There were two things which the colonial Virginians dreaded—despotism and the tomahawk. And it is significant that both were factors in the two uprisings of the seventeenth century. In Bacon's Rebellion the people demanded, not only protection from the savages, but an end to Berkeley's misgovernment. If the Council was right in their interpretation of the disorders of 1688, they, like the ousting of Andros in New England, were a part of the Glorious Revolution. The Council afterwards took great credit for suppressing the disorders, but one can only surmise whether the people would have remained quiet had not James been overthrown. We must not permit the Indian terror to blind us to the fact that the rebellions of 1676 and 1688 were both in defense of liberty.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] CO389.6, pp. 113, 137.
[2] H. W. Hening, Statutes at large 2: 423, 424.
[3] CO389.6, p. 116.
[4] CO1-40, p. 23.
[5] CO1-40, p. 23.
[6] CO5-1371, pp. 27, 33.
[7] CO5-1371, pp. 55, 60.
[8] Ibid., p. 152.