All these widely varying refugees found new homes in other colonies
as well as in Virginia, as we shall presently hear. In Virginia it
was chiefly to the Shenandoah Valley that they came, that valley
which Spotswood and his knights of the Golden Horseshoe had seen
and claimed for King George. The coming of these new people changed
Virginia a good deal.
After the death of King Charles the coming of the Cavaliers had
made Virginia Royalist and aristocratic, so now the coming of those
persecuted Protestants and Presbyterians tended to make it democratic.
That is, the coming of the Cavaliers increased the number of those
who believed in the government of the many by the few. The coming
of the European Protestants increased the number of those who
believed in the government of the people by the people.
So in the House of Burgesses there were scenes of excitement. But
these were no longer in Jamestown, for the capital had been removed
to Williamsburg. Jamestown, you remember, had been burned by Bacon.
Lord Culpeper however rebuilt it. But a few years later it was again
burned down by accident. It had never been a healthy spot; no one
seemed very anxious to build it again, so it was forsaken, and
Williamsburg became and remained the capital for nearly a hundred
years.
Today all that is left of Jamestown, the first home of Englishmen
in America, is the ivy-grown ruin of the church.
Pages:
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229