What Are The Causes Of Tensions In Colonial Society

Vishaal Gupta
Mr. Decarlo
AP US
July 23 2010
Creating Tensions in Colonial Society After the different European nations colonized the Americas, societies began to sprout in those colonies. They were very similar to those societies that had been going on for centuries in Europe. There were governments, workers, schools, and hospitals. Issues began to come about in these societies due to revolts and rebellions by the people. They were unhappy with the way they were treated and their life style that they were forced to live by their mother countries. This caused tensions within the societies. The greatest cause of these tensions was the Stono Rebellion, followed by the Bacon’s Rebellion and the witchcraft trials in Salem, and finally, the
Pueblo Revolt. The action that led to the greatest tension in colonial society was the Stono Rebellion. It took place on September 9th, 1739 in the state of South Carolina. At this time, slavery was still going on in the United States, especially in the south. All of the slaves at this time were black, shipped in from Africa as part of the triangular trade. The rebellion, which started by the Stono River, was started by a band of twenty slaves, led by a slave named Jemmy, who were seeking their liberty. They broke into a store and stole weapons and began their march onto the Edisto River. On their march, they called all bystanders and forced all other slaves to join them even if they did not want any part of the rebellion. At the river, they were met by the white colonists of South Carolina. They shot majority of the slaves, and sold the ones that survived to the West Indies or other states, or executed them. There are many different theories for why the slaves rebelled and why they did it at that certain time. One theory states that malaria disease was going around in the capital city of South Carolina, Charlestown. This may have caused confusion amongst the slaves and the other inhabitants of the state. It is also said that Spain offered freedom to any slaves who reached Spanish territory in the Americas which would encourage slaves to run away. Another possible reason for the timing of the rebellion was that a month earlier, the Security Act was passed in South Carolina. This made it mandatory for all of the white citizens of South Carolina to carry weapons with them when they go to church on Sunday. This was just for their security, but the rebel leaders realized that during church services was the best time to rebel because all of the armed white citizens were away from their land. The results of the Stono Rebellion were enormous. The state wanted to make sure that nothing like this would happen again so they gave the slaves a few more rights. Owners of the slaves would be punished for excessive punishments and causing the slaves to encounter excessive labor. The state also created schools for the slaves so that they could learn about the Christian ways. South Carolina also limited the number of slaves that came in because there were so many more slaves than white citizens. They also became more restrictive on the slaves through the Negro Act of 1740. This banned the slaves from meeting in groups, growing their own food, and learning to read. This rebellion gave slaves a couple more rights, but took away many more. This rebellion clearly caused much turmoil and tension between the slaves and the whites. It was the greatest slave rebellion in colonial history. They two sides could not get along and could not see each other as equals. This created constant fighting and tension between colonial citizens. Another event that caused tensions in colonial society was Bacon’s Rebellion in 1676.
This was the first act of serious opposition to authority in America, occurring in Jamestown, Virginia. The two sides in the battle were the governor of Virginia, Sir William Berkeley and Nathaniel Bacon. Bacon was a troublemaker and schemer and was sent to Virginia by his father to mature. He was the cousin of Berkeley so naturally Berkeley treated his cousin nicely and gave him land and a government position. Virginia was going through many issues during this time. The main issue was economically with the decline of tobacco prices, competition with other colonies, and increased prices of manufactured goods from England. The increased prices from England were due to the Anglo-Dutch war that was going on at the time. There was a competition between England and the Dutch for selling their goods and war broke out. The weather also made it difficult for the goods to arrive in America. These economics issues upset the people of Virginia and they needed somebody to blame. They put the blame on the local Indians. This created a great amount of tension between the two sides. The Indians even attacked a local Virginia store. The citizens reacted by attacking back, but accidently attacked the wrong tribe. This infuriated all of the Indians and large scales raids began. In an attempt to stop the fighting, Berkeley took away powder and ammunition from the Indians. He then called the Long Assembly and
they agreed to declare war on all of the Indians that they deemed as bad. Wars began which meant the people had to pay taxes to support the army which angered the people even more. Another mistake made by Berkeley was the regulation of trade by government between the citizens and the Indians. This made it so that independent traders had to go through the government to make trades. This upset the traders, which included Bacon who was a trader. He was also upset that he was not named a general of the army so he became the leader a group of volunteer fighters to fight the Indians. The first thing the group did was attack Pamunkey tribe and forced them out of their land. This caused Berkeley to send three hundred men to invade Bacon’s base but he and his men escaped into the forest. Berkeley declared Bacon and his men rebels but said that he would pardon them if they went home peacefully, but they refused. Instead they attacked the Occaneecheee tribe and stole their pelts. Berkeley wanted Bacon to give himself up so that he could be sent to England to be tried before King Charles II, but the House of Burgesses said that Bacon must beg for his forgiveness. At the same time, Bacon was voted onto the House of Burgesses by the local citizens who supported his Indian campaign. Due to his new position, he attended the June assembly of 1676 where he was mistakenly given credit the new laws that created at this meeting. When he arrived at the assembly, he was captured by Berkeley but was let go. Bacon soon returned with men and surrounded the government house. He threatened to shoot everybody there if he was not given his commission. Berkeley gave into his demands and Bacon began his role as rebellion leader. He made mistakes as leader, such as letting Berkeley leave Jamestown. He came back soon afterwards and attempted a coup, but Bacon’s support was still too powerful. On July 30th, Bacon issued his “Declaration of the People” in which he stated that Berkeley was evil. He also made people take oath where they had to swear their loyalty to him. Then, Berkeley and his followers were able to capture Bacon. This allowed Berkeley to once again take control. Bacon tried numerous times to take back control but was unsuccessful. He started to lose support and could not control his own men. He died on October 26th, 1676. Berkeley had complete control. He took all rebel territory and the rest of the rebels were hung. This rebel obviously caused a ton of tension between the people. The rebels fought against those that supported the government. The people also fought against the Indian tribes which also created much tension. This did not cause as much trouble as the Stono Rebellion did, but it showed the flaws of the government and the tension that surrounds colonial society. Along with Bacon’s Rebellion, the Salem Witch trials greatly reflected the tensions of colonial society.
