ffairs were conducted much
as the local justices saw fit. The Assembly of 1659 even authorized free
trade with the Indians by anyone in any goods--even guns and ammunition.
Never before had regulation on a point of such vital interest to the
security of the colony been so utterly abandoned.

RECALL OF SIR WILLIAM BERKELEY BY THE ASSEMBLY, 1659-1660

Soon after the Assembly of March 1659 ended, Richard Cromwell resigned
the reins of government in England. The English nation was again plunged
into turmoil. Letters arriving in Virginia spoke of the people divided
"some for one Government some for another." The prospect of London
"burned into Ashes and the streets running with blood" was held a
likely outcome of the divisions.

In the midst of this troublous situation, Governor Mathews died. The
next Assembly met in March 1660. In a move that has astonished
historians since that time it asked Sir William Berkeley, the royal
Governor whom its former leaders had deposed, to govern Virginia again.
No royal banners were unfurled; Charles II was not proclaimed King. The
House of Burgesses, holding the supreme power in the colony, merely
offered the governorship to the man who had been universally admired for
his justice, humanity, and willingness to sacrifice his own interest to
that of the colony.

Berkeley had been unwilling to disavow his loyalty to the Crown in 1652
and he was not prepared to do so now. He replied to the Burgesses'
invitation by saying that he would not dare to offend the King by
accepting a commission to govern from any power in England opposed to
him. He urged them to choose instead a more vigorous man from amongst
their own number. But he did offer to accept the governorship directly
from the House of Burgesses if the Council would concur with the
Burgesses in offering it to him. He promised that if thereafter any
supreme power in England succeeded in re-establishing its authority in
Virginia he would immediately lay down his commission and "will live
most submissively obedient to any power God shall set over me, as the
experience of eight yeares have shewed I have done." He would not refuse
their call, he wrote, if they accepted his conditions, for "I should be
worthily thought hospitall mad, if I would not change povertie for
wealth,--contempt for honor."

The Council on March 21, 1660, unanimously concurred in the Burgesses'
choice of Berkeley as Governor, and the King's loyal servant was
there