Volume 13
Number 035
Jamestown Journey: Shay’s Rebellion
I
Lead: In the 1780s desperate New
England frontier farmers revolted
against tight credit and farm
foreclosures in Shays’ Rebellion.
Intro.: Dan Roberts and A Moment
in Time with Jamestown - Journey of
Democracy, tracing the global advance
of democratic ideals since the founding
of Jamestown, Virginia in 1607.
Content: In the aftermath of the
American Revolution, New England
coastal merchants, seeking to address
the pent up consumer demand after
an eight year war, bought large
amounts of British goods on credit in
hopes of selling them to both coastal
and inland markets. Partly out of
spite at her former colonies for
having the nerve to rebel, however,
Britain cut off American trade with
the West Indies. Now there was no
place to sell huge amounts of lumber,
fish, hemp and other farm goods.
When the mostly Boston merchants
failed to pay their debts the British
called them in. The merchants then
called in their loans to western
farmers who had only their land with
which to pay their debts. Foreclosures
spread west and in 1786 western
Massachusetts farmers formed the
Regulator Movement and united in
the so-called Shays’ Rebellion, named
for one of their leaders, former
Continental army officer Daniel
Shays, a farmer from Pelham.
When the Massachusetts General
Court refused to provide debt relief,
the Regulators turned to violence
shutting down the inland courts.
Governor Bowdoin tried to raise the
militia, but militiamen in the back
country refused to take up arms
against their neighbors. Finally,
coastal militia groups put down the
rebellion but not before a wave of
fear swept across the new United
States.
Next time: Congressional
impotence and a new Constitution.
This series is supported by the
Jamestown 400th Federal Commission
with its International Conference
Series on the Foundations and Future
of
Democracy,
see
jamestownjourney.org,
at
the
University of Richmond, this is Dan
Roberts.
Resources
Minot, George Richards. History of the Insurrections in
Massachusetts in 1786 and of the Rebellion Consequent
thereon. New York, Da Capo Press, 1971.
Szatmary, David P. Shay's Rebellion: The Making of an
Agrarian Insurrection. Amherst: University of
Massachusetts Press, 1980.
Copyright by Dan Roberts Enterprises, Inc.