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Bacon's Rebellion: Victim Or Villain?

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The topic of Bacon’s Rebellion has been heavily debated for centuries and is filled with much controversy. Bacon’s Rebellion, 1676-1677, was an uprising of the settlers in the colony of Virginia against the Natives and the governor (Rice 1). The settlers believed that the government was doing too little to protect them from Indian attacks. The leader of the rebels, Nathaniel Bacon, demanded a commission to fight the Natives and clashed with Governor Berkeley on several occasions when he was refused the commission (Stanard 75-80). Eventually, the tension became so intense that Bacon burnt Jamestown, the capital of Virginia (Rice 11). Some scholars call the rebellion justified and consider Governor Berkeley a scoundrel. Others, label Bacon …show more content…

Of the two conflicting views of Bacon’s Rebellion- that the villain was either Bacon or Berkeley– I agree that Berkeley was the villain in the story, and that Bacon was right to rebel against him. Nathaniel Bacon is often seen as a selfish and radical rebel who was jealous of the elites, including Governor Berkeley, and wanted to defeat all Native Americans surrounding Virginia. The National Park Service records that Bacon was a stubborn, plotting problem maker (McCulley 2). Furthermore, it states that Bacon’s father sent him to Virginia in “hope that he would mature” (McCulley 2). However, his father’s efforts were in vain. Bacon remained a troublemaker and used his plotting skills to act on the jealousy he had for the wealthy Virginian elites. Robert Beverly, the author of The History and Present State of Virginia, proposed that Bacon and other rebel leaders were “well-to-do men...who were excluded from the powered elite” (Beverly 1). It is further suggested that these men were not included in the monopolized Watson 3 trade with the Natives, because Berkeley only extended that right to his elite friends. According to this view, it was the jealousy of Bacon and fellow aristocrats who were barred from …show more content…

This view suggests that Bacon and others began the rebellion to fight against both Native enemies and allies for personal gain. While it is true that Bacon did lead attacks against friendly Natives, I have not found solid evidence that suggests Bacon was seeking to use the rebellion to win slaves and property (Rice 4). Nevertheless, many believe that Bacon began the rebellion due to jealousy and want of power and money. On the other end of the spectrum, many consider Bacon to be a heroic fighter against tyranny, and name Governor Berkeley as the villain in this story. To understand this concept, one must know about Governor Berkeley’s flaws and failures. In Bacon’s Bacon’s Rebellion: The Declaration, he points out eight of the major faults that Governor Berkeley has committed against the people and the King. These include unjust taxes and voting laws, corruptly appointing favored people as judges, monopolizing trade with Natives and therefore tolerating their attacks, as well as preventing the army from pursuing Native enemies (Bacon and Sherwood 2-9). Mary Stanard also records these grievances in her work, The Story of Bacon’s Rebellion (Stanard

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In this document Bacon declares himself General by the consent of the people and asserts that Governor Sir William Berkeley and his supporters have used their power to commit crimes against the people of Virginia and the English Crown. The document cites eight grievances related to unjust taxes, inadequate protection from the Indians, and government corruption. Bacon calls for the immediate surrender or capture of Berkeley and 23

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Bacon’s Rebellion was when different groups like African American slaves, poor people and servants, the people from the lower level of the social hierarchy came together to try to over throw the white plantation

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Ultimately the rebellion would fail when Nathaniel Bacon was killed. The Colonial government in the House of Burgesses would then begin to reform the colony so that race rather than property determined the status of colonists. While this eased the tensions of the majority of the yeoman, it had repercussions for the African freemen. Breen gives evidence that following the rebellion, it became increasingly difficult for African freemen to continue their way of life. Breen states that many of the Africans he used as examples disappear from the court records, most likely indicating that they were forced back into slavery or moved to other locations where opportunities still

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830 Words | 4 Pages

From 1607 to the year before the Declaration of Independence, democratic society had been developing in the colonies over time through specific events. From religion to politics to social class, people looking to change the their lifestyle has done so with their own ideals in mind. Both the Zenger case of 1734 and Bacon’s Rebellion in 1676 are examples of people who found the government unjust taking matters into their own hands. While Bacon was more violent in his efforts compared to Zenger in his methods, both contributed to the development of a more democratic society in the colonies, and distancing from the monarchy of their matriarch. Nathaniel Bacon was the leader in a rebellion against what he deemed an unjust government.

