the Expanded English Civil War-Protectorate, Maryland, the Interregnum

A central theme in our history is English affairs, the Center, did play a consistent and impactful role in the development of its colonial North American colonies. We ought therefore discuss that early on in this section so we can better understand how it impacted this period, Berkeley’s post-1645 first administration–and how it culminated into his forced retirement in 1651-2. Berkeley was in England from June 1644 until his return in early June 1645. Not only there on Virginia business he met with the King and served him in the West District in the field. By 1646, the “First English Civil War” (1642-1646) was coming to an end.

Charles, by the end of April, 1646, had been captured after having been conclusively defeated in the field of battle, and was held by the Parliamentarians who effectively controlled England and the government. In short, William Berkeley in Virginia was very much on his own; indeed his family castle, a royalist stronghold, had been taken by Cromwell’s New Model Army which made its appearance during the last year of this First Civil War. From this point on, until 1648, Parliament was “negotiating with the King on the reconstruction of a monarchy and its relations to parliament and the Church of England.

A Second Civil War will commenced in 1648, and it would end with the execution of Charles in (January 30) 1649. A Third Civil War (Anglo-Scottish War) will commence in 1650 and end in 1652. After the execution of his father, his twenty year old son, Charles II, assumed the title, and the position of King of Scotland. English government contested his claim to the throne and Cromwell defeated him in battle (Worcester) in September 1651, whereupon Charles II took refuge in France where he remained until the Restoration.

Through all of this William Berkeley maintained his loyalty to the Crown, to both Charles’. Left alone until 1651, Cromwell in that year determined to reassert the authority of Parliament and his governance over the North American colonies and elsewhere. Thus, when its authority had sufficiently stabilized in 1651, the Center once again exercised and reclaimed its role as the sovereign of those colonies. Given the vacuum that obviously characterized this period, Berkeley’s “going native” governance strategy was, either or both, compelled or was a logical public, as well as private, style of rule for him in Virginia. In that the preponderance of the Virginia planter elite remained, like him, loyal to the king (s) and to the Anglican Church, Berkeley was aligned with his fellow residents-citizens.

Who are those men behind the Curtin: Virginia’s Partnership of Periphery and Center,

No wonder Claiborne, commander-in-chief of Virginia’s military during Berkeley’s 1644-1645 absence, was ineffectual in his conduct of the Third Powhatan War. The next question includes what does Berkeley do when he returns in June 1645? But there are other questions as well. Opportunity-vulnerableness is one thing, but the civil war is the take-off period for the New Men merchants, and is Maryland only one of their ever-wilder and ever-widening series of merchant adventurer activities. Another dynamic is the extent to which a Virginia political elite culture is firming up, taking shape, and giving substance to Virginia’s policy-making political structures. Until Cromwell enters the picture this civil war period is more a free-for-all than an exercise of autonomy.

Let’s start out with Berkeley. There is some ambiguity as to who had called back Claiborne and his militia in June 1645. Kukla claims it was the Council of State on the day before Berkeley arrived from England.

In a tactic reminiscent of his councilor-commander practices in the 1620’s, Claiborne diverted the militia from its intended target [Opechancanough] to pursue his lifelong quest for the repossession of Kent Island. As Claiborne recaptured his island, Richard Ingle overran St Mary’s City [the Maryland capital] and overthrew Lord Baltimore’s authority in Maryland in the name of Parliament and Protestantism. Recognizing the nature of Claiborne’s personal vendetta, Virginia’s Council of State resolved on June 6, 1645 ‘concerning the government on the Isle of Kent’ that Claiborne was ‘not to intermiddle with the government’. The next day marked the ‘sudden arrival of Sir William Berkeley, who vigorously carried the war to the Indians, and who ‘personally led a party of Horse'” [99] Jon Kukla, Order and Chaos p. 291.

In either case Berkeley did repudiate Claiborne’s New Kent invasion either by direct action or by enforcement of the Council of State’s dictum., But he did not stand in the way of Ingle, nor Bennett, or Stone. Nor did he disrupt the plans of the Thompson New Men ensconced in the Earl of Warwick’s Commission of Foreign Plantations. He seems not to have exerted influence over the members of the Council of State to undo their invasion-takeover of Maryland? Nor did he enlist the Assembly. Did he take action against Claiborne, or Bennett in regards to Maryland? Not that the records indicate. Can one actually “privateer” a colony; if so, did Berkeley learn to live with it?

Based on his non-actions, Berkeley did not seek involvement in Maryland’s affairs. Whether this was quiet calculation that Maryland’s disruption could benefit Virginia, or resignation that the New Men and Puritans had engineered a takeover carrying Calbert’s colony into the Parliamentary orbit and he lacked capacity to reverse that dynamic I do not know. Billings is silent on this.

Having said all that, Berkeley did hit out against Bennett, Virginia’s leading Puritan in his religious campaign to be described below. As to Claiborne, it seems clear to me that he wasted no time with him; Claiborne was his Virginian anti-Christ and Berkeley’s implacable and consistent opposition to him makes Claiborne’s 1650-2 actions and decisions even more complex. What is also evident to me is his attempt to “peel off” Samuel Mathews and pivot him in directions with which he agreed and saw value, either personal or for Virginia.

But Berkeley’s non-action may also have been a carrot to the Clique, including Mathews who for decades had led fur-trading commerce with tribes in northern Virginia and what was then Maryland. Like his multi-faceted Indian treaty of 1646, Berkeley’s Maryland policy let Claiborne set himself apart from Virginian priorities and current needs, and those that disliked the establishment of the Maryland colony may have seen the Powhatan War and the opening up of the hinterland to Indian trade as attractive, if not necessary. Letting Claiborne define himself as London-oriented, and on a self-absorbed mission. Maybe I am overthinking the impact of Maryland on Virginian attitudes and policy needs, but Mathews, arriving late, took action against the Powhatan and had nothing in particular to do with Claiborne-Thomason’s venture.