It took place during 1692 in the New England settlement. The Puritans lived in New England. They were a very religious group of pioneers. They had their own churches, and had their own government that was run by the Church. Because of the time period in which they lived in, Puritans believed that supernatural forces were the cause of problems in their town. Soon, the first generation of the Puritans began to pass away and the second and third generations were coming to be. The Church was now having an issue with the number of members that it had. Only “Visible Saints” had the right to full membership they were those who stated their faith to the religion, conversion, and had been voted in by a congressional panel. As the new generations moved in, fewer and fewer people wanted to be part of this group. Another concern was that in a male dominated society, more women than men were becoming part of the Church group, upsetting the Church. In order to fix the problem, some of the panel members met in 1662 and established the Half-Way Covenant. This stated that even children of those who were partial members could become full members with just evidence of conversion. This was a comprise and not every Church accepted it. This started a feud between the fundamentalists who wanted a pure Church, and the liberals who wanted to include more people. In 1689, Salem elected Samuel
Parris their pastor. He brought with him his daughter, Betty Paris. In 1692, Betty and some of her friends became sick. The doctors could not find anything wrong with them physically so they stated that the cause of the problem were witches. This began the witch hunt. The first person that was accused of witchcraft was a slave by the name Tituba. Two other witches were convicted at the time. Tituba claimed that she was indeed a witch and that there were more in the village. Soon more and more women were convinced of witchcraft. There were those who felt that these convictions were unfair. One such person was Cotton Mather. He stated that convictions had to be looked into carefully because innocent people could be convicted. The ones who confessed said that the Devil made them do all of the things that they did. The stories told by the accused were so ridiculous that today, it is believed that they may have been forced to say those things. Many people died and they were all innocent. Things began to get out of hand and the final straw was when Phips’s wife was accused. He fired his court and began a new one. One of the things Phips did was deny the use of spectral evidence. An advocate for this was Increase Mather who used jeremiads, sermons, to tell people to be careful of their accusations. He wanted to be sure that people were not accusing innocent people. Phips let all of the accused go and stopped the killing. Many people began to apologize and Salem memorialized all of those who died because of the events. The trials are some of the worst things to happen to America. They were caused by people wanting a strong church, for men wanting to dominate women, and all because people were did not know much about medicine at the time. This would never happen today because are much more advanced. These trials caused a great deal amount of tension between the people of Salem and between the Church and the people. They were the ones convicted people so people looked at them for fault. The final event of tension in colonial America was the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. The issue was between the newly settled Spaniards and the local Indian tribe known as the Pueblo’s. The issues began in the Spaniards began to move into the area near the Pueblo’s in New Mexico in 1598. They were able to live together for some time, trading goods and knowledge. That changed, however, when the Spaniards forced the Pueblos to give them goods as taxes and forced them to do their manual labor. It started to turn into the manor system that had dominated Europe. The Spanish government was starting to control the Pueblos. The tensions truly began in 1599 with the Battle of Acoma where in the town of Acoma; the Pueblos attacked a group of Spaniards who were demanding goods from them. The Spanish government was very upset and cut punished the Pueblos in Acoma and burned down the city. Spanish started to convert the Pueblos to Catholicism creating even more tension. Also, the regional priest at the time started to destroy some of the Pueblo’s cultural things such as their kivas, or masks, and ceremonial areas. Then in 1675, Governor Juan de Trevino had forty seven men of medicine arrested. Four of them were hung while the others were whipped. One of those whipped was Popé. When he returned home, he worked on getting rid of the Spanish. He began to hold secret which included local Indian tribes. Even though the revolution represented evil amongst two groups of people, it also represented multiple groups joining together to fight a common enemy. However, not everybody joined because they wanted to according to a Tewa Indian. He stated that Popé forced some people to join. Popé wanted everybody to revolt and do the opposite of what they were told. Not everybody agreed and some even told the new Governor, Antonio de Otermin that a revolt was about to occur. In August of 1680, a priest by the name of Juan Pio tried to sneak to the nearby village to do Mass but was killed along with along with four hundred other Spaniards by the Pueblos. This was the beginning of the Revolt. A few days later, the Indian army attacked the Spanish capital at Santé Fe. The Spanish were ready and had the advantage due their weapons. But that soon ended when support arrived for the Indians. The Spaniards began losing so Otermin made the decision to run away. The Spaniards fled and the Indians won the battle, but that was the only thing they were going to win. Over the next twelve years, Pueblo cities were burned and destroyed thanks to Otermin and his successor, Jironza Petriz. Then, in 1692, the new governor, Diego de Vargas, was successful in taking back New Mexico. But the revolt took such a big toll on the Spaniards that the Pueblos were still able to maintain a little of their culture. They were no longer repressed and the two groups lived together and that status remains the same today. This revolution was one of the biggest Indian revolts in American. It created a great deal of tension between the local Indians and the European settlers that remained for centuries. Colonial America was a very important time in American. It was the time of revolts and rebellions. Many battles were fought and many lives were lost. Tensions were created amongst many different groups of people. Colonial society was very different than society today and that can be seen through the many different battles that were fought and the different tensions that arose due to these fights.

Works Cited
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