XXV. principles;" and the convention of the Old Dominion CHAP. renewed their assurances, "that it was the most ardent wish of their colony and of the whole continent of 1775. North America, to see a speedy return of those hal.cyon days when they lived a free and happy people." To Patrick Henry this language seemed likely to lull the public mind into confidence, at a time when the interruption of the sessions of the general assembly left them "no opportunity, in their legislative capacity, of making any provision to secure their rights from the further violations with which they were threatened." He therefore proposed "that this colony be immediately put into a posture of defence, and that a committee prepare a plan for the embodying, arming, and disciplining such a number of men, as may be sufficient for that purpose." The resolution was opposed by Bland, Harrison, and Pendleton, three of the delegates of Virginia in congress, and by Nicholas, who had been among the most resolute in the preceding May. The thought of an actual conflict in arms with England was new; they counted on the influence of the friends of liberty in the parent country, the interposition of the manufac turing interests, or the relenting of the sovereign himself. "Are we ready for war?" they asked; "are we a military people? Where are our stores, our soldiers, our generals, our money? We are defenceless; yet we talk of war against one of the most formidable nations in the world. It will be time enough to resort to measures of despair when every well-founded hope has vanished." "What," rejoined Henry, "has there been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years to Mar. CHAP. justify hope? Are fleets and armies necessary to a XXV. work of love and reconciliation? These are the imple1775. ments of subjugation, sent over to rivet upon us the Mar. chains which the British ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? We have been trying that for the last ten years; have we any thing new to offer? Shall we resort to entreaty and supplication? We have petitioned-we have remonstrated-we have supplicated-and we have been spurned from the foot of the throne. In vain may we indulge the fond hope of reconciliation. There is no longer room for hope. If we wish to be free, we must fight! I repeat it sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of Hosts is all that is left us! "They tell me, that we are weak; but shall we gather strength by irresolution? We are not weak. Three millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. We shall not fight alone. A just God presides over the destinies of nations; and will raise up friends for us. The battle is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat, but in submission and slavery. The war is inevitable-and let it come! let it come! "Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God!-I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death." XXV. His transfigured features glowed as he spoke, and CHAP. his words fell like a doom of fate. He was supported by Richard Henry Lee, who made an estimate of the 1775. April. force which Britain could employ against the colonies, and after comparing it with their means of resistance, proclaimed, that the auspices were good; adding, that Thrice is he armed, who hath his quarrel just! The resolutions were adopted. To give them effect, a committee was raised, consisting of Patrick Henry, Richard Henry Lee, Washington, Jefferson, and others, who in a few days reported a plan for the establishment of a well-regulated militia by forming in every county one or more volunteer companies and troops of horse, to be in constant training and readiness to act on any emergency. Whatever doubts had been before expressed, the plan was unanimously accepted. Nicholas would even have desired the more energetic measure of organizing an army. The convention also voted to encourage the manufacture of woollen, cotton, and linen; of gunpowder; of salt, and iron, and steel; and recommended to the inhabitants to use colonial manufactures in preference to all others. Before dissolving their body, they elected their former delegates to the general congress, in May, adding to the number Thomas Jefferson, "in case of the non-attendance of Peyton Randolph." To intimidate the Virginians, Dunmore issued various proclamations, and circulated a rumor that he would excite an insurrection of their slaves. He also sent a body of marines in the night preceding the twenty-first of April, to carry off the gunpowder, stored at Williamsburg in the colony's magazine. The party CHAP. Succeeded; but as soon as it was known, drums were XXV. sent through the city to alarm the inhabitants, the 1775. independent company got under arms, and the 21. people assembled for consultation. At their instance April the mayor and corporation asked the governor upon what motives the powder had been carried off privately "by an armed force, particularly at a time when they were apprehensive of an insurrection among their slaves ;" and they peremptorily demanded that it should be restored. The governor at first answered evasively; but on hearing that the citizens had reassembled under arms, he abandoned himself to passion. "The whole country," said he, " can easily be made a solitude, and by the living God! if any insult is offered to me, or those who have obeyed my orders, I will declare freedom to the slaves, and lay the town in ashes." The offer of freedom to the negroes came very oddly from the representative of the nation which had sold them to their present masters, and of the king who had been displeased with the colony for its desire to tolerate that inhuman traffic no longer; and it was but a sad resource for a commercial metropolis, to keep a hold on its colony by letting loose slaves against its own colonists. The seizure of the powder startled Virginia. "This first public insult is not to be tamely submitted to," wrote Hugh Mercer and others from Fredericksburg to Washington; and they proposed, as a body of light-horsemen, to march to Williamsburg for the honor of Virginia. Gloucester county would have the powder restored. The Henrico committee would be content with nothing less. Bedford offered XXV. a premium for the manufacture of gunpowder. The CHAP. independent company of Dumfries could be depended upon for any service which respected the liberties of 1775. April. America. The Albemarle volunteers "were ready to resent arbitrary power, or die in the attempt." "I expect the magistrates of Williamsburg, on their allegiance," such was Dunmore's message, "to stop the march of the people now on their way, before they enter this city; otherwise it is my fixed purpose to arm all my own negroes, and receive and declare free all others that will come to me. I do enjoin the magistrates and all loyal subjects, to repair to my assistance, or I shall consider the whole country in rebellion, and myself at liberty to annoy it by every possible means; and I shall not hesitate at reducing houses to ashes, and spreading devastation wherever I can reach." To the secretary of state he wrote: "With a small body of troops and arms, I could raise such a force from among Indians, negroes, and other persons, as would soon reduce the refractory people of this colony to obedience." On Saturday, the twenty-ninth of April, there were at Fredericksburg upwards of six hundred well armed men. A council of one hundred and two weighed the moderating advice received from Washington and Peyton Randolph, and they agreed to disperse; yet not till they had pledged to each other their lives and fortunes, to reassemble at a moment's warning, and by force of arms to defend the law, the liberty, and rights of Virginia, or any sister colony, from unjust and wicked invasion. Did they forebode that the message from a sister colony was already on the wing? |