When the news of these atrocities reached Sir William Berkeley, hasty preparations were made for an expedition against the invaders. Sir Henry Chicheley was put at the head of forces of horse and foot, with orders to give immediate pursuit to the savages. But just as all was in readiness and the command to march hourly expected, the Governor decided that the expedition should be abandoned. Chicheley's commission was annulled, his forces disbanded and the soldiers sent to their homes.[492]
What induced Berkeley to take this strange step none could tell. The murders of the savages were continuing. The frontier was defenseless. Messages were coming from the exposed plantations imploring aid. Why should he desert the people and expose them to the fury of the Indians? It is possible that he detected symptoms of mutiny among the troops and thought it better to abandon the expedition than to run the risk of a rebellion. He was well aware of the discontent of the people, and his letters to England show that he dreaded an insurrection.[493] The unhappy planters ascribed the Governor's strange conduct to avarice. He and his friends had a monopoly of the Indian trade, and it was hinted that he preferred to allow the atrocities to continue rather than destroy his source of revenue. He was determined, was the cry, "that no bullits would pierce beaver skins".[494] More probable seems the explanation that Berkeley hoped to prevent further depredations by the help of the Pamunkeys and other friendly tribes, and feared that an invasion of the Indian lands might defeat this purpose.[495]
But an Assembly was summoned in March and instructed by the Governor to take immediate measures to secure the frontier.[496] Acting, no doubt, under Berkeley's influence, the Assembly resolved not to carry the conflict into the enemy's territory, but to wage a defensive war. Forts were to be erected upon the upper waters of the great rivers, and manned with regular troops as a protection to the outer plantations. To defray the cost, new and heavy taxes were put upon the people.[497]
This last act of the Long Assembly caused bitter dissatisfaction. The border counties had hoped that provision would be made for an expedition against the Indians. No headway could be made unless the whites took the offensive and hunted down the savages in their own villages. The erection of forts was useless.[498] The Indians would experience no difficulty in avoiding them in their murderous raids. They could approach the remote plantations, or even those far within the frontiers, without fear of detection by the soldiers, for the numerous swamps and dense woods afforded them ample covert. It was not intended that the forts should be used as bases for expeditions into the enemy's country; nor could the soldiers leave them to pursue and punish the plundering savages. What then, it was asked, could be the value of fortresses, if they were to defend only the ground upon which they stood?[499]
The event proved the people right. The forts, when built, were but slight obstacles to the invasions of the Indians. The murders became more frequent than before. The impotency of the defenses of the colony seems to have inspired them to more terrible and vigorous attacks. The cry against the forts became more bitter. "It was a design," the people thought, "of the grandees to engross all their tobacco into their own hands".[500] As the cries of their women and children grew more piteous and distressing, the men of the frontier spoke openly of disobedience. Rather than pay the taxes for the accursed forts they would plant no more tobacco. If the Governor would not send an expedition against the Indians, they themselves would march out to avenge their wrongs. The forts must be dismantled, the garrisons dismissed.[501]
From all parts of the colony came the insistent demand that the Assembly, which had so long been but a mockery of representative government, should be dissolved and the people given a free election.[502] But Berkeley was not the man to yield readily to this clamor. Never, in all the long years that he had ruled over Virginia, had he allowed the rabble to dictate his policies. He would not do so now. When petitions came from the frontiersmen, asking leave to go out against the Indians, he returned a brusk and angry refusal.[503] A delegation from Charles City county met with a typical reception from the irritable old man. As they stood humbly before him, presenting their request for a commission, they spoke of themselves as the Governor's subjects. Upon this Berkeley blurted out that they were all "fools and loggerheads". They were subjects of the King, and so was he. He would grant them no commission, and bade them be gone, and a pox take them.[504] Later he issued a proclamation forbidding under heavy penalties all such petitions.[505]
Unfortunately, at this juncture came news that large bodies of Indians were descending upon the upper waters of the James, and that another bloody assault might soon be expected.[506] In terror and anger the people of Charles City county seized their arms, determined to repel this threatened storm, with or without the Governor's permission. Parties went about from place to place beating up volunteers with the drum. The magistrates were either in sympathy with the movement, or were unable to prevent it.[507] Soon a considerable body of rough, determined men were assembled, awaiting only a leader to march out against the enemy.
This leader they found in one of the most interesting and picturesque characters in Virginia history. Nathaniel Bacon is depicted as twenty-nine years of age, black-haired, of medium height and slender, melancholy, pensive, and taciturn. In conversation he was logical and convincing; in oratory magnetic and masterful.[508] His successful expeditions against the Indians and the swift blows he directed against the loyal forces mark him as a military commander of no mean ability.[509]
Bacon was almost a stranger in Virginia, for he had left England less than two years before.[510] He was fortunate, however, in having a cousin, also named Nathaniel Bacon, high in the favor of Sir William Berkeley.[511] It was doubtless through the influence of this relative that the young man attained a position of great influence, and was appointed to the Council itself.[512] But submission to the will of the imperious Governor was the price paid by all that wished to remain long in favor in Virginia. Bacon did not approve of Berkeley's arbitrary government; he disliked the long continuation of the Assembly, the unjust discriminations, the unusual taxes, the incapacity of officials; and it was not in his fiery temper to conceal his opinions. Soon, it would seem, the frowns of the Governor began to fall upon him, and he grew weary of coming to Council.[513]
Bacon had made his home in Henrico, at that time one of the extreme frontier counties. His marked ability, his liberal education, his place in the Council soon gave him a position of great influence among his rough but hardy neighbors. None could be better suited to assume command over the desperate volunteers that had gathered in Charles City county.