They made a sally, the ladies being removed, but to very little purpose; and two or three days afterwards, being impatient for plunder, the followers of the governor “embarked in the night, secretly weighing anchor, and dropping silently down the river,” fled from an enemy greatly inferior to themselves in number, and who, while lying outside the walls, had been exposed to hardships much severer than their own. Berkeley also fled, accompanied by the inhabitants and their goods, thus leaving Jamestown open to the insurgents. The next morning Bacon entered; it was reported that the governor had only fled to join a party of royalists who were advancing from the north. He determined therefore to burn the town, to prevent its becoming a harbour to the enemy; and Drummond and Lawrence, who were with Bacon, not only counselled this desperate measure, but themselves set fire to their own houses, which were the best in the town after the governor’s. The number of houses, however, was small, amounting to about eighteen; but the church, the oldest in America, and the newly-erected State-house, were consumed likewise, “the ruins of the church-tower and the memorials in the adjoining grave yard being all that now remain to point out to the stranger where once Jamestown stood.” Leaving the smoking ruins of Jamestown, Bacon marched to meet Colonel Brent, who was advancing from the Potomac with 1,200 men. No battle ensued, however, for the greater number of these deserted the royalist cause, and Bacon, advancing to Gloucester, called a convention and administered an oath to the people, swearing them to the cause of popular liberty. The whole of Virginia, with the exception of the eastern shore, was now revolutionised. Berkeley had again fled to Accomac. At this important moment, Bacon, who had inhaled disease on the marshes of Jamestown, suddenly fell sick, and on the 1st of October died, leaving the great cause of the people without a leader. His death wrung the popular heart; despair fell on all, for there was no one to finish his work. The place of his interment was never known; it was concealed even from the body of his partisans, lest his remains should be insulted by the vindictive Berkeley. According to one tradition his friend Lawrence secretly buried him, laying stones upon his coffin; others maintain that his body was sunk in the deep waters of the majestic York River; and this is by no means improbable.