Bacon Rebellion
...hen they gathered more land for tobacco growth they created a surplus of tobacco, which cause the prices of the tobacco to decrease. When the price of tobacco decreased farmers needed to plant more of this cash crop but in order to plant more, they needed more labor. Since family growth was so slow in the Chesapeake area and one half of the children born didn’t survive they had to look outside the family for labor. Considering Indians died of disease and African slaves were too expensive they turned to indentured servitude. Indentured servitude was a system, or a more effective term, a contract. This contract was made between a wealthy landowner and a person who wanted to get away from the life they had and didn’t have enough money to start off fresh on their own. Each party would sign a contract, they would rip it in half, one party would keep half, and the other would keep the other half of the agreement. The details of this particular contract were that the indentured servant would work for a predetermined amount of time and after they completed their servitude, they were given freedom. Along with their freedom they received food, clothes, and a small amount of land to make their own. Through this system plantations in the south accumulated their labor force. Bacon’s Rebellion occurred in Virginia in the year 1676. This rebellion occurred primarily out of indentured servants who had been freed finding out that life wasn’t as good as they had started out hoping. Nathaniel Bacon, and 29-year-old farmer, united 300 men who were, more often than not, poor bachelors, discontented, disfranchised, and rebellious. He united them because he, along with fellow planters, were upset with Governor Berkley whom was profiting from fur trading with Indians and did nothing to aid the frontiersmen whom were being attacked by unfriendly natives whose land was being taken away. Bacon and his followers fell murderously upon the Indians, friendly and violate. They continued into Jamestown...