treasurer. It was not, he told them, his intention "to infringe their liberty of free election", but he sent a list of names that would be acceptable to him, and asked them to put one of these in nomination. To this the Company assented readily enough, even nominating two from the list, but when the election was held, the King's candidates were overwhelmingly defeated.[202] When James heard this, he "flung himself away in a furious passion", being "not well satisfied that out of so large a number by him recommended they had not made any choice".[203] The incident meant that James had given the Company an unmistakable intimation that it would be well for them to place the management of affairs in the hands of men more in harmony with himself, and that they had scornfully refused.

The Company was now doomed, for the King decided that the charter must be revoked. He could not, of course, annul a grant that had passed under the Great Seal, without some presence of legal proceedings, but when once he had determined on the ruin of the Company, means to accomplish his end were not lacking. John Ferrar wrote, "The King, notwithstanding his royal word and honor pledged to the contrary ... was now determined with all his force to make the last assault, and give the death blow to this ... Company."[204]

James began by hunting evidence of mismanagement and incapacity by the Sandys party. He gave orders to Captain Nathaniel Butler, who had spent some months in Virginia, to write a pamphlet describing the condition of the colony. The Unmasking of Virginia, as Butler's work is called was nothing less than a bitter assault upon the conduct of affairs since the beginning of the Sandys administration. Unfortunately, it was not necessary for the author to exaggerate much in his description of the frightful conditions in the colony; but it was unfair to place the blame upon the Company. The misfortunes of the settlers were due to disease and the Indians and did not result from incapacity or negligence on the part of Sandys. The Company drew up "A True answer to a writing of Information presented to his Majesty by Captain Nathaniel Butler", denying most of the charges and explaining others, but they could not efface the bad impression caused by the Unmasking.[205]

In April, 1623, James appointed a commission to make enquiry into the "true estate of ... Virginia".[206] This body was directed to investigate "all abuses and grievances ... all wrongs and injuryes done to any adventurers or planters and the grounds and causes thereof, and to propound after what sort the same may be better managed".[207] It seems quite clear that the commissioners understood that they were expected to give the King "some true ground to work upon", in his attack on the Company's charter.[208] In a few weeks they were busy receiving testimony from both sides, examining records and searching for evidence. They commanded the Company to deliver to them all "Charters, Books, Letters, Petitions, Lists of names, of Provisions, Invoyces of Goods, and all other writing whatsoever". They examined the clerk of the Company, the messenger and the keeper of the house in which they held their meetings.[209] They intercepted private letters from Virginia, telling of the horrible suffering there, and made the King aware of their contents.[210]

In July the commission made its report. It found that "the people sent to inhabit there ... were most of them by God's visitation, sicknes of body, famine, and by massacres ... dead and deceased, and those that were living of them lived in miserable and lamentable necessity and want.... That this neglect they conceived, must fall on the Governors and Company here, who had power to direct the Plantations there.... That if his Majesty's first Grant of April 10 1606, and his Majesty's most prudent and princely Instructions given in the beginning ... had been pursued, much better effects had been produced, than had been by the alteration thereof, into so popular a course."[211] James was much pleased with the report, and it confirmed his determination to "resume the government, and to reduce that popular form so as to make it agree with the monarchial form".[212]

Before taking the matter to the courts, the King resolved to offer the Company a compromise. If they would give up the old charter, he said, a new one would be granted them, preserving all private interests, but restoring the active control of the colony to the Crown. The government was to be modelled upon the old plan of 1606, which had already given so much trouble. "His Majesty," the Company was told, "hath ... resolved by a new Charter to appoint a Governor and twelve assistants, resident here in England, unto whom shall be committed the government.... And his Majesty is pleased that there shall be resident in Virginia a Governor and twelve assistants, to be nominated by the Governor and assistants here ... whereby all matters of importance may be directed by his Majesty."[213] The Company was commanded to send its reply immediately, "his Majesty being determined, in default of such submission, to proceed for the recalling of the said former charters".[214]

A special meeting of the stockholders was called, October 30th, 1623, to consider the King's proposal. Every man present must have known that the rejection of the compromise would mean the loss of all the money he had invested in the colony, and that if the King's wishes were acceded to his interests would be preserved. But the Company was fighting for something higher than personal gain—for the maintenance of liberal institutions in America, for the defence of the rights of English citizens. After a "hot debate" they put the question to the vote, and the offer was rejected, there being "only nine hands for the delivering up of the Charters, and all the rest (being about three score more) were of a contrary opinion".[215]

As a last hope the Company resolved to seek the assistance of Parliament. A petition was drawn up to be presented to the Commons, and the shareholders that were members of that body were requested to give it their strenuous support when it came up for consideration. The petition referred to Virginia as a "child of the Kingdom, exposed as in the wilderness to extreme danger and as it were fainting and labouring for life", and it prayed the House to hear "the grievances of the Colony and Company, and grant them redress".[216] The matter was brought before the Commons in May, 1624, but before it could be considered, a message was received from the King warning them "not to trouble themselves with this petition as their doing so could produce nothing but a further increase Schisme and factions in the Company". "Ourself," he announced, "will make it our own work to settle the quiet, and wellfare of the plantations."[217] This was received with some "soft mutterings" by the Commons, but they thought it best to comply, and the Company was left to its fate.[218]

In the meanwhile the King had placed his case in the hands of Attorney-General Coventry, who had prepared a quo warranto against the Company.[219] Although all hope of retaining the charter was gone, the Sandys party were determined to fight to the end. They voted to employ attorneys and to plead their case before the King's Bench. The quo warranto came up June 26th, 1624, and "the Virginia Patent was overthrown", on a mistake in pleading.[220] With this judgment the London Company practically ceased to exist, and Virginia became a royal province.

CHAPTER III

The Expulsion of Sir John Harvey

The people of Virginia sympathized deeply with the London Company in its efforts to prevent the revocation of the charter. The Governor, the Council and the Burgesses gave active assistance to Sandys and his friends by testifying to the wisdom of the management and contradicting the calumnies of their enemies. In the midst of the controversy the Privy Council had appointed a commission which they sent to Virginia to investigate conditions there and to gather evidence against the Company. This board consisted of John Harvey, John Pory, Abraham Piersey and Samuel Matthews, men destined to play prominent rôles in Virginia history, but then described as "certayne obscure persons".[221] When the commissioners reached the colony they made known to the Assembly the King's desire to revoke the charter and to take upon himself the direction of the government. They then asked the members to subscribe to a statement expressing their gratitude for the care of the King, and willingness to consent to the contemplated change. The Assembly returned the paper unsigned. "When our consent," they said, "to the surrender of the Pattents, shalbe required, will be the most proper time to make reply: in the mean time wee conceive his Majesties intention of changing the government hath proceeded from much misinformation."[222]

After this they ignored the commissioners, and addressed themselves in direct letters and petitions to the King and the Privy Council.[223] They apprehended, they wrote, no danger from the present government, which had converted into freedom the slavery they had endured in former times.[224] They prayed that their liberal institutions might not be destroyed or the old Smith faction of the Company placed over them again.[225] These papers they sent to England by one of their number, John Pountis, even refusing to let the commissioners see them. But Pory succeeded in securing copies from the acting secretary, Edward Sharpless.[226] The Council, upon learning of this betrayal, were so incensed against the secretary that they sentenced him to "stand in the Pillory and there to have his Ears nailed to it, and cut off".[227] His punishment was modified, however, so that when he was "sett in the Pillorie", he "lost but a part of one of his eares".[228] The King, upon learning of this incident, which was represented to him "as a bloody and barbarous act", became highly incensed against the Council.[229]

In the meanwhile James had appointed a large commission, with Viscount Mandeville at its head, "to confer, consult, resolve and expedite all affaires ... of Virginia, and to take care and give order for the directing and government thereof".[230] This body met weekly at the house of Sir Thomas Smith, and immediately assumed control of the colony.[231] Their first act was to decide upon a form of government to replace the Virginia Magna Charta. In conformance with the wishes of the King they resolved to return to the plan of 1606. In their recommendations no mention was made of an Assembly. It seemed for a while that the work of Sandys was to be undone, and the seeds of liberty in Virginia destroyed almost before they had taken root. Fortunately, however, this was not to be. The commission, perhaps wishing to allay the fears of the colonists, reappointed Sir Francis Wyatt Governor, and retained most of the old Council. This made it certain that for a while at least the government was to be in the hands of men of lofty character and liberal views.[232] More fortunate still for Virginia was the death of James I. This event removed the most determined enemy of their Assembly, and placed upon the throne a man less hostile to the Sandys faction, less determined to suppress the liberal institutions of the colony.

Soon after his accession Charles I abolished the Mandeville commission and appointed in its place a committee of the Privy Council.[233] For a while he seemed inclined to restore the Company, for he consulted with Sandys and requested him to give his opinion "touching the best form of Government".[234] But he finally rejected his proposals, declaring that he had come to the same determination that his father had held. He was resolved, he said, that the government should be immediately dependent upon himself and not be committed to any company or corporation.[235] But, like his father, he was "pleased to authorise Sir Francis Wyatt knight to be governor there, and such as are now employed for his Majesties Councell there to have authoritie to continue the same employment". No provision was made for a representative body, the power of issuing decrees, ordinances and public orders being assigned to the Council.

