Bacon’s Rebellion
2026-09-20 · 10 min · 11 entities
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Feed author/publisher: Heather Cox Richardson
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Episode description as stored
September 19, 2026
350 years ago, on September 19, 1676, Nathaniel Bacon and his followers burned Jamestown - the capital of the Virginia Colony, Virginia lawmakers would respond by making sure poor men would not again make common cause by passing laws to divide them along racial lines, A year before Bacon's Rebellion, raids by both the Virginia militia and the Susquehannocks inflamed a power struggle in the colony, Since the colony’s beginning, there had been a clear line between men with land and power and those who worked for them, Enslaved people and indentured white workers worked and socialized together, and as their community grew, they migrated west, They resented the eastern government that seemed to ignore their interests, Nathaniel Bacon created a powerful coalition that marched on Jamestown, protesting taxes and corruption, They held Jamestown for several months before they were forced to retreat, When they tried to recapture the town they ended up burning it, The rebellion fell apart after Bacon's death a month later, and the crisis convinced the wealthy elite of Virginia to drive wedges between Black slaves and white servants to avoid anything like it from happening, They gave legal rights and protections to white servants and made it costly for white and Black Virginians to socialize, Black Americans were bound more tightly into slavery while white Virginians were convinced that they were independent.
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