Portrait of Frances Culpeper Stephens Berkeley Ludwell, wife to three colonial governors
Unknown Artist, Portrait of Frances Culpeper Stephens Berkeley Ludwell, wife to three colonial governors, c. 1660. Via Wikimedia Commons.
Frances Culpeper was born in Kent, England in 1634. She was the youngest of the five children of Thomas Culpeper and Katherine St. Leger Culpeper. There is not much recorded information about her childhood, but she grew up in a wealthy family. Thomas was a respected lawyer and Katherine was the daughter of a knight. Given her family’s status, it is likely that Frances received a private education as a young girl.
Thomas was a member of the Virginia Company of London, a joint stock company founded by King James I in London in 1606. The goal of the company was to establish an English colony in North America. Members of the Company raised money for settlements and shared the profits. This allowed the king to benefit from colonization without using government money.
The Virginia Company founded the Virginia Colony in North America. Around 1650 Thomas and Katherine decided to move their family to the new colony. Frances made the long journey across the Atlantic Ocean and settled into a life very different from the one she had left behind. As the daughter of a Virginia Company member, Frances was well placed to make an advantageous marriage. In 1652 or 1653, when she was around eighteen years old, Francis married Captain Samuel Stephens. Samuel was born and raised in Virginia, the son of colony leaders. He owned a significant amount of land in Virginia and what eventually became the Carolinas. Before their wedding, Samuel agreed to make Frances his heir.
Samuel became the governor of Albemarle County in 1667, but he died only two years later. Frances and Samuel never had any children together, so she inherited all of his property. In English common law, a legal practice known as coverture meant that married women had no legal identity of their own, and could not enter into contracts or own property. A woman’s legal identity was covered by her husband’s. However, widows could inherit and manage property from their spouses. Samuel’s death made Frances a wealthy woman. But upper-class women like Frances were expected to be married, so Frances did not wait long before marrying again.
Frances’s property and family connections made her a desirable woman. Within six months of Samuel’s death, she married the governor of the entire Virginia Colony, Sir William Berkeley. This marriage elevated Frances to the status of noblewoman. She was now able to use the title “Lady” and, as the wife of the governor, exercise a great deal of influence with the colony’s most elite circles.
Frances and William lived at Green Spring Plantation near Jamestown. The brick home was the first house in the English colonies to have a large central entrance hall and staircase. Frances and William entertained Virginia politicians on a regular basis. But not everyone in the colony was happy with William’s leadership. His marriage was a frequent source of criticism for his political opponents because William was twice Frances’s age.
Frances’s property and family connections made her a desirable woman.
In 1676 a group of colonists led by Nathaniel Bacon rose up against William because he refused their demand to drive Native Americans out of the Virginia Colony. This uprising is now known as Bacon’s Rebellion. Frances publicly supported her husband during the rebellion, becoming a popular figure among William’s supporters. But William’s enemies criticized her for expressing political opinions, which was generally frowned upon for women at the time. Their criticisms did not deter Frances. In June 1676 she traveled to London as William’s personal representative to King James I. She asked the king to support William against his enemies.
Frances’s plea succeeded. In early 1677 she returned to Virginia with 1,000 English soldiers under the command of Herbert Jeffreys, who was tasked with investigating and putting down the rebellion against William. Herbert managed to end the conflict, but the crisis demonstrated that William did not have the respect of the colonists of Virginia. Herbert was appointed the new governor.
In the aftermath of the rebellion, Frances secured a pardon for one of the colonists from a royal commissioner. This shows that she had significant influence over the male leaders of the colony, even as her husband’s power was fading. William returned to England to ask the king to reinstate him as governor, while Frances remained in Virginia. He died in London on July 9, 1677. In his will, he left Frances the Green Spring Plantation as well as the property that Frances inherited from her first husband.
After William’s death, Frances took an even more active role in Virginia politics. She led a political group named the “Green Spring” faction that met regularly at her home. Their primary goal was to preserve the rights and freedoms of English colonists as the government in England tried to assert its rule over the American colonies. It became the most influential political group in the colony until 1680, when another new governor was appointed.
Frances married Philip Ludwell, the secretary of the Virginia colony, around 1680. They continued to live in Virginia, and Frances remained an influential figure in Virginia society. The couple did not have children, but Frances did help raise two children from Philip’s previous marriage, and she supported Philip when he served as the governor of Carolina from 1689 to 1693. Frances died around 1695 in Virginia. She is buried on Jamestown Island.
Vocabulary
- coverture: A common law practice where women fell under the legal and economic oversight of their husbands upon marriage.
- joint stock company: A business that is owned by its investors, who all own a share of the company based on how much money they invested.
- royal commissioner: An official representing the interests of the king or queen.
- Virginia Company: The English trading company established by the king to settle in North America.
Discussion Questions
- How did Lady Frances Berkeley rise to power in colonial Virginia?
- What role did Lady Frances Berkeley play during Bacon’s Rebellion? Why was her participation unusual?
- What does Lady Frances Berkeley’s story reveal about the lives of wealthy and powerful women in colonial Virginia?
Suggested Activities
- APUSH Connection: 2.3 The Regions of British Colonies
- Include this life story in a lesson about colonial Virginia and/or Bacon’s Rebellion. Her story shows how certain women had the ability to influence politics and society in spite of the limitations placed on them by coverture.
- Pair this life story with Life Story: Margaret Brent, another English woman of nobility who moved to the American colonies. What do their stories have in common? How did their choice to marry or not marry impact their lives?
- Combine this life story with Life Story: Cockacoeske and Life Story: Elizabeth Key Grinstead to consider the varying experiences of women of different racial backgrounds in colonial Virginia.
- For a larger lesson on the experiences of women in the Chesapeake colonies, combine this resource with the following:
Themes
POWER AND POLITICS