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136 Words | 1 Pages

Great question! I get the impression that Bacon was a spoiled brat who wanted to become powerful and rich. It appears that he wanted to increase his wealth with more land and the only way he could acquire this land was to eradicate the Indians. I assume that he resented the fact that Berkeley never fully accepted him into the elite inner circle. Bacon decided the way to gain power and to change the laws for his own advantage was to remove Berkeley and his supporters.

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406 Words | 2 Pages

While being on the council, Bacon abused his powers by disobeying orders from Berkeley, forcing people to fight for him, and later on, burning Jamestown, certainly fitting the definition of a traitor. Governor Berkeley gave very specific orders and disliked when others disobeyed them. When Bacon saw that Berkeley did not

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1345 Words | 6 Pages

(McCulley, 1987) Historians have found out that the real issue that caused Nathaniel Bacon’s rebellion was his stubbornness, selfishness and as well as, the unlucky choices and decisions Governor Sir William Berkeley made for appointment. People may specifically point fingers to a number of reasons for Bacon's rebellion, they may include the following: economic problems, competition

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880 Words | 4 Pages

This led to Bacon’s Rebellion, a gang of impoverished and landless former servants attacked the capital of the colony and plundered the homes of the wealthy. Both colonies constituted a successful form of government; however, both governments were carried out in dissimilar ways. The establishment of two primitive English colonies, Jamestown and Massachusetts Bay Colony had many homogeneous attributes and differences. Both had an adequate relationship with the Native Americans that deteriorated and

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In the Chesapeake colonies, life was dominated by the plantation economy. There was a decidedly unequal distribution of skill and wealth, as the minority of the great planters dominated the lives of both the common white planters and the African slaves. Opposition to the great planters by common freedmen was seen in Bacon’s Rebellion of 1676, and although the shift to slave labor lessened tensions between white planters somewhat by pitting them both against the “inferior” slaves, plantation society remained a highly rigid and segregated social hierarchy. On the other end of the spectrum, the New England colonies operated on a much more egalitarian social structure. The New English colonies were based around town systems rather than plantations.

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The result of the Bacon’s Rebellion made a establishment of hierarchies based on class, but hidden by race. The Bacon’s Rebellion had to do with the environment because there was a significant deal of social mobility, but this gave the colonist anxiety. The colonists faced lack of stability and an uncertain future, plus a chance of social mobility. Therefore, this became a conflict as individuals fought for nature's

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441 Words | 2 Pages

They tried to destroy Boston, Massachusetts. They initiated their own military government of a Thomas Gage, and starved the city of their right to gather. As if we will break so easily. But the King, never one for mercy, did not just stop there. Our northern neighbors were reward at our expense.

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In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird the author Harper Lee uses protagonist to express the idea that having the courage to fight can make people hate you. The thesis means that Atticus is fighting for other that is something that others will not do at all. This also means that Atticus was fighting for someone who is a colored and people did not like what he was doing. Next is that Atticus was standing up for Tom Robinson from getting accused of what he didn’t do. He also let Calpurnia stay at his house because he needed her and Alexandra told him to fire Calpurnia.

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Rebellion is the voice of the unsatisfied, the oppressed, and the messengers of change. The people of the United States want to separate from the British monarchy that controls them. In the Declaration of independence, Thomas Jefferson encourages the rebellion against King George and the pursuit of what the colonists have been denied for so many years. Jefferson believes that a rebellion is justifiable when an oppressive figure inhibits one from exercising one’s natural rights. Jefferson uses suffering-related diction and logical appeal to justify the defiance of restrictive government.

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Although the truth reality here is the roots of the rebellion of the 13 colonies start from the beginning of the establishment of colonies. According to the lecture 10, “in 1660 through the first series of Navigation Acts, the English parliament sets the rules for how the people in the 13 colonies would live their lives”. This was one of the reasons of the rebellion of the 13 colonies, because the colonies they want to have they own rules and live their lives according to the rules that favoring each colony no only England. The acts that created the parliament was only to benefit England, because specify how the colonies behave between them and the mother land. The colonies beginning to get tired of the England rules and they want a change.

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King Philips War and Bacon’s Rebellion were two pivotal points in early American history. Ironically, they both shared many similarities between them. There are three main points of discussion in comparison of the two conflicts: 1) why the fighting started, 2) what they were fighting over, and finally 3) who they were fighting against. Each of these conflicts resulted in tragic loss of many lives of settlers and Indians and caused even more tension between the English and the Native Americans.

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