By stressing the association of the Claiborne councillors with London’s ruthless regicides and meddlesome mercantilists, Berkeley deprived his adversaries of critical support from the many Virginians who never felt personally oppressed by the Stuart kings, the Anglican Church, Dutch traders, or [in Maryland] Calvert ‘tyranny’. Becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy Berkeley’s alienation of [the Claiborne Clique] from local loyalties forced [the Clique] into an ever greater dependence upon interest-group allies in London [and their]supporters who were increasingly tainted with popular perceptions of political authoritarianism and personal avarice as the 1650’s evolved. [In reaction to this] Realizing that the homeland [Virginia, Maryland] allies they enlisted to defeat the Calverts had cost them the approval of their original constituency, the Claiborne councillors eschewed the fanatical coercion that bloodied battlefields in England and Maryland, and reasserted Virginia’s traditional resentment of outside political interference. [99] Fausz. “Merging and Emerging Worlds, p. 86

Berkeley himself was friendly toward these initiatives throughout the post-1645 period, even to the extent of financial participation, and he was, of course, more than sympathetic to Abraham Wood’s (a key Mathew’s ally and protégé)  fort and trading post awarded to him in the 1646 Indian treaty. In any event Berkeley through the period lasting into 1652 substantially stayed out of the Maryland affair.

the Curious Mathews Episode: That Berkeley was his own man we do not contest, but is there something going on from at least 1643-46 that suggest London may have had plans for Samuel Mathews, and with asserting control over William Berkeley. If London permitted Thomason and Claiborne to engineer their Maryland adventure, why put up with a nettlesome royal governor next door in Virginia? Kukla and Billings (and I) agree there was a serous attempt between 1642-3 and 1646 to bring Berkeley to bay.

Let’s start with the Earl of Warwick. Certainly the wild man of English privateering, war with the Spanish, and colonization of North and South America. The founder and inspirer of Providence Colony had, as mentioned previously, drifted, and then rushed to puritan and parliamentary groups during the pre-civil war and as the civil war evolved. Early on (1641) he was named by Parliament to head the Commission on Foreign Plantations, replacing the Laud Commission,. Laud in 1641 had been impeached, sent to the Tower, convicted and would-be executed. Replacing him was. of all characters, the son of now-dead Thomas Smythe despised enemy, the Rich family titled in 1641 as the Second Earl of Warwick. In today’s parlance he was made “czar” of parliamentary colonial affairs–and head of the Admiralty to boot..

Only one “holdover from the Laud Commission remained on Warwick’s Commission, and Warwick himself “had possession of the governmental rubber stamp of approval of his long-standing personal anti-Spanish foreign policy”. His command of the Navy empowered is colonial policy. When he decided to crack down on Dutch Virginian trade, he could and did seize a lot of Dutch ships enroute to one colony or another. As he watched Claiborne’s Maryland scheme ripen in 1642 and 1643, did he see opportunities in Virginia as well? Well, maybe? Maybe Not. In his new position did Warwick sense the limits of his ambition, and the wildness of Claiborne’s. Roper stresses Warwick’s instincts were less wild and sensitive to the limits of his power.

But despite this undisputed mass of authority and power ” the ascendancy of Warwick and his allies to their government brought little practical change to English overseas trade and colonization in terms of what we might call imperial oversight or even in terms of the relationship between the colonies and the metropolis. The patterns of commerce, territorial expansion and imperial administration that had been established prior to 1641 remained essential in place; indeed they intensified [99] L. H. Roper, Advancing Empire: English Interests and Overseas Expansion, 1613-1688(Cambridge University Press, 2017) pp. 128-9.

Warwick’s new Commission was less hell-bent for adventure but more sensitive to the American colonial perspective. Warwick’s Commission was infused with good number of London officials who had been closely associated, indeed some were lobbyists, of the American colonies, especially Massachusetts-New England Puritans and Pilgrims. As Roper asserts “after 1642 the commercial and political connections between colony and the metropolis became increasingly integrated. [99]L. H. Roper, Advancing Empire: English Interests and Overseas Expansion, 1613-1688(Cambridge University Press, 2017) p. 130

In his new position he made great use of his rolodex of former investors, family, and business partners, and no one benefited more than Maurice Thomson.  Warwick, acting indirectly by 1644, let Thomason and his agents carry out their coup of Calvert’s colony, thrusting out its government and installing their own–but at no point did he strip Calvert of his charter, which without doubt was within his authority. This may be the first sign that as far as the colonies went, Warwick had his limits. In this we find considerable support.

Virginia also was impacted by the kind mercies of Thomason and his associates, but while Thomason et al devoured Maryland by 1648, Virginia-relevant Commission policy was almost the opposite. Billings observes “the civil war prevented Warwick’s commission from intruding upon Virginia, though it did not deter the earl from considering what might be done to establish Parliament’s writ there. His first inclination was to let Virginians rule themselves, and he was not necessarily adverse to leaving Berkeley in place, just so long as everyone accepted the commission’s oversight“.

Billings further reports he made these intentions public which was sent out early in 1644. By that point Berkeley had put through his 1643 blitzkrieg Assembly restructure and combined with his 1642 anti Virginia Company leadership position was well-positioned within Virginia’s elite; in no way was Berkeley, despite his experience, anywhere near as vulnerable as the Calvert brothers. [99] Warren G Billings, Sir William Berkeley, p. 106. But maybe a gentle stirring of the Virginia waters might yield some positive results could, and apparently did, wander into Warwick’s mind.

First reported by Kukla who asserts that Warwick through Mathews had weaved the Claiborne Clique’s way way through Berkeley’s masterful stoke of restructuring Virginia provincial government in his 1643 bicameral remaking of the Virginia Assembly. “Not wanting to be outmaneuvered by a new governor, the merchant-councilors accepted the newly-created House of Burgesses as a legitimate political arena. They induced Thomas Stegg, the Virginia factor of Maurice Thomson to resign from the Council of State, and by whatever means win the election to the new lower house, and secure the speakers’ chair for their faction [Jon Kukla, Order and Chaos p. 292].

At that time Warwick sent private letters to Samuel Mathews, who for some reason was in England [99] Billings, Sir William Berkeley, p. 106 and footnote 61. Mathews, after having returned to the Virginia Council of State in 1638, had stepped down in 1644; he would not return to the Council during affairs discussed in this module; his genealogists refer to this time as “as his quiet period”, adding he was more consumed with his private profit-making affairs, and withdrawing from the public.