But the Assembly was saved by the unselfish conduct of Wyatt and Yeardley and their Councils.[236] Had these men sought their own gain at the expense of the liberty of their fellow colonists, they would have welcomed a change that relieved them from the restraint of the representatives of the people. The elimination of the Burgesses would have left them as absolute as had been Wingfield and the first Council. But they were most anxious to preserve for Virginia the right of representative government, and wrote to England again and again pleading for the reëstablishment of the Assembly.[237] "Above all," they said, "we humbly intreat your Lordships that we may retaine the Libertie of our Generall Assemblie, than which nothing can more conduce to our satisfaction or the publique utilitie."[238] In 1625 Yeardley himself crossed the ocean to present a new petition. He pleaded with Charles "to avoid the oppression of Governors there, that their liberty of Generall Assemblyes may be continued and confirmed, and that they may have a voice in the election of officers, as in other Corporations".[239] After the overthrow of the Company charter, there could be no legal election of Burgesses and no legislation save by proclamation of the Governor and Council. Yet Wyatt, in order to preserve as far as possible some form of representative government, held conventions or informal meetings of leading citizens, to confer with the Council on important matters. They issued papers under the title of "Governor, Councell and Collony of Virginia assembled together",[240] and it is possible that the people elected their delegates just as they had formerly chosen Burgesses. Since, however, acts passed by these assemblages could not be enforced in the courts, all legislation for the time being took the form of proclamations.[241]

Finally Charles yielded to the wishes of the people, and, in the fall of 1627, sent written instructions to the officials in Virginia to hold an election of Burgesses and to summon a General Assembly.[242] The King's immediate motive for this important step was his desire to gain the planters' acceptance through their representatives of an offer which he made to buy all their tobacco. In the spring of 1628 the Council wrote, "In obedience to his Majesties Commands wee have given order that all the Burgesses of Particular Plantations should shortly be assembled at James Citty that by the general and unanimous voice of the whole Colony his Majesty may receave a full answere."[243] Although the Assembly must have realized that its very existence might depend upon its compliance with the King's wishes, it refused to accept his proposition. The planters were willing to sell their tobacco to his Majesty, but only upon more liberal terms than those offered them. Charles rejected the counter-proposals of the Virginians, with some show of anger, but he did not abolish the Assembly, and in ensuing years sessions were held with great regularity.[244]

The apprehensions of the colonists during this trying period were made more acute by the resignation of Sir Francis Wyatt. In the winter of 1625-26 the Council wrote the Virginia commissioners, "The Governor hath long expected a Successor, and the necessity of his private estate compelling him not to put off any longer his return for England, wee hope it is already provided for."[245] Great must have been the relief in the colony when it was learned that Sir George Yeardley had been chosen to succeed Governor Wyatt. Yeardley had been the bearer of the Virginia Magna Charta, under which the first Assembly had been established, and his services had not been forgotten by the people. But he was not destined to see the restoration of the Burgesses, for he died in November, 1627.[246] We have lost, wrote the Council in great grief, "a main pillar of this our building & thereby a support to the whole body".[247]

By virtue of previous appointment, Captain Francis West, brother of the Lord De la Warr who had lost his life in the service of Virginia, at once assumed the reins of government. Captain West continued in office until March 5th, 1629, when he resigned in order to return to England.[248] John Harvey, a member of the Virginia commission of 1624, was the King's next choice for Governor, but pending his arrival, the office fell to one of the Council—Dr. John Pott. This man had long been a resident of Virginia, and had acted as Physician-General during the years when the sickness was at the worst. He is described as "a Master of Arts ... well practiced in chirurgery and physic, and expert also in the distilling of waters, (besides) many other ingenious devices".[249] He had made use of these accomplishments to poison large numbers of Indians after the massacre of 1622.[250] This exploit caused the temporary loss of his place in the Council, for when James I settled the government after the fall of the Company, Pott was left out at the request of the Earl of Warwick, because "he was the poysoner of the salvages thear".[251] In 1626 his seat was restored to him. He seems to have been both democratic and convival, and is described as fond of the company of his inferiors, "who hung upon him while his good liquor lasted".[252]

In the spring of 1630 Sir John Harvey arrived in Virginia.[253] This man proved to be one of the worst of the many bad colonial governors. Concerned only for his own dignity and for the prerogative of the King, he trampled without scruple upon the liberties of the people, and his administration was marked throughout by injustice and oppression.

His first efforts as Governor were to attempt to win the friendship and support of one of the Council and to bring humiliation and ruin upon another. He had been in Virginia but a few weeks when he wrote the King asking especial favors for Captain Samuel Matthews. "This gentleman," he said, "I found most readie to set forward all services propounded for his Majesties honor, ... and without his faithful assistance perhaps I should not soe soon have brought the busines of this Country to so good effect." It would be a just reward for these services, he thought, to allow him for a year or two to ship the tobacco of his plantation into England free of customs.[254] At the same time Harvey seemed bent upon the utter undoing of Dr. Pott. Claiming that the pleasure loving physician while Governor had been guilty of "pardoninge wilfull Murther, markinge other mens Cattell for his owne, and killing up their hoggs", Harvey suspended him from the Council and, pending the day of his trial, confined him to his plantation.[255]

It seems quite certain that this treatment of the two Councillors was designed to impress upon the people a just appreciation of the Governor's power. Harvey felt keenly the restriction of the Council. It had been the intention of James and after his death Charles to restore the government of the colony to its original form, in which all matters were determined by the Council. "His Majesties ... pleasure," wrote the Privy Council in 1625, "is that all judgements, decrees, and all important actions be given, determined and undertaken by the advice and voices of the greater part."[256] If these instructions were adhered to, the Governor would become no more than the presiding officer of the Council. To this position Harvey was determined never to be reduced. He would, at the very outset, show that he was master in Virginia, able to reward his friends, or to punish those that incurred his displeasure.

Dr. Pott could not believe that the proceedings against him were intended seriously, and, in defiance of the Governor's commands, left his plantation to come to Elizabeth City. "Upon which contempt," wrote Harvey, "I committed him close prisoner, attended with a guard." At the earnest request of several gentlemen, the Governor finally consented that he might return to his plantation, but only under bond. Pott, however, refused to avail himself of the kindness of his friends, and so was kept in confinement.[257] On the 9th of July he was brought to trial, found guilty upon two indictments, and his entire estate confiscated.[258]

That Pott was convicted by a jury of thirteen men, three of them Councillors, is by no means conclusive evidence of his guilt. The close connection between the executive and the courts at this time made it quite possible for the Governor to obtain from a jury whatever verdict he desired. In fact it became the custom for a new administration, as soon as it was installed in power, to take revenge upon its enemies by means of the courts.

Pott's guilt is made still more doubtful by the fact that execution of the sentence was suspended "untill his Majesties pleasure might be signified concerning him", while the Council united in giving their security for his safe keeping.[259] Harvey himself wrote asking the King's clemency. "For as much," he said, "as he is the only Physician in the Colonie, and skilled in the Epidemicall diseases of the planters, ... I am bound to entreat" your Majesty to pardon him.[260] It would seem quite inexplicable that Harvey should go to so much trouble to convict Dr. Pott, and then write immediately to England for a pardon, did not he himself give the clue to his conduct. "It will be," he said, "a means to bring the people to ... hold a better respect to the Governor than hitherto they have done."[261] Having shown the colonists that he could humble the strongest of them, he now sought to teach them that his intercession with the King could restore even the criminal to his former position.

When Dr. Pott was at Elizabeth City his wife was reported to be ill, but this did not deter her from making the long and dangerous voyage to England to appeal to the King "touching the wrong" done her husband.[262] Charles referred the matter to the Virginia commissioners, who gave her a hearing in the presence of Harvey's agent. Finding no justification for the proceedings against him, they wrote Harvey that for aught they could tell Pott had demeaned himself well and that there seemed to have been "some hard usage against him".[263] The sentence of confiscation seems never to have been carried out, but Pott was not restored to his seat in the Council.[264]

This arbitrary conduct did not succeed in intimidating the other Councillors. These men must have felt that the attack upon Dr. Pott was aimed partly at the dignity and power of the Council itself. If Harvey could thus ruin those that incurred his displeasure, the Councillors would lose all independence in their relations with him. Soon they were in open hostility to the Governor. Claiming that Harvey could do nothing without their consent, and that all important matters had to be determined "by the greater number of voyces at the Councell Table", they entered upon a policy of obstruction. It was in vain that the Governor declared that he was the King's substitute, that they were but his assistants, and that they were impeding his Majesty's business; they would yield to him only the position of first among equals. Early in 1631 Harvey was filling his letters to England with complaints of the "waywardness and oppositions of those of the Councell". "For instead of giving me assistance," he declared, "they stand Contesting and disputing my authoritie, avering that I can doe nothinge but what they shall advise me, and that my power extendeth noe further than a bare casting voice."[265] He had received, he claimed, a letter from the King, strengthening his commission and empowering him to "doe justice to all men, not sparinge those of the Councell", which he had often shown them, but this they would not heed. "I hope," he wrote, "you never held me to be ambitious or vainglorious, as that I should desire to live here as Governor to predominate, or prefer mine owne particular before the generall good." My position in Virginia is most miserable, "chiefly through the aversions of those from whom I expected assistance". He had often tried to bring peace and amity between them, but all to no purpose, for he was scorned for his efforts. He would be humbly thankful if his Majesty would be pleased to strengthen his commission, "that the place of Governor and the duty of Councellors may be knowne and distinguished".[266]

It is probable that the Councillors also wrote to England, to place before the King their grievances against Harvey, for before the end of the year letters came from the Privy Council, warning both sides to end the dispute and to proceed peacefully with the government of the colony. In compliance with these commands they drew up and signed a document promising "to swallow up & bury all forepart Complainte and accusations in a generall Reconciliation". They thanked their Lordships for advice that had persuaded their "alienated & distempered" minds to thoughts of love and peace and to the execution of public justice. The Council promised to give the Governor "all the service, honor & due Respect which belongs unto him as his Majesties Substitute".[267] It is quite evident, however, that this reconciliation, inspired by fear of the anger of the Privy Council, could not be permanent. Soon the Council, under the leadership of Captain Matthews, who had long since forfeited Harvey's favor, was as refractory as ever.

