Virginia Under Charles I And Cromwell, 1625-1660 Part 4

Thus ended the brief period in which Virginia's government was turned upside down and permanent alteration caused in her relations with England. Although the King once more became the symbol of the unity of the colony and the mother country, the royal prerogative would never again be blindly accepted by the people of either place. Larger developments in the economic, social, and intellectual spheres were bringing to an end the era of all-powerful Kings. Power had descended to the lower ranks of society, and that power was beginning to be brought into play.

This larger s.h.i.+ft of power has been chronicled in the story of Virginia from 1625 to 1660. It is the story of a small community of Englishmen transplanted to American sh.o.r.es, living for a time subject to traditional English restraints, then, in a period of rapid expansion, losing their cohesiveness and their values under the impact of the American experience and their own natures. Their political expression soon pa.s.sed from a pa.s.sive to an active mode. The law became something they made, not something someone else applied to them. Land was similarly not something bestowed on them by generous parents, but something one took from Nature, or Nature's surrogate, the Indian. Labor was no longer a privilege allowed the individual by the community, but a precious gift contributed by the individual to the community. In sum, the ordinary people who had removed themselves to the New World soon discovered that they were no longer humble servants of great lords, but were themselves lords of the American earth. If they had the power why not exercise it? The process by which the rulers of the people were forced to become the "servants" of their "subjects" thereupon began. The culmination of this rearrangement of the political atoms of society was the War for Independence of 1776. Whether the swing from authority to liberty was for good or for evil is not for the historian to say.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Another booklet in this series contains a selected bibliography of works on seventeenth-century Virginia. The interested student should consult that booklet for a more detailed listing of works used in preparing this account of Virginia in the period 1625-1660.

The best secondary account of Virginia in the period covered by this booklet is Wesley Frank Craven, _The Southern Colonies in the Seventeenth Century, 1607-1689_ (Baton Rouge, 1949). Craven skilfully combines research in Virginia local history with a broad understanding of developments in England and in other colonies. He points out the social and political significance of many hitherto ignored aspects of Virginia history. Other important works include Charles McLean Andrews, _The Colonial Period of American History_, I (New Haven, 1934), Thomas Jefferson Wertenbaker, _Virginia under the Stuarts_ (Princeton, 1914), Herbert L. Osgood, _The American Colonies in the Seventeenth Century_, 3 vols. (New York, 1904-1907), and Edward D. Neill, _Virginia Carolorum: The Colony under the Rule of Charles the First and Second, A.D.

1625-A.D. 1685_ (Albany, 1886).

Any study of colonial Virginia must begin with a perusal of Philip Alexander Bruce, _Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century_, 2 vols. (New York, 1895), and his _Inst.i.tutional History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century_, 2 vols. (New York, 1910). Bruce's work is the indispensable platform upon which political and social accounts of the period must rest. Morgan Poitiaux Robinson, _Virginia Counties: Those Resulting from Virginia Legislation_ [Virginia State Library, Bulletin, IX, Nos. 1-3] (Richmond, 1916), is a carefully doc.u.mented study of the growth of Virginia as evidenced by the formation of its counties. Maps showing the area of settlement at frequent intervals give a graphic account of the nature and extent of Virginia's expansion.

There are a number of local histories chronicling the growth of particular regions in Virginia. An outstanding local history is Fairfax Harrison, _Landmarks of Old Prince William_ (Richmond, 1924), which a.n.a.lyzes the growth of settlement in the Potomac River valley. Histories of the Eastern Sh.o.r.e are numerous: Susie M. Ames, _Studies of the Virginia Eastern Sh.o.r.e in the Seventeenth Century_ (Richmond, 1940), Jennings Cropper Wise, _Ye Kingdome of Accawmacke, or the Eastern Sh.o.r.e of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century_ (Richmond, 1911), and Ralph T.

Whitelaw, _Virginia's Eastern Sh.o.r.e_, 2 vols. (Richmond, 1951).

A reading of but a few works in Virginia history will be enough to show that the interpretations and conclusions of the authors must be accepted with extreme caution. There are two conflicting interpretations for nearly every important event in Virginia's history. History may be defined as the attempt to state what happened in the past on the basis of inadequate evidence existing in the present. The reader should keep always in mind that historical writing is largely a series of guesses more or less intelligently elaborated.

Much of the original ma.n.u.script material upon which an account of the period must be based has been published in the following sources: William Waller Hening, _The Statutes at Large; being a Collection of all the Laws of Virginia_, Vol. I (Richmond, 1809), H. R. McIlwaine, _Minutes of the Council and General Court of Colonial Virginia, 1622-1632, 1670-1676_ (Richmond, 1924), H. R. McIlwaine, _Journals of the House of Burgesses of Virginia, 1619-1658/59_ (Richmond, 1914), Nell Marion Nugent, _Cavaliers and Pioneers: Abstracts of Virginia Land Patents and Grants, 1623-1666_ (Richmond, 1934), _Virginia Magazine of History and Biography_ (Richmond, 1893 to present), _William and Mary Quarterly_ (Williamsburg, 1892 to present), _The Southern Literary Messenger_, January 1845 (doc.u.ments on the recall of Governor Berkeley by the Burgesses and Council of Virginia in 1660), and W. Noel Sainsbury, _Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series, 1574-1660, Preserved in the State Paper Department of Her Majesty's Public Record Office_ (London, 1860). The essential guide to most of this material is Earl G. Swern, _Virginia Historical Index_, 2 vols. (Roanoke, 1934).

The most important unpublished ma.n.u.script materials of the period are the county records, some of which are complete from the earliest period of settlement. Originals or transcripts of the county records are available in the Virginia State Library, Richmond. Another important source of unpublished ma.n.u.script material for the period is the "Virginia, Book No. 43" ma.n.u.script in the Library of Congress, Was.h.i.+ngton, D. C., which contains numerous commissions and proclamations for the period 1626-1634. Among the Virginia papers of the Barons of Sackville, Knole Park, are a few doc.u.ments relating to the period which have not been printed either in the doc.u.mentary articles in the _American Historical Review_, XXVII (1922), Nos. 3-4, or elsewhere. They are now available on microfilm in the Library of Congress, having been photographed by the British Ma.n.u.scripts Project of the American Council of Learned Societies.

Important unpublished dissertations include James Kimbrough Owen, "The Virginia Vestry: A Study in the Decline of a Ruling Cla.s.s" (Ph. D.

dissertation, Princeton University, 1947), and Edna Jensen, "Sir John Harvey: Governor of Virginia" (M. A. thesis, University of Virginia, 1950).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Virginia Farrer Map of Virginia, 1651, showing common geographical misconceptions of the period.]