In any event it would explain why Mathews was absent when Claiborne diverted Virginia militia and invaded New Kent in the autumn of that year, and also suggest why Mathews, the plantation conquistador did not become active in the Third Powhatan until after Berkley’s return in 1645. Mathews seems to have played no know role in the Ingles invasion nor in the negotiations that followed. I might also suggest, Mathew’s wife coming from an aristocratic family that had serves Charles (Hinton), offered him some threads https://www.genealogy.com/ftm/p/a/l/Jerry-M-Palmer/GENE9-0001.html

It was during that time Warwick wrote privately to Mathews, making known to him his desire to conduct a moderate program for Virginia and seeking his assistance in that endeavor. He went so far as saying that if Mathews wanted to assume the direction of Virginia government, through the governor’s office, he would have Warwick’s support. In any event in those private letters [99] See Billings, Sir William Berkeley, footnote 61, p. 106 Warwick repeated privately, his message and position publicly expressed, but also hinted that, as Billings puts it, he was ok “if Mathews maneuvered Berkeley from office, and was elected instead, such a change would not be unwelcome“.

Kukla picks up on this and asserts that by 1645, that position had sharpened, and that “Mathews had written authorization from the Earl of Warwick … to bring Virginia. if Mathews chose into Parliament’s fold”. Kukla cites different correspondence than Billings (see footnote 53, p. 292), and adds the Third Powhatan war had intervened–and the affair in Maryland had commenced. I might add Parliament’s position in the war was improving as well, and Berkeley’s stay in England, was still fresh. [99] Jon Kukla, Order and Chaos in Early America, p. 292. Both Kukla and Billings concur, however, that Mathews did not follow through on these letters, and apparently stayed in England–leaving Berkeley untouched in Virginia.

Mathews, closely associated with New Men Merchants in Harvey’s ouster, and in playing his role in the 1639 Virginia “deal was by 1639 well-known and respected within the Company and Parliamentary camp. His very close personal relationship with Claiborne, and was a key player in the Magazine and fur-trading, not to ignore his long-standing business role in supplying the tobacco export fleet with victuals and supplies on their voyages back to England–Mathews was not a supporter of trade with the Dutch, although archeology of his plantation reveal a number of Dutch goods in his possession. Nevertheless, he declined to follow up on Warwick’s letter.

Whatever, Warwick had in mind with his Mathew’s letters, it was always a sideshow in the great cosmic potential policy agenda of that revolutionary period. Mathews was the logical candidate and he declined; Warwick lacked reasonable capacity to move against Berkeley. Why Mathews did so, we can only guess. His family genealogist, Jerry M. Palmer suggest that the period 1644 to 1650 or so was Mathew’s “quiet period” in which having resigned from the Council of State in 1644, he pursued his own interests and profits–apparently involving trips to London. https://www.genealogy.com/ftm/p/a/l/Jerry-M-Palmer/GENE9-0001.html The renowned “governor-slayer”, was not interested in going after Berkeley. He did, however go after the Powhatan.

Others observed that by this time a political culture had taken shape in which Virginia politics was fashioned around the principle of least government, and even such places as the Council of State allowed “to each his own” in the pursuit of private profits. If our earlier observations on Berkeley and going native have substance, one senses a collegiality among the larger planter class, sort of like J R Ewing’s Dallas “Cattleman Club” created a common bond among those who aggressively competed for any tobacco they could grow and export.

Strongest in the Council of State, this atmosphere of shared ambitions, seems to have carried over into policy-making in which planter owners were the “us” and the others were the “they”. It is possible the Clique’s emergence in the late twenties generated an imposed unity against the Clique by our mainstream planters. That the Clique’s most apparent advantage was its ability to interweave themselves into both New Men and Privy Council circles no doubt set them off from the Mainstream planter. The rise of the Assembly meant an alternative to the Council of State had manifest itself, and the development of leadership within that body created overtones that furthered links to local county leadership, which in return led to “spreading”/quid pro quo or the “if you get the benefit for that then I can get the benefit for this” policy-making atmosphere. In this atmosphere Berkeley, with his going native strategy, was one of them, albeit more than first among equals, but inside rather than an external agent. The free-floating vacuum that was the civil war period was fertile ground for this development.

By the middle forties, with Claiborne more on his own than ever, that the Clique was weakening, with Mathews being a likely example. Joint activities and partnerships in economic ventures, as well as social relationships among neighbors in a fairly compact, if isolated, policy system, that formed around counties probably provided some opportunities to work together in policy-making.  The rejuvenation of local militias triggered by the the Third Powhatan provided yet another occasion for the development of social patterns among the competitive elites.

The oligarchy, as I see it, was, if anything, more entrenched, and the tilt to counties further enhanced as they led a great deal of the resistance to the Powhatan. Whatever its good points and bad, the First Migration elite fabricated a policy system to support its goals and ambitions, and once again demonstrated their capacity to govern and to define in their own terms political and economic development of the colony. And, for all practical purposes the tobacco plantation-based monoculture, sustained by inertia and a shred pattern of economic activity reinforced by tobacco’s role as the principal currency of the colony continued on is merrie way, civil war, Indian rebellion notwithstanding.

The Interregnum (1648,1649,1651, 1652) 

The period between 1649 through 1652 was without doubt the most disruptive to Virginia politics ever to that point, and events in “the Center” were the prime cause of that disruption. Ironically, as we shall see, because Berkeley and the Assembly were united in their rejection of the “new Republic in England”, and loyal to the new young king, Charles II, the actual disruption in Jamestown was minimal–until as they say, “it wasn’t”. Through it all Berkeley remained in power to 1652. His support for Charles II was firm and consistent–and aggressively if verbally pursued. He manned his battlements, literally, until the very last. It is worth comment that while we concentrate on Virginia and Berkeley in this section, that Barbados and Bermuda were even more hostile to the Parliament than Berkeley.

Accordingly, we include several issuances of the period by Parliament, Berkeley and the Assembly so the reader can make their own judgment on the intensity of this obstinate position. The reader ight also note my sense is this reaction is more than a cranky, obsessive inflexibility to the realities of Parliament’s s victory in England, but also a reaction to the regicide which struck at the heart of one thousand years of English history, and signaled the radicalness of the change in the offing. This in not how the Periphery is supposed to communicate with the Center–and the Center did catch on to that.