A new cause for complaint against the Governor arose with the founding of Maryland. In 1623 George Calvert, the first Lord Baltimore, had received a grant of the great southeastern promontory in Newfoundland, and had planted there a colony as an asylum for English Catholics. Baltimore himself had been detained in England for some years, but in 1627 came with his wife and children to take personal control of his little settlement. His experience with the severe Newfoundland winter persuaded him that it would be wise to transfer his colony to a more congenial clime. "From the middle of October," he wrote Charles I, "to the middle of May there is a sad face of winter upon all the land; both sea and land so frozen for the greater part of the time as they are not penetrable ... besides the air so intolerable cold as it is hardly to be endured.... I am determined to commit this place to fishermen that are able to encounter stormes and hard weather, and to remove myself with some forty persons to your Majesties dominion of Virginia; where, if your Majesty will please to grant me a precinct of land, with such privileges as the King your father ... was pleased to grant me here, I shall endeavour to the utmost of my power, to deserve it."[268]

In 1629 he sailed for Virginia, with his wife and children, and arrived at Jamestown the first day of October. His reception by Governor Pott and the Council was by no means cordial. The Virginians were loath either to receive a band of Catholics into their midst, or to concede to them a portion of the land that they held under the royal charters. Desiring to be rid of Baltimore as speedily as possible, they tendered him the oath of supremacy. This, of course, as a good Catholic he could not take, for it recognized the English sovereign as the supreme authority in all ecclesiastical matters. Baltimore proposed an alternative oath of allegiance, but the Governor and Council refused to accept it, and requested him to leave at once. Knowing that it was his intention to apply for a tract of land within their borders, the Virginians sent William Claiborne after him to London, to watch him and to thwart his designs.

Despite Claiborne's efforts a patent was granted Baltimore, making him lord proprietor of a province north of the Potomac river, which received the name of Maryland. Baltimore, with his own hand, drew up the charter, but in April, 1632, before it had passed under the Great Seal, he died. A few weeks later the patent was issued to his eldest son, Cecilius Calvert. The Virginians protested against this grant "within the Limits of the Colony", claiming that it would interfere with their Indian trade in the Chesapeake, and that the establishment of the Catholics so near their settlements would "give a generall disheartening of the Planters".[269] But their complaints availed nothing. Not only did Charles refuse to revoke the charter, but he wrote the Governor and Council commanding them to give Lord Baltimore every possible assistance in making his settlement. You must, he said, "suffer his servants and Planters to buy and transport such cattle and comodities to their Colonie, as you may conveniently spare ... and give them ... such lawful assistance as may conduce to both your safetyes".[270]

The second Lord Baltimore appointed his brother, Leonard Calvert, Governor of Maryland, and sent him with two vessels and over three hundred men to plant the new colony. In February, 1634, the expedition reached Point Comfort, where it stopped to secure from the Virginians the assistance that the King had promised should be given them.

They met with scant courtesy. The planters thought it a hard matter that they should be ordered to aid in the establishment of this new colony. They resented the encroachment upon their territories, they hated the newcomers because most of them were Catholics, they feared the loss of a part of their Indian trade, and they foresaw the growth of a dangerous rival in the culture of tobacco. Despite the King's letter they refused to help Calvert and his men. "Many are so averse," wrote Harvey, "that they crye and make it their familiar talke that they would rather knock their Cattell on the heades than sell them to Maryland."[271] The Governor, however, not daring to disobey his sovereign's commands, gave the visitors all the assistance in his power. "For their present accomodation," he said, "I sent unto them some Cowes of myne owne, and will do my best to procure more, or any thinge else they stand in need of."[272] This action secured for Harvey the praise of the Privy Council, but it made him more unpopular with his Council and the people of Virginia.

After a stay of several weeks at Point Comfort, Calvert sailed up the Chesapeake into the Potomac, and founded the town of Saint Mary's. This, however, was not the first settlement in Maryland. In 1631, William Claiborne, returning from England after his unsuccessful attempt to block the issuing of Baltimore's charter, had established a settlement upon Kent Island in the Chesapeake Bay. Here he had built dwellings and mills and store houses, and had laid out orchards and gardens. In thus founding a colony within Baltimore's territory he was sustained by the Council. When Calvert arrived in 1634 he sent word to Claiborne that he would not molest his settlement, but since Kent Island was a part of Maryland, he must hold it as a tenant of Lord Baltimore. Upon receipt of this message Claiborne laid the matter before his colleagues of the Virginia Council, and asked their commands. The answer of the Councillors shows that they considered the new patent an infringement upon their prior rights and therefore of no effect. They could see no reason, they told Claiborne, why they should render up the Isle of Kent any more than the other lands held under their patents. As it was their duty to maintain the rights and privileges of the colony, his settlement must continue under the government and laws of Virginia.

Despite the defiant attitude of the Virginians, it is probable that Calvert would have permitted the Kent Islanders to remain unmolested, had not a report spread abroad that Claiborne was endeavoring to persuade the Indians to attack Saint Mary's. A joint commission of Virginians and Marylanders declared the charge false, but suspicion and ill will had been aroused, and a conflict could not be avoided. In April, 1635, Governor Calvert, alleging that Claiborne was indulging in illicit trade, fell upon and captured one of his merchantmen. In great indignation the islanders fitted out a vessel, the Cockatrice, to scour the Chesapeake and make reprisals. She was attacked, however, by two pinnaces from Saint Mary's and, after a severe conflict in which several men were killed, was forced to surrender. A few weeks later Claiborne gained revenge by defeating the Marylanders in a fight at the mouth of the Potomac.

In these encounters the Kent Islanders had the sympathy of the Virginia planters. Excitement ran high in the colony, and there was danger that an expedition might be sent to Saint Mary's to overpower the intruders and banish them from the country. Resentment against Harvey, who still gave aid and encouragement to Maryland, became more bitter than ever. His espousal of the cause of the enemies of Virginia made the planters regard him as a traitor. In 1635 Samuel Matthews wrote to Sir John Wolstenholme, "The Inhabitants also understood with indignation that the Marylanders had taken Capt. Claibournes Pinnaces and men ... which action of theirs Sir John Harvey upheld contrary to his Majesties express commands."[273] The Councillors held many "meetings and consultations" to devise plans for the overthrow of the new colony, and an active correspondence was carried on with Baltimore's enemies in England in the vain hope that the charter might yet be revoked.[274]

Matters were now moving rapidly to a crisis. Harvey's administration became more and more unpopular. Sir John Wolstenholme, who kept in close touch with the colony, declared that the Governor's misconduct in his government was notorious at Court and in the city of London.[275] When, in the spring of 1635, he was rudely thrust out of his office, the complaints against him were so numerous that it became necessary to convene the Assembly to consider them.[276]

To what extent Harvey usurped the powers of the General Assembly is not clear, but it seems very probable that he frequently made use of proclamations to enforce his will upon the people.[277] It was quite proper and necessary for the Governor, when the houses were not in session, to issue ordinances of a temporary character, but this was a power susceptible of great abuse. And for the Governor to repeal statutes by proclamation would be fatal to the liberties of the people. That Harvey was guilty of this usurpation seems probable from the fact that a law was enacted declaring it the duty of the people to disregard all proclamations that conflicted with any act of Assembly.[278]

Also there is reason to believe that Harvey found ways of imposing illegal taxes upon the people. John Burk, in his History of Virginia, declares unreservedly that it was Harvey's purpose "to feed his avarice and rapacity, by assessing, levying, and holding the public revenue, without check or responsibility".[279]

In 1634 an event occurred which aroused the anger of the people, widened the breach between the Governor and the Council, and made it evident to all that Harvey would not hesitate upon occasion to disregard property rights and to break the laws of the colony. A certain Captain Young came to Virginia upon a commission for the King. Wishing to build two shallops while in the colony and having need of a ship's carpenter, Young, with the consent of Harvey, seized a skilled servant of one of the planters. This arbitrary procedure was in direct defiance of a statute of Assembly of March, 1624, that declared that "the Governor shall not withdraw the inhabitants from their private labors to any service of his own upon any colour whatsoever".[280]

Upon hearing of the incident Captain Samuel Matthews and other members of the Council came to Harvey to demand an explanation. The Governor replied that the man had been taken because Young had need of him "to prosecute with speed the King's service", and "that his Majesty had given him authority to make use of any persons he found there".[281] This answer did not satisfy the Councillors. Matthews declared "that if things were done on this fashion it would breed ill bloude in Virginia", and in anger "turning his back, with his truncheon lashed off the heads of certain high weeds that were growing there".[282] Harvey, wishing to appease the Councillors, said, "Come gentlemen, let us goe to supper & for the night leave this discourse", but their resentment was too great to be smoothed over, and with one accord rejecting his invitation, "they departed from the Governour in a very irreverent manner".[283]

Harvey, in his letters to the English government tried to convey the impression that he was uniformly patient with the Council, and courteous in all the disputes that were constantly arising. That he was not always so self restrained is shown by the fact that on one occasion, he became embroiled with one of the Councillors, Captain Stevens, and knocked out some of his teeth with a cudgel.[284] Samuel Matthews wrote that he had heard the Governor "in open court revile all the Councell and tell them they were to give their attendance as assistants only to advise with him". The Governor attempted, he declared, to usurp the whole power of the courts, without regard to the rights of the Councillors, "whereby justice was now done but soe farr as suited with his will, to the great losse of many mens estates and a generall feare in all".[285]

In 1634 the King once more made a proposal to the colonists for the purchase of their tobacco, and demanded their assent through the General Assembly. The Burgesses, who dreaded all contracts, drew up an answer which was "in effect a deniall of his Majesties proposition", and, in order to give the paper the character of a petition, they all signed it. This answer the Governor detained, fearing, he said, that the King "would not take well the matter thereof, and that they should make it a popular business, by subscribing a multitude of hands thereto, as thinking thereby to give it countenance".[286] The Governor's arbitrary action aroused great anger throughout the colony. Matthews wrote Sir John Wolstenholme, "The Consideration of the wrong done by the Governor to the whole Colony in detayning the foresaid letters to his Majesty did exceedingly perplex them whereby they were made sensible of the condition of the present Government."[287]

The crisis had now come. During the winter of 1634-35 the Councillors and other leading citizens were holding secret meetings to discuss the conduct of the Governor. Soon Dr. John Pott, whose private wrongs made him a leader in the popular discontent, was going from plantation to plantation, denouncing the Governor's conduct and inciting the people to resistance. Everywhere the angry planters gathered around him, and willingly subscribed to a petition for a redress of grievances. In April, 1635, Pott was holding one of these meetings in York, at the house of one William Warrens, when several friends of the Governor presented themselves for admission. "A servant meeting them told them they must not goe in ... whereupon they desisted and bended themselves to hearken to the discourse among them." In the confusion of sounds that came out of the house they could distinguish many angry speeches against Harvey and cries against his unjust and arbitrary government. When Pott read his petition, and told the assemblage that it had the support of some of the Councillors, they all rushed forward to sign their names.

