Sir william berkeley biography of barack

Governor Berkeley defeated the Native Americans and the Dutch, extended explorations, and encouraged agriculture, but so persecuted dissenters that many of them left the colony. An uncompromising royalist, he made Virginia a haven for supporters of King Charles I and declined to recognize the Commonwealth.

Berkeley was deposed by a Puritan force from England in 1652 and lived quietly on his Virginia plantation until the Restoration in 1660, when he was re-appointed governor. His second term as governor was marred by great domestic discontent and strife. A drop in tobacco prices brought great economic suffering to the colony.

At the same time it was charged that Berkeley was showing favoritism toward a small group of friends and depriving the freemen of their rights. When, in addition, Berkeley refused to take the measures demanded by the frontiersmen for protection against the Native Americans, Bacon’s Rebellion broke out in 1676.

Temporarily forced to flee, Governor Berkele