Bacons Rebellion

Bacons Rebellion was the first stirring of the revolutionary sentiment in America. It began in Jamestown Virginia in 1676. It was a short rebellion between two stubborn men wanting all the power in the world, or just Jamestown. Due to economics, environmental, and social struggles the rebellion got further out of hand than it should have and did not really solve much, other than a few issues. Bacons rebellion was not truly a fight against tyranny but a dispute between two stubborn selfish leaders.
Small farmers and frontiersmen were beginning to get upset with Sir William Berkley. He was putting restrictions on the right to vote, raising taxes on tobacco, a pervasive sense of subordination to an aristocratic minority “for haveing wronged his Majesties prerogative and interest” (Bacon) and the lack of protection from Native American attacks. The biggest problem of them all was the conflicts dealing with Native Americans tribes. Berkley had worked to establish peace with the tribes and successfully negotiated a settlement reserving the lands east of the Blue Ridge Mountains for the white settlers. During the 1640’s and 1650’s the growing population began to spill over in the Indian lands west of the mountains which was a direct violation of the treaty, this led to deadly clashes between the races. Many Virginians, including many unemployed former indentured servants, thought the governor stood on the wrong side of the issue. Economic problems, “such as declining tobacco prices, growing commercial competition from Maryland and the Carolinas, an increasingly restricted English market, and the rising prices from English manufactured goods” (Loux) caused problems for the Virginians causing the tensions in Jamestown to escalate. Along with all the economic problems they were facing, weather was also an obstacle. Problems such as hailstorms, floods, dry spells, and hurricanes rocked the colony all in the course of a year and had a damaging effect on the colonist by