Wertenbaker reports of Berkeley’s reaction to the regicide. Upon receiving the news, he called the Assembly immediately into session. Its first resolution was to proclaim Charles II as king, a second declared it high treason “to question even by insinuation the ‘undoubted & inherent right of His Majesty … to the Colony of Virginia, and to all other of His Majesties dominions”. Calling Charles I’s executioners lawless tyrants, it further proclaimed that “what person soever, by false reports and malicious rumors shall spread abroad, among the people, anything tending to change of government, … such persons, not only the authors of … but the reporters and divulgers thereof, shall be adjudged guilty [99] T. J. Wertenbaker, Virginia Under the Stuarts, p. 77

When Berkeley and the Assembly later followed this up by rejecting the right of Parliament to exercise sovereignty and to declare themselves a “Commonwealth”, Parliament responded in October 1650 with an act that stated “Since the colony had been settled by the English at great cost to the nation, it should rightly be under the authority of the present government, that “divers persons in Virginia had committed open treason ‘traytorously by force and Subtilty’ usurping the government, and defying the Commonwealth, and in order to repress speedily the rebellious colonists and to inflict upon them a merited punishment, they were to be forbidden all ‘Commerce or Traffique with any people Whatsoever’. The full force of the English navy was to be used in carrying out this act, and all commanders were directed to seize and bring in foreign vessels found trading with the colony”. Virginia was placed under a naval blockade, a blockade which was not as effective to cut off all shipping, did interdict a good many Dutch ships.

Berkeley again called the Assembly to convene and before it he launched into an extended rant [99]  See T. J. Wertenbaker, Virginia Under the Stuarts, p. 78] which does not translate well into modern American English. Suffice it to say it ends “by the grace of God we will not so tamely part with our King, and al those blessing we enjoy under him, and if they [Parliament] oppose us, do but follow me, I will either lead you to victory, or lose a life which I cannot more gloriously sacrifice then for my loyalty, and your security”. Thomas Paine of “Give me liberty or give me death” fame was more succinct, but Berkeley’s spirit and core emotion echoes through the ages.

The Assembly responded with enactments reiterating their loyalty to the Crown “denounced the [House of] Commons as usurpers and regicides, “We are resolved to Continue our Allegeance to our most Gracious King, yea, as long as his Gracious favor permits us, we will peaceably trade with the Londoners, and all other nations in amity with our Sovereigne. Protect all forraie Merchants with our utmost force in our Capes [Chesapeake Bay and Virginia Rivers]: Allwaies [always] pray for the happy restoration of our King, and … hazard of their souls [that] have opposed him”.

Aside from the emotion and intenseness of the response, a byproduct of the regicide, it is evident that in the minds of Berkeley and the Assembly, the third rail of Virginia politics had become free trade, with the Dutch or anybody. The citizens of 1773 Boston could not have equaled the genuineness of the emotion of those who took a stand one hundred and twenty three years earlier–except, of course, they were Virginia’s First Migration thuggish elite demanding continuation of the English monarchy and death to the Republic that overthrew it.

The Interregnum, I argue, was the pivot point in Virginia’s colonial history. True, a pivot from Virginia Company colonization to royal, for the lack of a better word, had evolved over what turned out to be an eighteen year process, inherited by William Berkeley in 1642. That period, however, certainly until around the 1630’s mid-decade, left the colony about in the same shape as it was in 1624. The 1650’s, however, if there were a breakout point, was where the scale and volume of change became most pronounced. We ask the reader to be sensitive to a reality that finally, after nearly a half-century, Virginia was more than just surviving,  a place where the narrow-focused, hard-working, ambitious, greedy, grasping settler grabbed land planted tobacco.

Like a delayed time bomb, however, the Periphery events, one at a time, exploded onto the Jamestown policy agenda. In this section, therefore, we chronicle the periphery disruptions, and content ourselves with reaction to them from Virginians. Our concluding segment, however, Cromwell’s expedition to Virginia and Maryland, the negotiations of its Commissioners for their surrender, the retirement of Berkeley, and the establishment of the Virginia republic is a book in itself. Remarkably, until recent years only a few of the better historians dealt with it.

First, during much of 1648 Charles was captured, held prisoner, then tried, condemned, and executed in early January, 1649. During this time Parliament itself was purged (ending the “Long Parliament); the remaining MPs in aggregate became the Rump Parliament. The House of Lords was terminated (which resulted in the withdrawal of Warwick and the termination of his Commission on Foreign Plantations). Considerable turnover of personnel in London and English governance/aristocracy followed. [99],[“After 1649 many aristocrats and gentlemen who had supported the parliamentary cause, such as Warwick who had commanded they navy, withdrew from public life alarmed at the radical course English society seemed to be taking” L. H. Roper, the English Empire in America (Routledge, 2015), p. 117. Warwick’s Commission was replaced (February, 1649) by the “Council of State”, which we will make notation so that it will not be confused with the Virginia Assembly  Council of State. In May 1649, the Rump Parliament issued a declaration declaring the “Commonwealth”, and asserting its jurisdiction over the various colonies and territories of the former Stuart “empire”.

This turnover, principally of royalists resulted in immigration to Virginia and  Barbados. We shall speak of that later. The turnover and the seizure of the English foreign policy establishment, its institutions and agencies, and the entrance of a new, sort of, establishment was a major dynamic in our history. This is the time that Maurice Thompson in particular, and his wing of the Warwick New Men, rose to power. In that it is they who waged the “invasion” and  the restructuring of Maryland colony, one can expect some repercussions in Virginia.

In 1652 the noise from the Center came crashing down on them. But, and it was a big “but”, unexpectedly from my way of thinking, the regime-policy system change that resulted, if anything sustained the underlying fundamentals of the colony’s economy, society, and groupings–but not its provincial political institutions. The Assembly, Burgesses more precisely, negotiated its way into becoming the sovereign most powerful political decision-maker of the new policy system. Changes in the electoral franchise were dramatic between 1646 and 1655, but reversed in that year. The political oligarchy survived in tact through to 1662.

In aggregate these changes were the transition into a new policy system (some call it a “regime change”)–replacing the Stuart policy system. There was a new “Center” and necessarily that resulted in changes to the Periphery. Being the seventeenth century there was, of course, both a lag, and a sequence of policies and programs that usually culminated with a master policy initiative, which is usually captured in textbooks and comprehensive histories; the Navigation Act of 1651 is one of these. The “minor” policy initiatives, however, disrupted things in their own way, and invited change and reaction when they were made known to the periphery.