When Harvey heard of these proceedings he was greatly enraged. Summoning the Council to meet without delay, he issued warrants for Dr. Pott and several others that had aided in circulating the petition. "After a few days Potts was brought up prisoner, having before his apprehending bin in the lower parts of the Country there also mustering his names at a meeting called for that purpose."[288] He does not seem to have feared the angry threats of the Governor, for when put in irons and brought before the Council, he readily consented to surrender the offending petition. At the same time he asserted "that if he had offended he did appeal to the King, for he was sure of noe justice from Sir John Harvey". When some of the other prisoners, in their hearing before the Council, asked the cause of their arrest, the Governor told them they should be informed at the gallows.

Shortly after this the Council was summoned to deliberate on the fate of the accused. The Governor, fearing that he might not secure conviction from a jury, "declared it necessary that Marshall law should be executed upon" them. When the Councillors refused to consent to any other than a legal trial, Harvey flew into a furious passion. For a while he paced back and forth in the room hardly able to contain himself. At length he sat down in his chair, and with a dark countenance commanded his colleagues to be seated. A long pause ensued, and then he announced that he had a question that they must answer each in his turn, without deliberation or consultation. "What," he enquired, "doe you think they deserve that have gone about to persuade the people from their obedience to his Majesties substitute?" "And I begin with you," he said, turning to Mr. Minifie. "I am but a young lawyer," Minifie replied, "and dare not uppon the suddain deliver my opinion." At this point Mr. Farrar began to complain of these strange proceedings, but Harvey commanded him to be silent. Captain Matthews also protested, and the other Councillors soon joined him in refusing to answer the Governor's question. "Then followed many bitter Languages from him till the sitting ended."

At the next meeting Harvey asked what the Council thought were the reasons that the petition had been circulated against him, and demanded to know whether they had any knowledge of the matter. Mr. Minifie replied that the chief grievance of the people was the detaining of the letter of the Assembly to the King. This answer seems to have aroused the Governor's fury, for, arising from his seat, and striking Mr. Minifie a resounding blow upon the shoulder, he cried, "Doe you say soe? I arrest you upon suspicion of treason to his Majesty." But Harvey found that he could not deal thus arbitrarily with the Councillors. Utie and Matthews rushed up and seizing him cried, "And we you upon suspicion of treason to his Majestie". Dr. Pott, who was present and had probably been waiting for this crisis, held up his hand as a signal to confederates without, "when straight about 40 musketiers ... which before that time lay hid, came ... running with their peeces presented" towards the house. "Stay here," commanded Pott, "until there be use of you."

In the meanwhile the Councillors crowded around Harvey. "Sir," said Matthews, "there is no harm intended you save only to acquaint you with the grievances of the Inhabitants and to that end I desire you to sit downe in your Chayre."

And there, with the enraged Governor seated before him, he poured out the recital of the people's wrongs. When he had finished there came an ominous pause. Finally Matthews spoke again. "Sir," he said, "the peoples fury is up against you and to appease it, is beyond our power, unlesse you please to goe for England, there to answer their complaints." But this Harvey refused to do. He had been made Governor of Virginia by the King, he said, and without his command he would not leave his charge.

But before many days the Governor changed his mind. He found himself deserted by all and entirely in the power of the Councillors. As sentinals were placed "in all wayes & passages so that noe man could travell or come from place to place", he could make no effort to raise troops. Dr. Pott and the other prisoners were set at liberty. A guard was placed around Harvey, ostensibly to protect him, but really with the purpose of restraining him. A letter came from Captain Purifee, a Councillor then in the "lower parts" of the colony, which spoke of designs of the people to bring Harvey to account for his many wrongs. In alarm the Governor consented to take the first ship for England. He endeavored, however, to name his successor, to induce Matthews, Pierce, and Minifie to go with him to England, and to secure a promise from the Council not to molest Maryland. But they would consent to none of these things.

In the meantime an Assembly had been called to consider the innumerable grievances against the Governor. When they met at Jamestown, Harvey sent them a letter, declaring the session illegal and ordering them to disperse to their homes. "Notwithstanding his threats ... the assembly proceeded according to their former intentions." Harvey then dispatched a letter to the Council, ordering them to send him his royal commission and instructions, but these documents had been intrusted to the keeping of Mr. Minifie with directions not to surrender them. The Council then turned themselves to the task of selecting a successor to Harvey. Their unanimous vote was given to Captain Francis West, the senior member of the board and formerly Governor. Feeling that since the expulsion of Harvey had been primarily a movement to protect the rights of the people, the Burgesses should have some voice in the election of the new Governor, they appealed to the Assembly for the ratification of their choice. West was popular in the colony, and "the people's suffrages" were cast for him as willingly as had been those of the Council. The Assembly then drew up resolutions setting forth the misconduct of Harvey and justifying their course in sending him back to England. These documents were entrusted to one Thomas Harwood, who was to deliver them to the King. Of what happened after Harvey's departure we have little record, but it is probable that the colonists revenged themselves upon the deposed Governor by confiscating all his ill gotten possessions.

It was decided that Dr. Pott should go to England to stand trial as his appeal to the King had taken the case beyond the jurisdiction of the Virginia courts. He and Harwood sailed upon the same vessel with Sir John. It is not hard to imagine with what dark looks or angry words Pott and Harvey greeted each other during their long voyage across the Atlantic. Doubtless Harwood and Pott held many a consultation upon what steps should be taken when they reached England to secure a favorable hearing for the colony, and to frustrate Harvey's plans for revenge. It was Harwood's intention to hasten to London, in order to forestall the Governor and "to make friends and the case good against him, before he could come".[289] But Sir John was too quick for him. Hardly had the ship touched the dock at Plymouth, than he was off to see the mayor of the city. This officer, upon hearing of the "late mutiny and rebellion" in Virginia, put Pott under arrest, "as a principal author and agent thereof", and seized all the papers and letters that had been entrusted to Harwood. Having thus gotten his hands upon the important documents, Harvey proceeded to London to complain of the indignities shown him and to ask for the punishment of his enemies.

When Charles I learned that the Virginians had deposed his Governor and sent him back to England, he was surprised and angered. It was, he said, an assumption of regal power to oust thus unceremoniously one of his officers, and he was resolved to send Harvey back, if for one day only. And should the Governor acquit himself of the charges against him, he was to be inflicted upon the colony even longer than had at first been intended. The case came before the Privy Council in December 1635.[290] In the charges that were made against Harvey nothing was said of the illegal and arbitrary measures that had caused the people to depose him. All reference was omitted to the detaining of the Assembly's letter, to the support given Maryland, to the abuse of the courts, to illegal taxes and proclamations. Possibly the agents of the Virginians felt that such accusations as these would have no weight with the ministers of a monarch so little in sympathy with liberal government, so they trumped up other charges to sustain their cause. Despite the assertion of Harwood that Harvey "had so carryed himself in Virginia, that if ever hee retourned back thither hee would be pistolled or Shott", he was acquitted and restored to his office. West, Utie, Matthews, Minifie and Pierce, whom Harvey designated as the "chief actors in the munity", were ordered to come to England, there to answer before the Star Chamber the charge of treason.[291]

As the time approached for him to return to Virginia, Harvey began to show symptoms of nervousness. Feeling possibly that the threats of "pistolling" were not to be taken lightly, he requested the King to furnish him a royal vessel in which to make the journey. The appearance of one of the King's own ships in the James, he thought, would "much abate the bouldness of the offenders". This request was granted, and, after some months of delay, Harvey set forth proudly in the Black George. But Charles had not cared to send a really serviceable vessel to Virginia, and for a while it seemed that the Black George would relieve the colonists of their troubles by taking Sir John to the bottom. The vessel, it would appear, sprang a leak before it had been many hours at sea, and was forced to return to port. The Governor then decided that a merchant vessel would suffice for his purposes, and set sail again, upon a ship of the Isle of Wight.

He reached Point Comfort in January, 1637. Not wishing to wait until his ship reached Jamestown before asserting his authority, he landed at once and established a temporary capital at Elizabeth City. He had received instructions to remove from the Council all the members that had taken part in the "thrusting out", and he brought with him commissions for several new members. Orders were issued immediately for this reconstructed Council to convene in the church at Elizabeth City. There, after the oath had been administered, he published a proclamation of pardon to all persons implicated in the "mutiny", from which, however, West, Matthews, and the other leaders were excluded. The Governor then proceeded to displace all officials whom he considered hostile to his administration. "Before I removed from Elizabeth City," he wrote, "I appointed Commissioners and sheriffs for the lower counties, and for the plantation of Accomack, on the other side of the Bay."

