Lesson Plan: Bacon’s Rebellion - Colonial Virginia
Lesson Origin: original
Georgia Performance Standard:
SSUSH1 The student will describe European settlement in North America
during the 17th century.
a. Explain Virginia’s development; include the Virginia Company, tobacco
cultivation, and relationships with Native Americans such as Powhatan,
development of the House of Burgesses, Bacon’s Rebellion, and the development
of slavery.
Essential Question: (Learning Question)
Analyze the causes and effects of Bacon’s Rebellion.
Materials: (include at least one primary source)
PBS Africans in America Pt.1
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part1/1p274.html
• Timothy Breen on the relationship between black slaves and white indentured
servants
• Margaret Washington on Virginians' concerns about white and black servants
Bacon’s Rebellion: the Declaration 1676 = Bacon’s summary of grievances
against the governor and his adviors http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5800
On Bacon’s Rebellion : Governor William Berkeley, 19 May 1676
http://historyscoop.wordpress.com/2009/08/18/governor-berkeley-on-baconsrebellion/
http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/D/1651-1700/bacon_rebel/bever.htm = Robert
Beverley on Bacon's Rebellion 1704
http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/jamestown-browse?id=J1055 List by Gov.
Berkeley of those executed
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/jefferson_papers/nbacon.html = Picture
of Nathaniel Bacon
http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/jamestown-browse?id=J1054 Bacon’s epitaph
http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/jamestown-browse?id=J1057 commentary on the
Indian uprisings and Bacon’s response
Instructions for class activities with suggested time = 90 min.
Introduction, warm up/hook
Show the map of colonial Virginia by the mid 1600’s. Teacher questioning to
guide students into a brief description of life in colonial Virginia.
Step by step instructions:
Students will be given the DBQ packet assignment which has the necessary
instructions.
Time suggested : 15 minutes to review the documents
45 minutes writing time
Students will use the time given in class to write a formal document based
essay.
Closure:
Summary report card activity in which students are given 4 criteria on the
whiteboard on which to evaluate the rebellion. Students will give letter grades A to
F for each criteria along with a brief defense of his/her score.
Criteria includes:
•
•
•
•
Leadership
Methods used
members involved
Were the goals of the rebels achieved?
Assessment: Formative
Questions
Summative
DBQ assignment attached
Report card activity
Technology use (include I-Respond file if used):
This could easily be modified to use as a web quest which would send students to
various sites from which the primary sources were obtained.
Suggestions for differentiation/modification:
Use the report card activity for regular level students instead of the formal essay
assignment. Also, the primary sources could be discussed in small group format
instead of evaluation by individuals.
Extensions (advanced students):
This lesson was created to use as an introductory lesson for Advanced Placement
students.
Depth of Knowledge level: 1_____ 2______3.______x__4._______ (rationale)
Elements of Teaching American History Grant activities incorporated into the
lesson:
Sourcing:
Students will need to consider the sources used in this lesson. Questions related to
possible bias and verifiable witnesses to the actual event should be considered.
Close Reading:
Students should use this technique as presented to them to address the attention
given to background, detail and characters involved.
AP United States History Document Based Question (DBQ) DBQ TOPIC: Bacon’s Rebellion DBQ Time Period: late 1600’s colonial America American History Document Based Question Directions: The following question requires you to construct a coherent essay that integrates your interpretation of Documents A‐H and your knowledge of the period referred to in the question. High scores will be earned only by essays that both cite key pieces of evidence from the documents and draw on outside knowledge of the period. Prompt / Question: Discuss the causes and effects of Bacon’s Rebellion. Be sure to include a discussion of class distinctions and labor in your answer. Use your knowledge of this time period 1650’s to 1720’s and the following documents to construct your answer. DOCUMENT A: Timothy Breen on the relationship between black slaves and white indentured servants SOURCE: Timothy H. Breen / William Smith Mason Professor of American History
/ Northwestern University/ PBS.org. Africans in America pt.1
Q: Given that there is a situation of black and white indentured servants, how did they begin to interact or deal with one another? Is there any sense of a commonality that crosses over differences of race or ethnicity? A: There are many ways that human beings divide themselves up. Class is one, [and] gender, race, ethnicity. There's a number of ways that people divide themselves up. And in early Virginia, race was a category that people recognized. Black people recognized difference, and sometimes, I would even argue, celebrated difference. But in this highly competitive, depressingly abusive world, poorer whites and poorer blacks ‐‐ people who were marginalized in this system of dependent labor ‐‐ oftentimes reached out to each other in ways that suggest that, at least in the first 50 or 60 years of Virginia, ...people of African background and English background were able to work together in ways that, again, in later period of American history, were impossible. DOCUMENT B: Margaret Washington on Virginians' concerns about white and black servants SOURCE: PBS.org. Africans in America pt.1/ Margaret Washington Associate