The good intentions of the Rump Parliament became manifest when, in January 1650, a bill was brought in and finally passed on August 1 ‘for the advancing and regulating the trade of the Commonwealth, and for the erection of a special special council of trade to look after this business. On September 27 another bill was brought in, and passed by October 3, which is sometimes called [the first] navigation act”, but which had for its immediate object the punishment of four rebellious colonies, Barbados, Bermuda, Antigua and Virginia, by forbidding them to have any manner of commerce by traffic with strangers, prohibiting any foreign ship to trade with them except by special license, and ordering “Generals at sea” to seize all ships that attempted to do so [99] Charles A. Andrews, The Colonial Period of American History, England’s Commercial and Colonial Policy, Vol. 4 (Yale University Press, 1938, 1964),  p.35-6

What is seldom mentioned among these changes was the end of the Thirty Years War in 1648. The consequence of greatest importance to this history is that it resulted in the independence of the Netherlands, which became the first republic–soon to be followed by the second (England). The flip side of that was the Dutch (and English) war against Spain ended as well. Warwick (and Thompson (et al) privateering in the West Indies, Brazil, and Caribbean went out of style. Smuggling didn’t, and from the colonies’ perspective that did not change.

The Stuarts had not dealt well with all this as we know, and the English new republic was of a mind in these years to hold a grudge against the Netherlands for their intrusion into the foreign trade of their colonies, tobacco in particular. For the first time, with war’s end and now the Rump Parliament in control, the entire English navy and merchant marine was available for their use. England, arguably, had the largest navy of that period, and that, for the first time meant it had sufficient capacity to involve itself in smuggling and enforcement of England’s new colonial foreign trade policy.

While it might seem odd, in this four year transition period, the issue of highest priority in the center was not to ensure the compliance of colonial governments to the new regime, but rather to eliminate the Dutch disruption in North American export trade. It was not until 1652 that the former issue became prime–when Cromwell entered the picture. Andrews, however, recognized the prime reason was to throw out the Dutch and establish an English monopoly of trade over its colonies, and most importantly the merchant community of London was the inspiration and driving force behind the legislation and English colonial policy.

The reader therefore will see much of Virginia (and Maryland) tobacco trade regulation, and a series of legislative acts that forbade North Americans from trading with the Dutch. These years were not kind in this regard to the Dutch, who suffered a number of setbacks including the near-bankruptcy of its West Indies Corporation–the power behind the New Netherlands colony. BTW, by 1652 England and Holland were at war: the first Anglo-Dutch war.

Although this was not known to Andrews in his 1938 work cited above (see Footnote 1, p.41), the authors of these trade bills were uncovered by Robert Brenner (see pp. 187-193 Merchants and Revolution), and constitute a surviving wing of what we call his “New Men” [other such as L. H. Roper (see in particular Advancing Empire) have fleshed this out considerably). Their principal reason for this desire to monopolize the tobacco trade was the dominance of Maurice Thompson in the interregnum foreign policy establishment; Thompson will be the prime author of the famous/infamous 1651 Navigation Act, which is usually considered as the first formal policy, the cornerstone, in English colonial trade.

The influence of the trading companies, which adhered to the old idea of monopoly, was undoubtedly very great with parliament and the [London] Council of State. The Commonwealth was dependent for its financial support upon London [City of] and the companies … and it is not difficult to believe that these corporations brought pressure to bear upon the Rump Parliament to legislate in their behalf as against the outports [Bristol, et al] which favored the ‘lost trades’ (that is the trades controlled by the Dutch, and an open commerce [99] Charles A. Andrews, The Colonial Period of American History, England’s Commercial and Colonial Policy, Vol. 4 (Yale University Press, 1938, 1964),  p. 42; while we have not developed this theme after we introduced and discussed its impact on the Virginia Company, the rivalry between London and the “outports” is both a major factor in the evolution-development of English colonial trade policy, but also a dynamic that impacted greatly very early English (North American) colonization. It is an important factor in the answer to our question as to why current American states are different from each other.

Thus change in the relations between Center and Periphery affected economics, trade, and the logistics-financing nexus-clusters on which they rested. Workforce immigration became the flip side of the tobacco trade, and the 1651 Navigation Act, unenforceable as it still was, augured, put pressure on past practices and imposed a pattern that we call mercantilism today. After 1651 mercantilism was more than an inconsistent mélange of practices and wishful thinking, it was a two-way street navigated by Center and Periphery as each attempted to maximize their goals. Even today it is still largely thought of as a one-way street from Center to Periphery, but the post 1651 seventeenth century experience was more complex and subtle:

[Center-based] officials could not extend their fiscal-military state across the Atlantic until locals eschewed their cross-national, flexible origins, and chose to conform to new imperial standards. The years between 1624 and 1713 were distinguished therefore, both by new expressions of state power, and by the greater realization that mercantilism rested on individual behavior. It would be the willingness of colonists to abandon an earlier cross-national Atlantic [-wide trading] community, and accept membership in the British empire. [99] Christian J. Koot, Empire at the Periphery: British Colonists, Anglo-Dutch Trade, and the Development of the British Atlantic, 1621-1713 (New York University Press, 2011), p.5

What also changed is that Virginia matured in these years, immigration increased, hinterland expansion (and reinvigorated tension with Indians despite their loss in the Third Powhatan), a new generation of elites–a flood of new indentured servants–and a steadily increasing stream of black slaves-fleshed out the colony and allowed it to pass from an exercise in human survival into a more settled, civilized, if grossly unequal, society with a veneer of elite affluence. Even the tobacco monoculture gave way a bit with production of staples, orchards, livestock and fur trading–with yet another small infusion of artisans, professions and merchants.

The political structures, especially counties, matured, expanded in scope and function, and with increased population turned into settlements as well as clusters of large plantations with freehold hangers on. These changes infused tensions, ambitions and varying perspectives into governance and that became William Berkeley’s problem in his second administration. Bacon’s 1676 Rebellion is testimony to how well he did in adjusting to the change.

While not wishing to go too far into civil war detail, the Interregnum also included the contested passing of the throne to Charles’s son, the twenty year old Charles II. Charles was recognized as King by the Parliament of Scotland in February 1629 and he militarily contested the assertion of sovereignty by the Rump Parliament. Cromwell defeated him severely at the battle of Worcester in September, and Charles was forced into exile in France, the Netherland and Spain over the next nine years. The reaction to the regicide, however, brought about a quick pushback with Scottish highlanders (Charles was, of course, a Scot and the Scottish king), a rather desperate rebellion arose in Ireland, and with moderates ousted from Lords and Parliament a moderate opposition of some means was outside Cromwell’s Presbyterian tent. This was all a bit heady and it infused Charles II and his supporters to take to the field.