The "thrusting out" did not cause Harvey to become more prudent in the administration of the government. His restoration, which Charles had meant as a vindication of the royal authority, the Governor seems to have interpreted as a license for greater tyranny. If the accusations of his enemies may be credited, he went to the greatest extremes in oppressing the people and in defying their laws. With the Council now completely under his control, he was master of the courts, and inflicted many great wrongs by means of "arbitrary and illegal proceedings in judgment". Confiscations and other "most cruel oppressions", it was declared, were used to punish all that showed themselves hostile to his government. He and his officers did not scruple to impose many unjust fines, which they converted "to their own private use", nor to strike terror into the people with whippings and "cutting of ears".[292]

Nor did Sir John neglect to take revenge upon those old enemies that had so defied and humiliated him. West, Utie, Matthews and Pierce were sent at once to England, and their goods, cattle and servants seized. Beyond doubt it was against Samuel Matthews that Harvey bore the most bitter animosity, and it was his estate that suffered most. The Governor had been heard to say that if one "stood, tother should fall, and if hee swomme, the other should sinke". Matthews was one of the wealthiest men of the colony, his property consisting largely of cattle, but Sir John now swore that he would not leave him "worth a cow taile". At the next session of the Quarter Court, suit was entered against Matthews by one John Woodall, for the recovery of certain cattle. The learned judges, upon investigation, found that in the year 1622 Matthews held two cows rightfully belonging to Woodall. It was their opinion that the increase of these cows "unto the year 1628 ... might amount unto the number of fifteen". "Computing the increase of the said fifteen head from the year 1628 to the time of their inquiry, they did return the number of fiftye head to the said Woodall."[293]

When Matthews heard that his estate had been seized and "havoc made thereof", he entered complaint with the Privy Council and secured an order requiring Harvey to restore all to his agents in Virginia. But the Governor was most reluctant to give up his revenge upon his old enemy. For seven months he put off the agents and at last told them that he had received new orders from the Privy Council, expressing satisfaction with what had been done and bidding him proceed.[294] Thereupon Secretary Kemp and other friends of the Governor entered Matthews' house, broke open the doors of several chambers, ransacked all his trunks and chests, examined his papers, and carried away a part of his goods and eight of his servants.[295] Soon after, however, Harvey received positive commands from the Privy Council to make an immediate restoration of all that had been taken. In January, 1639, he wrote that he had obeyed their Lordships exactly, by calling a court and turning over to Matthews' agents many of his belongings.[296] But Harvey denied that he had ever appropriated the estate to his own use, and claimed that he had been misrepresented by "the Cunning texture of Captain Mathews, his complaint".[297]

Among those that felt most keenly the Governor's resentment was a certain clergyman, Anthony Panton. This man had quarrelled with Harvey's best friend and chief advisor in the stormy days of the expulsion, Secretary Matthew Kemp. Panton had incurred Kemp's undying resentment by calling him a "jackanapes", "unfit for the place of secretary", and declaring that "his hair-lock was tied up with ribbon as old as St. Paul's".[298] The belligerent parson was now brought to trial, charged with "mutinous speeches and disobedience to Sir John Harvey", and with disrespect to the Archbishop of Canterbury. His judges pronounced him guilty and inflicted a sentence of extreme rigor. A fine of £500 was imposed, he was forced to make public submission in all the parishes of the colony, and was banished "with paynes of death if he returned, and authority to any man whatsoever to execute him."[299]

In the meanwhile the Governor's enemies in England had not been idle. Matthews, Utie, West and Pierce, upon landing in 1637, had secured their liberty under bail, and had joined with Dr. Pott in an attempt to undermine Harvey's influence at Court. Had Sir John sent witnesses to England at once to press the charges against them before the Star Chamber, while the matter was still fresh in the memory of the King, he might have brought about their conviction and checked their plots. But he neglected the case, and Charles probably forgot about it, so the whole matter was referred to the Lord Keeper and the Attorney-General where it seems to have rested.[300] The exiles had no difficulty in finding prominent men willing to join in an attack upon Harvey. Before many months had passed they had gained the active support of the "sub-committee" of the Privy Council to which Virginia affairs were usually referred.[301] Harvey afterwards complained that members of this committee were interested in a plan to establish a new Virginia Company and for that reason were anxious to bring discredit upon his government.[302] It was not difficult to find cause enough for removing Sir John. Reports of his misconduct were brought to England by every vessel from the colony. Numerous persons, if we may believe the Governor, were "imployed in all parts of London to be spyes", and to "invite the meanest of the planters newly come for England into Taverns", where they made them talkative with wine and invited them to state their grievances.[303]

The English merchants trading to Virginia also entered complaint before the Privy Council against Harvey's administration. They sought relief from a duty of two pence per hogshead on all tobacco exported from the colony, from a fee of six pence a head on immigrants, and a requisition of powder and shot laid upon vessels entering the James.[304] The Privy Council, always careful of the welfare of British trade, wrote the Governor and the Council, demanding an explanation of these duties and requiring an account of the powder and shot. Harvey replied at great length, justifying the duties and begging their Lordships not to credit "the malitious untruths of such who by all means do goe about and studie to traduce us".

But the Privy Council, not waiting to receive all of Harvey's defense, decided to remove him and to appoint in his place Sir Francis Wyatt.[305] The new Governor was directed to retain the old Council and to confirm Kemp as Secretary.[306] But he was authorized to restore to Matthews any part of his estate yet withheld from him, and to reopen in the Virginia courts the case against Anthony Panton.[307] The day of reckoning had now arrived. When Wyatt reached Virginia, he lost no time in bringing Harvey to account for his misdeeds. He was arraigned before the courts, where he was forced to answer countless complaints of injustice and oppression, and to restore to their owners his ill gotten gains. Kemp wrote, in March, 1640, that Sir John was being persecuted with great rigor, that most of his estate had been confiscated, and at the next court would assuredly be swept away.[308] A few weeks later Harvey wrote to Secretary Windebank, to relate his misfortunes. "I am so narrowly watched," he complained, "that I have scarce time of priviledge for these few lines, which doe humbly crave of you to acquaint his Majesty how much I groan under the oppressions of my prevayling enemies, by whom the King's honor hath soe much suffered and who are now advanced to be my judges, and have soe farr already proceeded against me as to teare from me my estate by an unusuall way of inviting my creditors to clamour." He wished to return to England, there to repair his fortunes and seek revenge upon his enemies, but for some time he was detained in Virginia. The new Governor thought best to keep him in the colony where it would be difficult for him to plot against the administration. Harvey wrote, "I am denyed my passage for England notwithstanding my many infirmities and weaknesses of body doe crave advice and help beyond the skill and judgment which this place can give."[309]

"Sir John being ... layed flatt," the Governor next turned his attention to Kemp.[310] Sir Francis, who had strong reasons for hating the Secretary, summoned him into court to explain his offenses against Anthony Panton. Realizing that he had little hope of clearing himself, Kemp sought to leave for England, but his enemies restrained him. "I am extremely injured," he wrote in April, 1640, "and shall suffer without guilt, unless my friends now assist me, ... the Governor and Council here ... aim at my ruin."[311]

But Wyatt feared to retain Harvey and Kemp permanently in Virginia. Both had powerful friends who might take the matter before the King or the Privy Council. So, in the end, both made their way to England, taking with them the charter and many important letters and records.[312] It was now their turn to plot and intrigue to overthrow the party in power.[313] And so quickly did their efforts meet success that before Wyatt had been in office two years he was recalled and Sir William Berkeley made Governor in his place.

CHAPTER IV

Governor Berkeley and the Commonwealth

Sir William Berkeley, who succeeded Governor Wyatt in 1642, is one of the striking figures of American colonial history. Impulsive, brave, dogmatic, unrelenting, his every action is full of interest. He early displayed a passionate devotion to the house of Stuart, which remained unshaken amid the overthrow of the monarchy and the triumph of its enemies. When the British Commons had brought the unhappy King to the block, Berkeley denounced them as lawless tyrants and pledged his allegiance to Charles II. And when the Commonwealth sent ships and men to subdue the stubborn Governor, they found him ready, with his raw colonial militia, to fight for the prince that England had repudiated. Throughout his life his chief wish was to win the approbation of the King, his greatest dread to incur his censure.

Berkeley did not know fear. When, in 1644, the savages came murdering through the colony, it was he that led the planters into the forests to seek revenge. In 1666, when a Dutch fleet sailed into the James and captured a number of English vessels, the Governor wished to sally out in person with a few merchantmen to punish their temerity.

He possessed many of the graces of the courtier, and seems to have charmed, when he so desired, those with whom he came in contact. His friends are most extravagant in his praises, and their letters refer to him as the model soldier, statesman and gentleman.

The overthrow of Sir Francis Wyatt was a severe blow to the enemies of the old Harvey faction. Anthony Panton entered a protest against the change of administration, claiming that it had been brought about by surreptitious means and that no just complaint could be made against Governor Wyatt.[314] At his petition Berkeley was ordered to postpone his departure for Virginia until the matter could be investigated further. Upon signing an agreement, however, to protect the interests of Wyatt and his friends, he was allowed to sail and reached the colony in 1642.

The new Governor soon showed that he had no intention of persecuting Harvey's enemies, or of continuing the bitter quarrels of the preceding administrations. In his first Council we find Samuel Matthews, William Pierce and George Minifie, all of whom had been implicated in the "thrusting out".[315] Whether proceeding under directions from the English government, or actuated by a desire to rule legally and justly, he conferred a priceless blessing upon the colony by refusing to use the judiciary for political persecution. So far as we can tell there was no case, during his first administration, in which the courts were prostituted to personal or party ends. Thomas Ludwell afterwards declared that it was a convincing evidence of Berkeley's prudence and justice that after the surrender to the Commonwealth, when his enemies might easily have hounded him to his ruin, "there was not one man that either publickly or privately charged him with injustice".[316] In March, 1643, he affixed his signature to a law allowing appeals from the Quarter Courts to the Assembly. This right, which seems not to have been acknowledged by Sir John Harvey, was of the very highest importance. It gave to the middle class a share in the administration of justice and afforded an effectual check upon the abuse of the courts by the Governor and Council.

