Bacon's Rebellion

Neather could his Wife halfe like the Markitt, when she saw
the Chapmen carey her Daughters Husband away Prissoner,
and her owne fine Cloathes goeing into Captivity, to be sould
by Match and pin,¹ and after worne by those who (before
these times) was not worth a point,² Yet it is thought, that
the ould Gent: Woman, was not so much concern’d that her
Son in Law was made a prissoner, as her Daughter was vext,
to see they had not left one Man upon the Plantation, to com-
fort neather herself nor Mother.

      This Block (and no less was the Commander of the fore
mention’d sleepers) being removed out of the way, the Gloster
Men began to stir abrode: Not provoked thereto out of any
hopes of geting, but through a feare of loseing. They did
plainely perceve that if they them selves did not goe to worke,
sombody ells would, while they (for there neglegence) might
be compeld to pay them there wages; and what that might
com to they could not tell, since it was probable, in such Ser-
vises, the Laberours would be there owne Carvers; and it
is commonly knowne, that Soulders makes no Conscience to
take more then there due.

      The worke that was now to be don, in these parts (and
further I cannot go for want of a guide) was cut out into sev-
erall parcells,³ according as the Baconians had devided the

     ¹I. e., by a form of auction in which a pin was stuck through a piece of
slow-match cord, which was then lighted, and bidding could continue till the
flre reached the pin, and the pin dropped.

     ²A point was a small appliance for fastening clothing; equivalent to, not
worth a pin.

    ³The insurgents were divided into five chief groups. One under Ingram
was at West Point, at the junction of the Pamunkey and Mattapony Rivers.
The second was at Green Spring, Berkeley’s old residence, under Captain Drew.
The third was at the house of Nathaniel Bacon, sr., on King’s Creek, York County,
under Major Whaly. The fourth, with Drummond and Lawrence, remained at
the brick house in New Kent County, opposite West Point, until Christmas time,
when all who were there moved up the river to the house of Colonel Henry Gooch,
where Whaly joined them. A fifth centre of resistance was in Nansemond County,
behind Warraseoyack Bay, under Captain Catlin and Colonel Groves (Calendar
of State Papers, Colonial, 1674-1676, p. 453). These bodies of men lived chiefly
from hand to mouth, foraging and plundering where they could. Such a rough
commissariat system helps to explain the desolation of the country on the arri-
val of the commissioners. Nathaniel Bacon, sr., claimed that he had lost £1000
sterling in stock and goods by Whaly’s occupation of his house.