During that time, Charles II acted as the English king, making decisions, including treaties, forming a rag-tag army and such. One such decision which hall be dealt with in a later module, was. in 1649, in an attempt to raise funds he issued a land grant in Virginia to an assemblage of aristocrats. The grant, known as the Northern Neck (which BTW included the previously mentioned Northumberland) grossed over five million acres-of ill, to non, defined territory. As Charles II lacked the power to enforce the grant until 1661, the grant mattered little in the period discussed by this module. The “Northern Neck”, however, did notably impact eighteenth century Virginia. Essentially Charles II did was whatever he could to retain the possibility of his return to the throne.

The reader should keep in mind that he would return to the throne. During the 1650’s while we concentrate on Virginia, he’s out there in the shadows until 1658 when Cromwell died, his son was “tossed out”, and  finally, the intervention a Scottish army and its general overthrew the Rump Parliament, brought back the remnants of the Long Parliament. In 1661 Charles was restored to the throne. In this period, Berkeley remained loyal to Charles II in his retirement period–and that was presumably one of the reasons he was restored to governorship in 1661. Gardening at Green Springs, Berkeley, the reader will discover Berkeley still packed a punch in the new provincial policy system.

As we might expect, Claiborne and Bennett were the chief beneficiaries in this new foreign policy-making system. That is a really big deal in our history. Their dominance will be the last hurrah of the Virginia Company legacy, and the de facto end of the First Migration period. The Virginia 1650’s (1652 to the Restoration) policy system will, like the English, be transformed into a new policy system-regime change, a policy system whose policy-making was dramatically different from the Stuart era–a policy system which will leave behand a bit of a bend in Virginia’s (and Maryland’s) policy making heritage.

The Interregnum in Depth: The Center Transforms, the Periphery Fights Back, System Change

Between 1648 and  1651 Virginia’s narrative is the hardline, almost threatening Berkeley-Assembly support for Charles II, but vituperative commentary on Parliament and its ambitions. Lacking any hints of compromise, it was so aggressive even the Council went along. Virginia’s actions were congruent with her rhetoric as Berkeley and the Assembly accelerated and intensified their pro-Dutch shipping overtures, and opposition to initial trade directives. It is thought the 1651 Navigation Law was a direct response and the Virginia reaction to that literally launched the ships that carried the commissioners and the marines to Virginia-Maryland in 1651.

The sentiment and speechifying in favor of Dutch trade in Virginia ran high in this period, but the opposite trend was increasingly evident in England. More subdued in Virginia was a sentiment that resuming the impaired English trade was also important. With such trade impaired, Virginia consumers had to make do with what they could obtain, and some attempted to create domestic equivalents such as livestock and orchards. Another example, that of silk production by Edward Digges, a future Interregnum governor (whose father was a famous parliamentary leader and shareholder of the Virginia Company) imported two Armenian artisans led to the Assembly approving legislation requiring planting of mulberry bushes by planters, and in 1656 provided 4,000 pounds of tobacco to support one of the Armenians. That Berkeley was also behind this experimentation sustained provincial attention into the Restoration period

At heart Virginia colonists were very much Englishmen and as emotions in England ran high that the Dutch were eating England’s lunch. “The risk that the rivalry between the two states might lead to war [as it did in 1652] gave new weight to those considerations of self-sufficiency, which since Elizabeth’s day had helped to promote an interest in colonization” [99]  Wesley Frank Craven. “the Southern Colonies” p.248 When the negotiating commissioners arrived in 1652, Cromwell had been conducting negotiations to avert such a conflict for almost three years, and in 1651 seizure of Dutch ships seriously intensified. In the spring of 1652, when the commissioner’s ships arrived in the Chesapeake, that patience was over.

In April 1652, the Dutch admiral  Trompe put out to sea with orders to protect Dutch shipping and in May, off Dover, the first encounter followed. War was declared in July. 1652. English colonists in Virginia did not lack for patriotic loyalties, and that had to have been a headwind against Dutch trade. The war itself (almost completely a naval war), fought chiefly in the English Channel and Mediterranean did not touch North America. Trompe was killed in battle in 1653, and overall the heavier English ships had the better of the action.

BEGIN HERE p. 77

Begin here with Thomason Roper 33-41

1. BEGIN Here Begin Here Koot, Courteen in Advancing Empire, p. 29, and Anglo Dutch in Bradburn p. 100, See Charles andrews

So there is a lot going on at the Center

 

Cromwell Has Enough

Our research consistently reports the English blockade of Virginia did not effectively close off foreign ships. Wertenbaker specifically comments the navy recruitment drive was not sufficiently productive, and there were too many demands placed on the navy. Apparently, it didn’t take long for the “Virginia’s parliamentary party”, i.e. Claiborne and Bennett to show up at the doors of Westminster to complain. So the London Council of Ministers reached into its policy pocket and pulled out a few ships including two frigates, found some sailors and marines (about 1650), appointed a leadership, and sent them off to retake Bermuda, Virginia, and secure Maryland.

Billings believes the force behind the expedition was Benjamin Worsley, Worsley was a sort of Cromwellian guru, a physician, who exerted an influence on Cromwell’s policy-making, in particular regarding colonial affairs). The expedition’s commanders were instructed that it was best to bring the dissenters back under the English tent peaceably; they should listen to the locals where possible, especially parliamentary and puritans, and in any case were granted some discretion so long as their mission was sustainable at the least cost-risk. It ought be mentioned that two weeks after these instructions Parliament passed the 1651 Navigation Act–and the ships left port several weeks after that. The fleet landed first at Bermuda and secured its surrender and return to the Commonwealth–then a storm hit them on their trip to Virginia.[99]  Warren M. Billings, Sir William Berkeley, pp. 108-9

The top leaders (commissioners), the Captain of the expedition (Robert Dennis) and our former Speaker of the 1643 Assembly, Thomas Stegg, went down with their ship in route, leaving the commissioners on the other frigate, Claiborne and Bennett, the most key, left to do the decision-making. They arrived in Chesapeake Bay, lower James River (near Newport) in January 1652. The disruption of leadership simplified the deliberation, but left it completely in the hands of the two Marylander-focused. This raised the possibility for an unexpected flexibility in Virginia negotiations. Neither were friends of Berkeley, but both had deep roots in the Virginia oligarchy. It is probable the single issue, other than to secure the colonies membership in the Commonwealth, was to expel Dutch shipping. That Berkeley should be removed was also no doubt high on their list.