Berkeley greatly endeared himself to the poor planters by securing the abolition of a poll tax that contributed to the payment of his own salary.[317] "This," the Assembly declared, "is a benefit descending unto us and our posterity which we acknowledge contributed to us by our present Governor."[318] Berkeley also made an earnest effort to relieve the burden of the poor by substituting for the levy upon tithables "assessments proportioning in some measure payments according to mens abilities and estates" But the colonial legislators soon found a just distribution of the taxes a matter of great difficulty, and we are told that the new measures, "through the strangeness thereof could not but require much time of controverting and debating".[319] In 1648 the experiment was abandoned and the old oppressive tax upon tithables revived.[320]

During the first administration of Berkeley numerous other measures were adopted tending to augment the liberty and prosperity of the people. In 1643 a law was passed prohibiting the Governor and Council from imposing taxes without the consent of the Assembly.[321] At the same session Berkeley assented to a statute exempting the Burgesses from arrest during sessions of Assembly and for ten days after dissolution.[322] The fees of the Secretary of State were limited and fixed in order to prevent excessive and unjust charges by that officer.[323]

That the colonists were not insensible of the Governor's liberal conduct is shown by their generosity to him on more than one occasion. In 1642 they presented him with an "orchard with two houses belonging to the collony ... as a free and voluntary gift in consideration of many worthy favours manifested towards the collony".[324] In 1643, when the war in England caused the suspension of Berkeley's pensions and allowances from the King, the Assembly voted a tax of two shillings per poll on all tithable persons as a temporary relief.[325]

When Sir William assumed the government in 1642 he was conscious that an effort was being made in England to restore the old London Company of Virginia, and it became his first care to thwart this design. In 1639 George Sandys had been sent to England as the agent of the Assembly and had presented a petition in the name of the Virginia planters, to the House of Commons, for the restoration of the old corporation.[326] The Assembly of April, 1642, called together by Berkeley, repudiated entirely the action of their agent, declaring that he had misunderstood his instructions. The renewal of the Company, they said, was never "desired, sought after or endeavoured to be sought for either directly or indirectly by the consent of any Grand Assembly or the common consent of the people". They drew up a petition to the King, expressing their desire to remain under his immediate care and protection, citing the many blessings of the present order of government, and drawing the most melancholy picture of their sufferings before the revocation of the charter. "The present happiness," they said, "is exemplified to us by the freedom of yearly assemblies warranted unto us by his majesties gratious instructions, and the legal trial per juries in all criminal and civil causes where it shall be demanded."[327]

This declaration of loyalty and contentment, reaching Charles at a time when so many of his subjects were rising in rebellion against his authority, was most pleasing to the unfortunate monarch. "Your acknowledgement," he replied to the Governor and the Assembly, "of our grace, bounty, and favour, towards you, and your so earnest desire to continue under our immediate protection, is very acceptable to us." "And," he continued, "as we had not before the least intention to consent to the introduction of any company over that our Colony, we are by it much confirmed in our resolution, as thinking it unfit to change a form of government wherein our subjects there ... receive much contentment and satisfaction".[328]

In the early years of Berkeley's administration the colony experienced another horrible Indian massacre. As in 1622 the blow came without warning. The cruel and barbarous war that followed the first massacre had long since come to an end and for many years there had been peace between the two races. It is true that the friendly relations that resulted from the marriage of Rolfe and Pocahontas had not been restored, that the Indians were not allowed to frequent the English settlements, that no weapons were sold them, but the peace was fairly well observed and there was no reason to suspect the savages of treachery.

The plot originated in the brain of Opechancanough. This remarkable savage was long supposed to have been the brother of Powhatan, but newly discovered evidence tends to show that this was not the case. It is known that he belonged to a foreign tribe that came from the far southwest. Having, it is supposed, been defeated in a battle with the Spaniards, he had led his people to Virginia and united them with the tribes under the command of Powhatan. This tremendous march must have consumed many months, and have been beset with countless dangers, but Opechancanough overcame them, and "conquered all along from Mexico" to Virginia.[329] He was now an extremely aged man. Being unable to walk he was carried from place to place upon a litter. His eyelids were so heavy that he could not of his own volition move them, and attendants stood always ready to raise them whenever it became necessary for him to see.[330] But his mind was clear, his force of will unshaken, and the Indians paid him the reverent obedience that his able leadership demanded.

Opechancanough planned the massacre for April 18th, 1644, and it was carried out upon that date with the utmost ferocity.[331] The slaughter was even greater than in 1622, and no less than five hundred Christians are said to have been destroyed.[332] But this calamity fell almost entirely upon the frontier counties at the heads of the great rivers, and upon the plantations on the south side of the James. The savages could not penetrate to the older and more populous communities of the lower peninsula. For this reason the disaster, horrible as it was, did not overwhelm the entire colony and threaten its destruction as had the massacre of 1622.

Another deadly war with the savages ensued immediately. Sir William Berkeley several times placed himself at the head of large expeditions and carried fire and destruction to many Indian villages.[333] As in the former war, the naked and poorly armed natives could not withstand the English, and, deserting their homes, they usually fled into the woods at their approach. And again the white men brought famine upon them by going out each year in the months of July and August to cut down their growing maize.[334] In order to protect the isolated frontier plantations the Governor ordered the people to draw together in fortified camps, strong enough to resist the assaults of a large body of the savages.[335] "He strengthened the weak Families," it was said, "by joining two or three ... together and Palizaded the houses about."[336]

Despite these wise measures the savages would probably have continued the war many years had not Opechancanough fallen into the hands of the English. The old king was surprised by Sir William Berkeley, and, because of his decrepitude, was easily captured.[337] He was taken in triumph to Jamestown, where the Governor intended to keep him until he could be sent to England and brought before Charles I. But a few days after the capture, a common soldier, in revenge for the harm done the colony by Opechancanough, shot the aged and helpless prisoner in the back.[338]

Soon after this event the Indians sued for peace. Discouraged and starving, they promised to become the friends and allies of the whites forever, if they would cease their hostility and grant them their protection. A treaty was drawn up and ratified by the Assembly and by the new Indian king Necotowance.[339] It provided that the savages should acknowledge the King of England as their sovereign and overlord; that Necotowance and his successors should pay as tribute "the number of twenty beaver skins at the goeing of the Geese yearly"; that all the land between the York and the James from the falls of both rivers to Kecoughtan should be ceded to the English; that all white prisoners and escaped negroes should be returned. In compensation the English agreed to protect the savages from the attacks of their enemies and to resign to them as their hunting ground the territory north of the York River.[340] This peace, which was most beneficial to the colony, was not broken until 1676, when the incursions of the wild Susquehannocks involved the native Virginia tribes in a new conflict with the white men.[341]

During the civil war that was at this time convulsing England most of the influential Virginia planters adhered to the party of the King. They were, with rare exceptions, members of the established church, and could have little sympathy with a movement that was identified with dissenters. If the triumph of Parliament was to bring about the disestablishment of the Church, or even the toleration of Presbyterians and Independents, they could not give them their support. Moreover, loyalty to the House of Stuart was strong in Virginia. The very remoteness of the planters from the King increased their reverence and love. They could not be present at court to see the monarch in all his human weakness, so there was nothing to check their loyal imaginations from depicting him as the embodiment of princely perfection. Nor had the wealthy families of the colony aught to anticipate of economic or political gain in the triumph of Parliament. Possessed of large estates, monopolizing the chief governmental offices, wielding a great influence over the Assembly and the courts, and looking forward to a future of prosperity and power, they could not risk their all upon the uncertain waters of revolution. Some, no doubt, sympathized with the efforts that were being made in England to limit the King's power of taxing the people, for the colony had always contained its quota of liberals, but the dictates of self-interest must have lulled them into quiescence. And the Governor, in this hour of need, proved a veritable rock of loyalty for the King. None that showed leanings towards the cause of Parliament could expect favors of any kind from Sir William Berkeley. Moreover, if they spoke too loudly of the rights of the people and of the tyranny of monarchs, they might find themselves under arrest and charged with treason.

But there was another faction in Virginia, composed largely of small planters and freedmen, which sympathized with the aims of their fellow commons of the mother country. Prominent among these must have been a small number of Virginia Puritans, who had for some years been subjected to mild persecution. The overwhelming sentiment of the colony had long been for strict uniformity in the Church "as neere as may be to the canons in England", and several statutes had been passed by the Assembly to suppress the Quakers and Puritans.[342] In 1642, Richard Bennett and others of strong Calvinistic leanings, sent letters to Boston requesting that Puritan ministers be sent to Virginia, to minister to their non-conformist congregations.[343] The New Englanders responded readily, despatching to their southern friends three ministers of distinction—William Thompson, John Knowles and Thomas James. Despite the laws against non-conformity these men anticipated little interference with their work and even brought letters of introduction from Governor Winthrop to Sir William Berkeley.[344] Little did they know the temper of the new Virginia Governor. So far from welcoming this Puritan invasion Berkeley determined to meet it with measures of stern repression. A bill was put through the Assembly requiring all ministers within the colony to conform to the "orders and constitutions of the church of England", both in public and in private worship, and directing the Governor and Council to expel all dissenters from the country.[345] Disheartened at this unfriendly reception, James and Knowles soon returned to New England, leaving Thompson to carry on the work. This minister, in defiance of the law, lingered long in Virginia, preaching often and making many converts.

Among those that embraced the Calvinistic tenets at this time was Thomas Harrison, formerly Berkeley's chaplain. Harrison seems to have regarded the massacre of 1644 as a judgment of God upon the colonists for their persecution of the Puritans. His desertion of the established Church aroused both the anger and the alarm of the Governor and in 1648 he was expelled from his parish for refusing to use the Book of Common Prayer. Later he left the colony for New England.

This persecution, although not severe enough to stamp out dissent in Virginia, could but arouse among the Puritans a profound dissatisfaction with the existing government, and a desire to coöperate with their brethren of England in the great contest with the King. Although not strong enough to raise the Parliamentary standard in the colony and to seek religious freedom at the sword's point, the Puritans formed a strong nucleus for a party of opposition to the King and his Governor.

