Bacon’s Rebellion 3: Go Ahead, Shoot!

Nathaniel Bacon and his army of volunteers have returned from beating up on the friendly Occaneechees (Occaneechis) on the Roanoke River in southern Virginia. It is election day, and Henrico County will elect Bacon and his sidekick, James Crews, to the Virginia Assembly, which has been called into session on June 5, 1676. This episode describes the dramatic session of that Assembly, which began with Bacon’s arrest and ended with he and his army holding the Assembly at gunpoint. Sir William Berkeley, governor of Virginia, demonstrates his own flair for the dramatic along the way, but by the end of this episode has taken refuge with other loyalists on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.

Oh, and there is a “manifesto.” Never a good sign.

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Selected references for this episode (Commission earned for Amazon purchases through the episode notes on our website)

James D. Rice, Tales from a Revolution: Bacon’s Rebellion and the Transformation of Early America

Wilcomb E. Washburn, The Governor and the Rebel: A History of Bacon’s Rebellion in Virginia

Matthew Kruer, Time of Anarchy: Indigenous Power and the Crisis of Colonialism in Early America

Nathaniel Bacon, “Declaration of the People,” July 30, 1676

Nathaniel Bacon, “Bacon’s Manifesto,” July 1676