Craven reports it likely Claiborne was mostly interested in Maryland, and so was disposed to be generous to his neighbors–he was after all its Secretary. Bennet on the other hand, was not likely similarly disposed as Virginia’s former leading Puritan, only  few years earlier he and  his followers had relocated to Maryland. Craven, however, posits Bennett’s religious beliefs predisposed him to a republic-parliamentary policy system, congruent with personal liberty. A Virginian since 1621, he was a founding member of the oligarchy, with serious ties to its economic base and its emerging society.  and may have been willing to approve favorable actions to Virginia that would have restored his standing to what was his home colony (he had been in Virginia since 1621). It is likely he was, however, not a Berkeley supporter  [99] Wesley Frank Craven, the Southern Colonies, pp.253-4 .

When they arrived a message was sent to Berkeley, demanding immediate surrender. His line was busy and he did not answer. When the English ships arrived, Berkeley did not seem at first impressed. The loss of a frigate and transports weakened the military strength and likely Berkeley concluded his Virginian militia could fare better than he expected. He had called up the militia (estimated at 1,000), and they manned the fortifications, determined to repel the “invaders”. Claiborne and Bennett, with more trained and better equipped veterans called his bluff, and sailed up the James to Jamestown. For three days each looked each other square in the eye. While doing so, both Claiborne and Bennett went ashore and started negotiating with Virginian leadership, several of which Wertenbaker asserts had property aboard the English ships; the safety of their goods was in question he claims. Negotiating with their friends in their houses, Claiborne and Bennett stole the homefield advantage from Berkeley.

Berkeley blinked and agreed to negotiations. Whatever the short-term odds might have been, it was clear even a victory would be followed up by a second English task force. As discussed earlier, Virginia could not stand alone apart from the mother country; it too would be toppled as Maryland and Bermuda did and would. The breakthrough, however, were the terms offered by the two commissioners.  The terms clearly reflected the moderate approached called for in their instruction: avoid battle and war, and economic disruption–after years of civil war even Cromwell was appreciative of a return to normalcy. Gracious terms and considerable leeway-discretion produced a most remarkable surrender and submission to the Commonwealth.  [99] T. J. Wertenbaker, Virginia Under the Stuarts, p. 80.  

Berkeley himself was probably more flexible than appearances suggested. “Even though he and Bennett and Claiborne stood opposite, they were rivals, not enemies. Bennett and Claiborne cared as much for Virginia as he. [Claiborne and Bennett’s] gravitation toward parliamentarians was born of practicality. They and Berkeley disagreed on economic policy. He favored the Dutch whereas their business interests tied them tightly to London” [99]  Warren G. Billings, Sir William Berkeley, p. 110 They were each and all members of Virginia’s oligarchy.

The commissioners negotiated with Berkeley along with the Council and Burgesses leaders. That Virginia submit and accept the Commonwealth was primary and non-negotiable, but the language used was that it was “voluntary” on the part of the Virginians; this was no conquest and there was no compulsion. In return Virginia got a whopper: “that Virginia shall be free from all taxes, customs, and impositions whatsoever, and none shall be imposed on them without the consent of the Grand Assembly, and soe that neither fforts nor castles bee erected or garrisons maintained without their consent”. Also, included in the terms was as fuzzy commitment that “the people of Virginia have free trade as the people of England do enjoy to all places and with all nations according to the lawes of that commonwealth”.

That by no means, however, was an unequivocal endorsement of trade with the Dutch. The commissions had copies of the new Navigation Act which they left behind for Virginian compliance. Further, full pardons-indemnity were granted for previous statements and resolutions made against Parliament, and those who had not take the Oath of Allegiance still had a year to do so or suffer their removal and confiscation of their estates. The Anglican Book of Common Prayer was allowed for one year also, and no Anglican ministers were removed from their parishes. Berkeley remained governor so long as he cooperated in the transition to a new governance that would be worked out with the new Assembly. Berkeley thus authorized an election to be held for Burgesses, who along with the Council would negotiate the new structure of Virginia government.

What came out of the Assembly-Council, governor-commissioner negotiations that followed was remarkable. It amounted to no less than a system change from the Stuart era provincial government to something akin to a republic, as in theory England had just done. In effect a new constitution was written [the English constitution is unwritten, of course]. Since commission instructions did not include specifics of governance, the commissioners were in unchartered territory; they no doubt knew if they exceeded their bounds, the London Council of State could make such changes as it deemed necessary.

As event turned out, the oversight of the London Council of State was not as diligent as it might have been. When the deal reached was sent back [99] T. J. Wertenbaker, Virginia Under the Stuarts, p. 80. to London, not all the language was ratified, but the negotiated structure of provincial government was not significantly tampered with. What was agreed to in these March 1652 negotiations lasted through to the Restoration.

Since the Parliament was England’s sovereign body in the commonwealth, the negotiations transformed the Burgesses into the sovereign body of Virginia–excepting of course a veto from the English government. The power of the Burgesses to enact laws were limited only by the laws of England. The Burgesses was empowered to elect both the Governor and the Jamestown Council of State; the Burgesses could define their powers and scope of functions. These were earthquakes that toppled the Stuart policy system in that both institutions were more powerful and central to Virginia governance in the Stuart policy framework. On top of this the Burgesses was given power of appointment of lower officials, but a grandfather-like clause allowed the first appointments under the new system to be drawn from nominations by the negotiating bodies. 

If the negotiated treaty was not amazing in and of itself, a closer examination of its application over the better part of a decade is almost astounding. Leaving beside the castration of the Council of State, Wertenbaker says at one point in the treaty debate the Council was to be stripped from its membership in the Assembly, i.e. no longer the upper house (the English House of Lords was abolished after Charles’ execution), but election to the Council was to be made by the Burgesses. The Council’s s jurisdiction over policy was dramatically reduced also.