Moreover, in addition to the comparatively small class of Puritans, there must have been in the colony hundreds of men, loyal to the established church, who yet desired a more liberal government both in England and in Virginia. A strong middle class was developing which must have looked with sympathy upon the cause of the English Commons and with jealousy upon the power of the Virginia Governor and his Council. There is positive evidence that many poor men had been coming to Virginia from very early times, paying their own passage and establishing themselves as peasant proprietors. Wills still preserved show the existence at this period of many little farms of five or six hundred acres, scattered among the great plantations of the wealthy. They were tilled, not by servants or by slaves, but by the freemen that owned them. Depending for food upon their own cattle, hogs, corn, fruit and vegetables, and for the other necessities of life upon their little tobacco crops, the poor farmers of Virginia were developing into intelligent and useful citizens. They constituted the backbone of a distinct and powerful middle class, which even at this early period, had to be reckoned with by aristocracy and Governor and King.

This section of the population was constantly being recruited from the ranks of the indentured servants. The plantations of the rich were tilled chiefly by bonded laborers, brought from the mother country. So long as land was plentiful in Virginia the chief need of the wealthy was for labor. Wage earners could not supply this need, for the poor man would not till the fields of others when he could have land of his own almost for the asking. So the planters surmounted this difficulty by bringing workmen to the colony under indenture, to work upon their farms for a certain number of years. Many a poor Englishman, finding the struggle for existence too severe at home, thus surrendered for a while his liberty, that in the end he might acquire a share in the good things of the New World. After serving his master five or six years the servant usually was given his liberty and with it fifty acres of land and a few farm implements. Thus equipped, he could, with industry and frugality, acquire property and render himself a useful citizen in his adopted country. There can be no doubt that many hundreds of former servants, become prosperous, did unite with the free immigrants of humble means to form a vigorous middle class.

Nothing could be more natural than that the small farmers should regard Parliament as the champion of the poor Englishman at home and in the colony. They knew full well that if Charles should triumph over the Commons, his victory would mean greater power for their Governor, greater privilege for the wealthy planters. On the other hand, the King's defeat might bring increased influence to the middle class and to the Burgesses.

It is not possible to determine how numerous was the Parliamentary party in Virginia, but the faction was powerful enough to cause serious apprehension to the loyalists. So bitter was the feeling that fears of assassination were entertained for Sir William Berkeley, and a guard of ten men was granted him. We are "sensible", declared the Assembly, in 1648, "of the many disaffections to the government from a schismaticall party, of whose intentions our native country of England hath had and yet hath too sad experience".[346]

But the commons of Virginia were not prepared to raise the standard of revolt. They must have lacked organization and leaders. Most of the aristocracy and wealth of Virginia was arrayed against them, while the government was in the hands of a man noted for his passionate attachment to the Throne. The Parliamentary party must have felt it best to await the event of the struggle in England, pinning their hopes upon the success of their comrades there. But even after Parliament had won the victory, after the King had been executed, they were not strong enough to overthrow Berkeley's government and force Virginia into obedience to the Commonwealth.

The news of the death of Charles I filled the royalists of Virginia with grief and anger. It seemed to them that the cause of law and order and religion in the unhappy kingdom had fallen with their monarch. Moreover, they could but expect the victorious party, after settling all at home, to extend their arms to the little colony and force upon them a reluctant obedience to the new government. But the intrepid Berkeley was determined never to submit until compelled to do so by force of arms. Charles II was proclaimed King. The Assembly was called together and a law enacted declaring it high treason to question, even by insinuation, the "undoubted & inherent right of his Majesty ... to the Collony of Virginia, and all other his majesties dominions".[347] The Assembly referred to Charles I in terms of reverence and affection, as their late blessed and sainted King, and, unmindful of consequences, denounced his executioners as lawless tyrants. For any person to cast dishonor or censure upon the fallen monarch, or to uphold in any way the proceedings against him, or to assert the legality of his dethronement, was declared by the Assembly high treason. "And it is also enacted," they continued, "that what person soever, by false reports and malicious rumors shall spread abroad, among the people, any thing tending to change of government, ... such persons, not only the authors of ... but the reporters and divulgers thereof, shall be adjudged guilty."[348]

Even before the news of these events reached England, Sir William had aroused the anger of Parliament by his persecution of the Puritans. Some of the people of Nansemond county had written, complaining of the banishment of Mr. Harrison, whom they described as an able minister and a man of splendid character. The English Council wrote Berkeley commanding him to restore Mr. Harrison to his parish. "Wee know," they said, "you cannot be ignorant that the use of the common prayer book is prohibited by the parliament of England."[349] And when they learned that the colony had refused to acknowledge the Commonwealth, and still adhered to the House of Stuart, they were determined to punish the Virginians for their temerity. Since it would be exceedingly inconvenient at this time of uncertainty and change to send an expedition across the Atlantic, it was decided to bring the colonists to their senses by cutting off their foreign trade. An act was passed by Parliament in October, 1650, declaring that since the colony had been settled by the English at great cost to the nation, it should rightly be under the authority of the present government; that divers persons in Virginia had committed open treason, "traytorously by force and Subtilty" usurping the government and defying the Commonwealth; and in order to repress speedily the rebellious colonists and to inflict upon them a merited punishment, they were to be forbidden all "Commerce or Traffique with any people Whatsoever". The full force of the English navy was to be used in carrying out this act, and all commanders were directed to seize and bring in foreign vessels found trading with the colony. No English ships were to sail for Virginia without special license from the Council of State.[350]

This was a dire threat indeed. To cut off all commerce with England and foreign countries would bring utter ruin upon the planters, for their tobacco crop would then be without a market. Even now, however, the Governor did not falter in his loyalty. He felt, no doubt, that Parliament would have difficulty in enforcing this act, and he looked to the Dutch merchantmen to take off the tobacco.

Before an Assembly called together in March, 1651, Berkeley delivered an address ringing with defiance of Parliament "Gentlemen," he said, "you perceave by the Declaration that the men of Westminster have set out, ... how they meane to deale with you hereafter.... Indeed me thinks they might have proposed something to us which might have strengthened us to beare those heavy chaines they are making ready for us, though it were but an assurance that we shall eat the bread for which our owne Oxen plow, and with our owne sweat we reape; but this assurance (it seems) were a franchise beyond the Condition they have resolv'd on the Question we ought to be in: For the reason why they talk so Magisterially to us is this, we are forsooth their worships slaves, bought with their money and by consequence ought not to buy, or sell but with those they shall Authorize with a few trifles to Coszen us of all for which we toile and labour.... The strength of their argument runs onely thus: we have laid violent hands on your Land-lord, possessed his Manner house where you used to pay your rents, therefore now tender your respects to the same house you once reverenced.... They talke indeed of money laid out in this country in its infancy. I will not say how little, nor how Centuply repaid, but will onely aske, was it theirs? They who in the beginning of this warr were so poore, & indigent, that the wealth and rapines of three Kingdomes & their Churches too cannot yet make rich."

The Governor then began an impassioned appeal to the Assembly to remain firm in their loyalty to the Crown. "Surely Gentlemen," he cried, "we are more slaves by nature, than their power can make us if we suffer ourselves to be shaken with these paper bulletts, & those on my life are the heaviest they either can or will send us.... You have heard under what heavy burthens the afflicted English Nation now groans, and calls to heaven for relief: how new and formerly unheard of impositions make the wifes pray for barrenness and their husbands deafnes to exclude the cryes of their succourles, starving children.... Consider your selves how happy you are and have been, how the Gates of wealth and Honour are shut to no man, and that there is not here an Arbitrary hand that dares to touch the substance of either poore or rich: But that which I woud have you chiefly consider with thankfullnes is: That God hath separated you from the guilt of the crying bloud of our Pious Souveraigne of ever blessed memory: But mistake not Gentlemen part of it will yet stain your garments if you willingly submit to those murtherers hands that shed it; I tremble to thinke how the oathes they will impose will make those guilty of it, that have long abhor'd the traiterousnesse of the act.... Gentlemen by the Grace of God we will not so tamely part with our King, and all these blessings we enjoy under him; and if they oppose us, do but follow me, I will either lead you to victory, or lose a life which I cannot more gloriously sacrifice then for my loyalty, and your security."[351]

When the Governor had completed his appeal the obnoxious act of Parliament was read aloud. The Assembly then passed a series of resolutions, reiterating their loyalty to the Crown, denouncing the Commons as usurpers and regicides, and defending themselves against the charge of treachery and rebellion. They had, they declared, adhered always to the "Lawes of England", which enjoined upon them the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and they refused now, at the bidding of Parliament, to break their word by renouncing their King. They could not be expected to give passive obedience to every party that possessed themselves of Westminster Hall, where the heads of divers factions had followed each other in quick succession. They had been accused of usurping the government of the colony, but their records would show that they had never swerved from their allegiance. And it ill became the Parliament that had overthrown the English constitution to bring such accusations. Finally, they declared, "we are resolv'd to Continue our Allegeance to our most Gratious King, yea as long as his gratious favour permits us, we will peaceably trade with the Londoners, and all other nations in amity with our Soveraigne: Protect all forraigne Merchants with our utmost force in our Capes: Allwaies pray for the happy restoration of our King, and repentance in them, who to the hazard of their soules have opposed him."[352]

As Berkeley had foreseen, the English found it impossible to enforce a strict blockade. The government could not spare war vessels enough to close the Virginia capes, and foreign merchantmen continued to sail unmolested into the James and the York, bringing goods to the planters and taking off their tobacco. Indeed the Dutch took advantage of this quarrel between colony and mother country to extend their American trade at the expense of the English merchants. The Council of State was soon made to realize by the complaints that poured in from the London shippers, that the "Blockade Act" was injuring England more than the refractory colony.

