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299 Appendix A Behn found a model for her protagonist in the eight-page quarto pamphlet Strange News from Virginia (1677; Unknown 1993a), and its sequel More News from Virginia (1677; Unknown 1993b). Another likely source is the Report of the King’s Commission of 1677. This commission was sent to Virginia by Charles II and consisted of Sir John Berry, Herbert Jeffreys, and Francis Moryson. The Report of the King’s Commission is known officially by two titles: either A True Narrative of the Rise, Progress, and Cessation of the Late Rebellion in Virginia, Most Humbly and Impartially Reported by his Majestyes Commissioners Appointed to Enquire into the Affairs of the Said Colony (Berry, Jeffreys, and Moryson 1993), or more simply “A True Narrative of the Late Rebellion in Virginia, by the Royal Commissioners , 1677.” The historical Bacon was an English gentleman who had immigrated into the colony around 1673 and was appointed to the council in Jamestown. Under the auspices of Governor Berkeley, the council was intent on maintaining a diplomatic relationship with the Indians. However, the planters on the frontier were in frequent skirmishes with the Indians and wanted to take matters into their own hands rather than entrust their security to official colonial policy. They found a sympathizer and commander in Bacon. He attacked the Indians before receiving his commission, which had been delayed by the governor. Bacon was stamped a traitor. While the governor was waiting for reinforcements in order to oppose the rebel, Bacon won another victory against the Indians. When the governor’s troops finally did arrive, Bacon defeated them, burned Jamestown, and then suddenly died in 1676. Strange News depicts Bacon as a man with admirable qualities gone bad. He initially went against the Indians in order to revenge the killing of his servant, but his success filled him with personal ambitions of greatness in violation of loyalty to the crown (Unknown 1993a, 166, 169). The 300 | Appendix A pamphlet is a brief account of the rise and fall of Bacon in Virginia. It succinctly describes Bacon’s personality and family and seeks to explain what changed this man of “great natural parts” into a sinful rebel “against that prudent and established Government, ordered by his Majesty of Great Brittain to be duly observed in that Continent.” The moral lesson is clear: “alas, when men have been once flushed or entred with vice, how hard it is for them to leave it, especially if it tends towards ambition or greatness, which is the general lust of a large Soul” (1993a, 169–70). The account makes clear that Behn must have invented the romantic scene in which Bacon takes poison after accidentally killing his beloved Indian queen; in real life, “Providence was pleased to let him dye a Natural death in his Bed” (1993a, 171). Several critics hold Strange News to be the historical basis for The Widow Ranter: Montague Summers (1967, 4:218); Frederick M. Link (1968, 80); and Anne Witmer and John Freehafer (1968, 11-12). For similar discussions of Behn’s source, see Bertha M. Stearns (1944, 165); Woodcock (1948, 215); and Wilcomb E. Washburn (1957, 3). However, some later critics suggest that even more similarities than those between The Widow Ranter and Strange News can be found when Behn’s play is compared with the commissioners’ report. Charles L. Batten Jr. thus points to the scene in which Hazard, newly arrived from England, meets his old companion Friendly, and they gradually turn to discussing the political and military situation in the colony. Friendly suggests that the colony needs men of courage, “for at this time the Indians, by our ill Management of Trade, whom we have armed against our selves, very frequently make War upon us with our own Weapons; though often coming by the worst, they are forced to make Peace with us again, but so, as upon every turn they fall to massacring us wherever we lie exposed to them” (Act 1, Scene 1, p. 214). The commissioners’ report makes the same complaint: “This made the People jealous that the Governor for the lucre of the Beaver and otter trade etc. with the Indians, rather sought to protect the Indians than them. Since after publick Proclamation prohibiting all trade with the Indians (they complaine) hee privately gave comission to some of this Friendes to truck with them, and that those persons furnished the Indians with Powder, Shott etc. so that they were better provided than his Majestye...

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