But it is the governor position that is most amazing. The negotiations left the governor’s duties and powers seriously ill-defined and even unspecified. This weakness and secondary position at best, endured over the next decade. The election of Bennett by the 1652 Assembly was unanimous, and likely was part of the agreement. He was to serve only a year, but he wound up serving until March 1655. Whether or not Bennet believed the Assembly would ‘hardline” a weak governor, the Burgesses were consistent in substituting their will on policy and in at least one case choosing the opposite path just to put him in his place. In any case, the governor over the next decade was more an implementer than policy maker.

The topic of governors and their power and role in the Virginia colonial policy system is important to the overall tilt of the policy system and its effect on the making of policy. As we shall see there is a consistent pattern of Burgesses versus governor in future Virginian history, and the relationship of future governors to the rest of the policy system is at best tense and torturous–several will in effect be fired, and the exceptions are those who to some degree were able to “go native”. That Berkeley will be one of the former in 1676 only completes the picture that the Burgesses construed its role and function to be superior to that of the governor–and would be more than a roadblock to a strong governor.

And it would be wise to also remember, that if the Burgesses deferred to any institutional structure, it would be the individual Burgesses of the mother county. That deferral lies at the heart of the decentralization tilt in the overall policy system. The related consequence is that with a weak governor there would be no natural place where the system-wide needs of Virginia could be anchored. It would not be long in seeing how critical policies would be handled, and offer insight why the comprehensive Virginia needs would mostly go unfilled. In a future module we will take a look at why Virginia was not able, through the entire colonial period, to create a major port city, despite pressure from London, and the wish of most members of Burgesses.

If we look at the 1652 treaty in another way, Virginia became a real republic in the terms of its day. What is almost shocking is that England itself, within a year, would undergo a Protector–Cromwell take over, transforming the English Commonwealth into more a dictatorship than a republic. Virginia on the other hand, as Wertenbaker reminds us, did not have a Cromwell, and until the Restoration wreaked its institutional magic a decade later, Virginia was governed by its legislature, with either a very weak governor (Samuel Mathews Jr, or non aggressive ones such as Bennett and Diggs). And where oh where did the Council of State go?  [99] T. J. Wertenbaker, Virginia Under the Stuarts, p. 80-7.

And where in all this did William Berkeley fit? In a second “treaty”, which applied expressly to Berkeley and the Council, Berkeley refrained from taking the Oath of Allegiance and he was permitted to speak well of the King for one year in the privacy of his home. His lands, estate and possessions were to remain his, although he was permitted the right to sell and move them as he saw fit–including specific permission that if he could move to the Netherlands. Billings simply observes that “Berkeley was on parole and at liberty to go his own way. He left Jamestown to being a life as a private citizen … These were bitter defeats and the memory of them inspired a hatred of rebels that never left him”. [99] Warren G. Billings, Sir William Berkeley, p. 111-12

With no mention of retirement of surrender of office, Richard Bennett assumed the position of governor, and Claiborne was restored to his old position as Secretary of the Colony. It appears that Bennet and Claiborne were able to present a slate of councilors for the Virginia Council of State that, in Fausz’s words were “composed exclusively of military oligarchs (our plantation conquistadors) and officers” that one suspects were allies and associated with the Claiborne Clique [99] Frederick Fausz, Merging and Emerging Worlds, Table 4, p.98 confirms that both Matthews’ (father and son), Argall Yeardley, and John West were members of the sixteen man Council.

Hustling up to Maryland, the two commissioners secured the “last outpost in Anglo-America” [99] Roper, Advancing Empire, p. 145   of  repeated their restructuring of Virginia’s policy system, but with more interest in cementing their own position there; for example, in contrast to Calvert’s predispositions, the two exclusively appointed Protestants to the Maryland Council of State. In July, they concluded a “comprehensive treaty” with the Maryland Susquehannock, Claiborne’s oldest ally, and opponent of the Powhatan, among others. The treaty “ceded vast territories along both shores of the northern Chesapeake”  to the “English nation” not Maryland, “excepting the Isle of Kent [his Kent Island enclave] and Palmers llands which belong to Captaine Claiborne.

The commissioners thus ended the war that Calvert had pursued with the Susquehannock’s, recognized the “Nation and State of Sasquehanough, and set in writing plants to renew their beaver trade venture.  Interestingly, in the same year Claiborne and his Virginia partners (which included Francis Yeardley, Abraham Wood, Henry Fleet) commenced a deer trade south of the James River. They guaranteed to the Susquehannock’s a safe southern border secure if the latter engaged in war with the Iroquois. [99] J. Frederick Fausz, “Merging and Emerging Worlds in Lois Green Carr et all, Colonial Chesapeake Society (North Carolina Press, 1988), pp. 82-88

Fausz asserts 1652 was the high point of the Claiborne and Bennett-Virginia-Susquehannock-London Puritan alliance. The commencement of the Anglo-Dutch war put a serious crimp on the development of beaver trade, the Iroquois began a two decade war with their enemies which exhausted the tribe, and caused its movement to safer territories, The ascendancy of more strident Puritans in Maryland degenerated into actual war by 1655, the implications of which prompted Cromwell to moderate his position there and seek to bring that civil war to an end–hence the calling of Samuel Mathews Sr to London to negotiate a settlement. His negotiations lasted to 1657 and resulted in a treaty that sustained Calvert’s charter that when combined with Calvert’s restoration in Maryland and the Stuarts in London isolated Claiborne in particular.

BEGIN . Billings, p110, Wertenbaker, p.79

Summary

If one wonders why today’s American states are different from each other we need to appreciate that history itself is differentiated by its nature. The fog of a history so long ago obscures much of this change, or reduces it to distorted stereotypes and smush, the collapsing of decades, even centuries into a sentence of description. changed appreciably from 1607 Virginia  to 1732 Georgia (never mind 1776 Delaware), the thirteen colonies took their own sweet time to come together. At the time of the American Constitution in 1789, Georgia had been around for fifty six years, Virginia one hundred and eighty two.

In essence he seems to have gone “native” and while still governor became a plantation owner himself becoming “one of them”. Leaving local county government to the planter elite and the House of Burgesses, he opened the door for the local planter oligopoly to cement its dominance, allow it to develop its own distinctive political ideology and culture, and incrementally promote-institutionalize it on its plantations, a way of life that mirrored the pre-Civil War English aristocratic manor.