At this moment, several leaders of the Virginia Parliamentary party came to the Council at Westminster and represented to it the necessity of fitting out an expedition to overthrow the Berkeley government. They could plead that the blockade had proved ineffective, that the honor of the Commonwealth demanded the prompt subjection of the impudent Governor, that the coöperation of the Virginia commons would make the task easy. Nor could they omit to remind the Councillors that it was their duty to bring relief to their fellow Puritans of Virginia.

At all events the Council, seeing the necessity of prompt action, sent forth a well armed expedition under the command of Captain Robert Denis to subdue both the Barbadoes and Virginia. But wishing to avoid, if possible, open hostilities, at the same time they sent commissioners to treat with the colonists and persuade them to submit peaceably to the Commonwealth. The Council of State evidently expected active assistance from the Parliamentary party in the colony in these efforts to establish the new political order, for they gave directions to the commissioners to raise troops in the plantations, to appoint captains and other officers, and to guarantee freedom to all servants that volunteered to fight with the Commonwealth forces. They were given power to grant pardon to all that submitted, making such exceptions as they thought proper, and were directed to establish a new government in accord with the present constitution of England.

When, in the spring of 1652, the British fleet sailed up the James river, Captain Denis found the intrepid Berkeley prepared for a strenuous resistance. With the guns of the warships approaching his capital, with English soldiers ready for a landing, with a strong party in the colony in sympathy with the invaders, he might well have despaired. Resistance would certainly entail enormous misfortunes upon the colony—bloodshed, devastation, civil strife—and success could be but temporary. Should he beat off the present expedition, others too powerful to be resisted would undoubtedly follow, and the punishment of the colony would be but the more severe.

Yet the Governor did not falter. He called around him the full strength of the colonial militia, posted them to good advantage, and himself took active command. Several Dutch vessels that had been trading in the James were pressed into service, filled with men and moored in close to Jamestown, with their guns trained upon the approaching enemy. Behind them were several land batteries. The whole made an imposing appearance, and might well have given apprehension to the invaders.

Fortunately, however, the threatened conflict was averted by the persuasion of the Parliamentary commissioners. These men, anxious to avoid civil war, availed themselves of the authority given them by the Council of State, to offer very lenient terms of surrender. Some of them seem to have preceded the fleet to Virginia, to consult with their friends and to formulate plans to render the Governor's resistance ineffectual. It is not improbable that these efforts were seconded by some of the most prominent men of the colony. Two members of the Council itself, it is said, who possessed goods of great value upon vessels in the fleet, received warning that their property would be at once confiscated, if they gave their support to the Governor. They therefore were constrained to advocate submission. With division in the ranks of the colonists and with the invaders ready for action, even Berkeley was at last forced to give way and consent to a capitulation.

The terms of surrender were drawn up at Jamestown and agreed to by the commissioners on the one hand, and by the Governor, Council and Burgesses on the other. It was agreed first, that Virginia should acknowledge its due allegiance to the Commonwealth of England, and "to the lawes there established". This submission, it was declared, was "a voluntary act, not forced nor constrained by a conquest upon the country".[353] It was also stipulated "that the people of Virginia have free trade as the people of England do enjoy to all places and with all nations according to the lawes of that commonwealth". Even more interesting was the agreement "that Virginia shall be free from all taxes, customs and impositions whatsoever, and none to be imposed on them without consent of the Grand Assembly, and soe that neither fforts nor castles bee erected or garrisons maintained without their consent". When these terms of surrender were reported to the English government, Parliament thought that the commissioners had been too liberal in their concessions, and some of the articles were not ratified.

The commissioners granted full pardon and indemnity for all "acts, words or writeings done or spoken against the parliament" and any persons refusing to take the oath of allegiance to the new government were given "a yeares time ... to remove themselves and their estates out of Virginia". The use of the Book of Common Prayer was permitted for one year in the parishes that so desired, and no ministers were deprived of their charges or their livings.[354]

Separate articles were drawn up between the commissioners and the Governor and Council. Neither Berkeley nor the Councillors were to be compelled, during the ensuing twelve months, to take the oath of allegiance. They were not to be censured for speaking well in private of the King. They were given leave to sell all their property and to quit the country without molestation. They were permitted to send a message to Charles II, giving an account of the surrender.[355]

The commissioners were now confronted with the all-important task of establishing a new government. They had been given power by the Council of State to hold an election of Burgesses granting the franchise to all who had taken the oath of allegiance. Feeling, doubtless, a reluctance to assume the entire responsibility of moulding a new constitution, they resolved to wait until the Burgesses assembled and to consult with them in all their measures. The election was held without delay, and the members were sworn in on April 26th, 1652.

The Burgesses and the commissioners then entered upon a long and serious debate concerning "the settling and governing of Virginia".[356] The English Council had not, it would seem, given specific directions in regard to this work, so the members of the little constitutional convention were practically at liberty to do what they chose. Realizing, however, that all might be changed if it proved unsatisfactory to Parliament, they proceeded cautiously. Their chief concern was to establish a tentative government that would prevent present confusion and could later be perfected by the Council of State. It so happened, however, that the English, amid the confusion of the times, neglected to attend to this matter, and the work of the convention remained essentially unaltered throughout the Commonwealth period.

The House of Burgesses, since it had been officially recognized by the Council of State, was made the chief governing body of the colony. Except for the veto of the English government its power was to be unlimited. It was to elect the Governor and to specify his duties. If his administration proved unsatisfactory it might remove him from office. The Burgesses were also to elect the Council, to prescribe its functions and limit its power. This proud body, which had formerly been so powerful, was now to exist only on the suffrage of the House. It was even debated whether Councillors should be admitted to membership in the General Assembly. The appointment of all officials was also to "appertain to the Burgesses, the representatives of the people", but it was agreed that for the present most of the first nominations should be left to the Governor and the commissioners.[357]

Thus did Virginia become in all but name a republic. In England, the long cherished hope of the patriots for liberty was to be disappointed by the usurpation of Oliver Cromwell, and the victory of Parliament over the stubborn Charles was to result only in the substitution of one despot for another. But the commons of Virginia, although they had played an insignificant role in the great drama of the times, were to reap the reward which was denied their cousins of England. Their government for the next eight years was to be truly representative of the people. Nor did the English government often interfere with their affairs. Busy with his numerous wars and with the cares of administration, the Protector never found time to acquaint himself thoroughly with what was happening in Virginia. In 1653, and again in 1658, Cromwell promised to make some definite regulations for the government of the colony, but he was interrupted on each occasion before he could put his resolutions into effect. That it was his intention, however, to keep the appointment of the Governor in his own hands seems certain. In 1654 the Assembly received word that his Highness had decided then to continue Colonel Bennett, of whose good character he had heard, in the execution of his office, until he could further signify his pleasure. In 1657, the Council of State requested Cromwell to appoint some person to go to Virginia as its Governor, but this he failed to do.[358] With the exception of such spasmodic interruptions as these, and the partial enforcement of the Navigation Acts, the colony was left almost to its own devices throughout the Commonwealth period.

By the unanimous vote of the commissioners and the Burgesses Mr. Richard Bennett was made Governor. This choice must have been satisfactory both to the English government and the Parliamentary party in the colony. Mr. Bennett had been one of the few prominent Virginia Puritans and had left the colony during the persecution of dissenters by Sir William Berkeley. As a member of the commission he had been instrumental in bringing about the surrender and saving the colony from civil war. It was agreed that he should serve for one year, "or untill the next meeting of the Assembly", but as his administration proved most satisfactory he was continued in office by Cromwell until March 31st, 1655.[359]

The new government, however, was not to be established entirely without disorder and strife. In the interval between the surrender and the assembling of the Burgesses affairs on the Eastern Shore assumed a threatening aspect. The people of Northampton, many of whom seem formerly to have been favorable to the Commonwealth, became ill affected to the new régime, even before it was well begun. A number of things conspired to bring about this change. Among the inhabitants of Northampton were a number of Dutch who had settled there during the preceding decade. When war broke out between Holland and England in 1652 it was rumored that these people were conspiring with the Indians to bring about another massacre in Virginia. Groundless as these suspicions were, they infuriated the English and caused grave fears for the safety of the Dutch planters. When the justices of the peace took precautions to protect the unfortunate foreigners their action caused discontent and bitterness against the new government. Moreover, the Navigation Acts, recently passed by Parliament, restricting foreign trade would, if enforced, prove especially damaging to the people of the Eastern Shore. Finally, Northampton had not been represented in the Assembly since 1647, except for one Burgess in 1651, and the belief had sprung up that the county was to become independent of the government at Jamestown. For various reasons, therefore, Northampton was hostile to the government. And when the Parliamentary commissioners imposed upon them a tax of forty-six pounds of tobacco per poll, the people of the county voiced their anger in no uncertain terms, and selected a committee of six to draw up a statement of their grievances and present it to the new Assembly.

"Wee," they protested, "the Inhabitants of Northampton Countie doe complanye that from tyme to tyme wee have been submitted & bine obedient unto the paymt of publeq taxacons. Butt after ye yeare 1647, since yt tyme wee Conceive & have found that ye taxes were very weightie. But in a more espetiall manner ... the taxacon of fforty sixe pounds of tobacco p. poll (this present yeare). And desire yt ye same bee taken off ye charge of ye Countie; furthermore wee alledge that after 1647, wee did understand & suppose or Countie or Northampton to be disioynted & sequestered from ye rest of Virginia. Therefore that Llawe wch requireth & inioyneth Taxacons from us to bee Arbitrarye & illegall; fforasmuch as wee had neither summons for Ellecon of Burgesses nor voyce in their Assemblye (during the time aforesd) but only the Singular Burgess in September, Ano., 1651. Wee conceive that wee may Lawfullie ptest agt the pceedings in the Act of Assemblie for publiq Taxacons wch have relacon to Northmton Countie since ye year 1647."[360]