The fact that Bacon's Rebellion took up the time 

 and thought of England's greatest men for such a 

 considerable period of time had an effect on the King's 

 attitude toward the colonies. The monarch saw how 

 little he knew of colonial affairs and, in the words of 

 Secretary Coventry, determined "to be a little better 

 acquainted with those that bear offices in his Planta- 

 tions than of late he hath been . . . and let them 

 know, they are not to govern themselves, but be 

 governed by him." '" 



Yet the King's new interest in the colonies did not 

 automatically result in their better administration. 

 The King's attempt to enforce order was almost 

 hopelessly inadequate. Governor Berkeley was as 

 much inconvenienced by having royal troops in 

 Virginia after the rebellion as he had been by not 

 having them there during it. The soldiers' failure to 

 arrive in time to help against the rebels increased the 

 Governor's wartime difficulties. Their arrival after 

 the rebellion complicated the Go\ernor"s supply and 

 shelter problems. The troops were to a large extent 

 dependent on the populace. Their pay, which was 

 supposed to come from England, rarely arrived, and 

 as a result even greater burdens fell upon the \'ir- 

 ginians. Thus the soldiers' presence weakened rather 

 than strengthened the ro>al authority. In 1678, after 

 exhausting all local resources for support of the royal 

 troops, the \'irginia Council was forced to beg the 

 English government to take quick action in order to 

 prevent the redcoats from either starving or raising a 

 mutinv." Thus, in 1677 and in the following years, 

 \'irginians were experiencing the difficulties brought 

 about liy the presence of a standing peacetime army. 

 These inconveniences were similar to the difficulties 

 that American patriots were to suffer in the following 

 centurv. 



Library, Oxford ; Thomas Ludwcll to Ht-niy Coventry, October 

 5, 1676, Longleat, vol. 77, folio 231; Samuel Pepys to .Sir John 

 Berry, November 14, 1676, in J. R. Tanner, ed., .-1 Descriptive 

 Catalogue oj the Naval Mamtscripts in the Pepysian Library at Mag- 

 dalene College, Cambridge, vol. 3, in Publications of the j\avy Records 

 Society, 1909, vol. 36, no. 3443. 



'" Henry Coventry to Sir Jonathan .Atkins, governor of 

 Barbados, Xovember 21, 1677, in Letter-Book of Coventry, 

 British Museum, .additional MS. 25120, p. 120. 



" Thomas Ludwell [to Henry Coventry] in letter dated June 

 28, 1678, Longleat, vol. 78, folio 264; Herbert Jeffreys to Henry 

 Coventry, July 4, 1678, ibid., folio 269: Philip Ludwell to Henry 

 Coventry, June 16, 1679, ih,d.. folios 386-387. 



PAPER 17: THE EFFECT OF B.^CON'S REBELLION 



Effect on Judicial Branches 



In the judicial branches of the English government, 

 Bacon's Rebellion caught administrators dozing. The 

 King's Governor was not clearly authorized to institute 

 martial law and wage war against fellow Englishmen. 

 He was empowered to wage war against the Indians 

 but not against rebel colonists.'^ The Governor as- 

 sumed, however, that he had the right to put down 

 rebellion, if not by the positive authority of his com- 

 mission, at least by the natural law of self-preserva- 

 tion.'' The English authorities were uncertain as to 

 the judicial powers the King's Governor actually 

 possessed in an emergency, and they prepared orders 

 and commissions specifically authorizing Berkeley to 

 apply martial law and to try and convict rebels. 

 The most important document in which this authori- 

 zation appeared was the so-called "\'irginia Charter'" 

 of October 10, 1676, which promised security to 

 \'irginia landholders threatened by royal grants of 

 parts of \'irginia to court favorites. This charter gave 

 the Governor and Council of Virginia "full power and 

 authority to hear and determine all treasons, murders, 

 felonys and other offences committed and done 

 within the said government so as they proceed therein 

 as near as may he to the laws and statutes of this king- 

 dome of England." '* There has been much confusion 



'2 Wilcomb E. Washburn, "The Humble Petition of Sarah 

 Drummond," William and Mary Qjiarterly, ser. 3, July 1956, vol. 

 13, pp. 366 367 and footnote 45. See also the King's com- 

 mission to Governor Berkeley, July 31, 1660, in The Southern 

 Literary Messenger, 1845, vol. 11, pp. 1-5. Matters of war and 

 peace were discussed in terms of the Indians, but the King also 

 authorized the Governor "to direct and Governe, correct and 

 Punish our Subjects now inhabiting or being, or which shall 

 hereafter inhabit or be in Virginia, or in Isles, Ports, Havens, 

 Creeks, or Territories thereof, either in time of Peace or 

 Warr ...."' 



•3 In October 1676 .Attorney General Jones asked Francis 

 Moryson, one of the Virginia agents and later King's commis- 

 sioner, whether a commission from England to declare martial 

 law in Virginia should be issued to Berkeley. Moryson answered 

 that the Governor already had as much authority as the 

 attorney general could give him: "all places will naturally have 

 as much of that, as they need in time of warr: For martiall 

 Law is (as I take it) but a branch of the Law of Nature, by 

 whose impulse wee are commanded to defend ourselves, and 

 if opposed by multitudes, then to resort to multitudes to defend 

 us." (Colonial Office Papers, ser. 5, vol. 1371, pp. 6-12, 

 Public Record Office, London). 



" William Waller Hening, Ihe Statutes at Large ... .4 Collec- 

 tion of All the Laws of Virginia . . . , New York, 1823, vol. 2, 

 pp. 532-533. 



141 