Professor of History / Cornell University Q: Given the conditions and the sense of isolation in a colony like Virginia, was there a real concern around this emerging class of white and black workers who begin to become a threat? Do you feel that that has anything to do with why it begins to start shifting towards an enslaved class? A: You can't discount the notion that black and white servants and slaves were going to unite over their common oppression. We have evidence of them running away together. We have evidence of them rising against their masters together. They lived together. They slept together. So yes, there was a possibility of a lower class surge against the elites. So that's a very important consideration for the Virginians, in terms of wanting to create one kind of labor force. DOCUMENT C: On Bacon’s Rebellion SOURCE: Governor William Berkeley, 19 May 1676 The declaration and Remonstrance of Sir William Berkeley his most sacred Majesty’s Governor and Captain General of Virginia Showeth That about the year 1660 Col. Mathews the then Governor dyed and then in consideration of the service I had done the Country, in defending them from, and destroying great numbers of the Indians, without the loss of three men, in all the time that war lasted, and in contemplation of the equal and uncorrupt Justice I had distributed to all men, Not only the Assembly but the unanimous votes of all the Country, concurred to make me Governor in a time, when if the Rebels in England had prevailed, I had certainly dyed for accepting it, `twas Gentlemen an unfortunate Love, showed to me, for to show myself grateful for this, I was willing to accept of this Government again, when by my gracious Kings favor I might have had other places much more profitable, and less toilsome then this hath been. Now after all this, if Mr. Bacon can show one precedent or example where such actions in any Nation what ever, was approved of, I will mediate with the King and you for a pardon, and excuse for him, but I can show him an hundred examples where brave and great men have been putt to death for gaining Victories against the Command of their Superiors. Lastly my most assured friends I would have preserved those Indians that I knew were [utterly] at our mercy, to have been our spies and intelligence, to find out our bloody enemies, but as soon as I had the least intelligence that they also were treacherous enemies, I gave out Commissions to destroy them all as the Commissions themselves will speak it. DOCUMENT D:
Bacon’s Rebellion: The Declaration (1676) SOURCE: "The Declaration of the People, against Sr: Wm: Berkeley, and Present Governors of Virginia," 1676. 1. For having, upon specious pretenses of public works, raised great unjust taxes upon the
commonalty for the advancement of private favorites and other sinister ends, but no visible
effects in any measure adequate; for not having, during this long time of his government, in any
measure advanced this hopeful colony either by fortifications, towns, or trade.
2. For having abused and rendered contemptible the magistrates of justice by advancing to places
of judicature scandalous and ignorant favorites.
3. For having wronged his Majesty’s prerogative and interest by assuming monopoly of the
beaver trade and for having in it unjust gain betrayed and sold his Majesty’s country and the
lives of his loyal subjects to the barbarous heathen.
4. For having protected, favored, and emboldened the Indians against his Majesty’s loyal
subjects, never contriving, requiring, or appointing any due or proper means of satisfaction for
their many invasions, robberies, and murders committed upon us.
5. For having, when the army of English was just upon the track of those Indians, who now in all
places burn, spoil, murder and when we might with ease have destroyed them who then were in
open hostility, for then having expressly countermanded and sent back our army by passing his
word for the peaceable demeanor of the said Indians, who immediately prosecuted their evil
intentions, committing horrid murders and robberies in all places, being protected by the said
engagement and word past of him the said Sir William Berkeley, having ruined and laid desolate
a great part of his Majesty’s country, and have now drawn themselves into such obscure and
remote places and are by their success so emboldened and confirmed by their confederacy so
strengthened that the cries of blood are in all places, and the terror and consternation of the
people so great, are now become not only difficult but a very formidable enemy who might at
first with ease have been destroyed.
6. And lately, when, upon the loud outcries of blood, the assembly had, with all care, raised and
framed an army for the preventing of further mischief and safeguard of this his Majesty’s colony.
7. For having, with only the privacy of some few favorites without acquainting the people, only
by the alteration of a figure, forged a commission, by we know not what hand, not only without
but even against the consent of the people, for the raising and effecting civil war and destruction,
which being happily and without bloodshed prevented; for having the second time attempted the
same, thereby calling down our forces from the defense of the frontiers and most weakly exposed
places.
8. For the prevention of civil mischief and ruin amongst ourselves while the barbarous enemy in
all places did invade, murder, and spoil us, his Majesty’s most faithful subjects.
DOCUMENT E Pen and Ink drawing of Bacon's troops about to burn
Jamestown
DOCUMENT F Robert Beverley on Bacon's Rebellion 1704
Four things may be reckoned to have been the main ingredients towards this
intestine commotion, viz., First, The extreme low price of tobacco, and the ill usage
of the planters in the exchange of goods for it, which the country, with all their
earnest endeavors, could not remedy. Secondly, The splitting the colony into
proprieties, contrary to the original charters; and the extravagant taxes they were
forced to undergo, to relieve themselves from those grants. Thirdly, The heavy
restraints and burdens laid upon their trade by act of Parliament in England.
Fourthly, The disturbance given by the Indians. Of all which in their order.
DOCUMENT G Nathaniel Bacon, three-quarter length portrait, seated, facing right] Engraving by T.
Chambarsafter a painting by Seipse. created/published [between 1760 and 1800]