Robert Beverley emigrated from Yorkshire to Virginia in 1663, and since the surname Beverley is frequently encountered in Yorkshire it has not been possible to determine with certainty his town of origin. While it is possible that he had been married and had lost a first wife in England, in 1666 he married Mary, the widow of a Virginia planter, George Keeble of Lancaster. Together they had three sons and a daughter before Mary died in June 1678. Ten months after Mary's death, Robert married again, this time Catharine Hone, widow of Theophilus Hone of James City County, with whom he had four sons and a daughter.
Upon arriving he settled in Middlesex County and soon became prominent in local affairs. He was elected Clerk of the House of Burgesses in 1670 and was a Justice of Middlesex County by 1673. In his own words written in 1683 he said "From the year 1668 to the year 1676, I served his Majesty in military and civil offices of trust with fidelity and approbation.

In 1676 with the occurrence of Bacon's Rebellion, Robert Beverley assumed a highly visible role in restoring order in the colony. He was cited by name in one of Bacon's early proclamations as a wicked councillor of the Governor. Subsequent to the burning of Jamestown, the flight of Governor Berkeley to the Eastern Shore, and the death in October 1676 of Bacon due to fever, Beverley was

charged by Berkeley with suppressing the insurgents. He captured a number of the rebel leaders very quickly, and in November 1676 was commissioned by Governor Berkeley to be commander of all his forces. This commission praising his loyalty, circumspection and courage contains the earliest surviving record of the use of Beverley's title of Major.
 

   In the spring of 1682 dissatisfaction arose over the low price of tobacco due to a glut on the market. When efforts to legislate a constraint on tobacco planting failed, a number of persons cut down tobacco plants in Gloucester County. As Beverley had been a leader in calling for a cessation in planting, and

the government feared anything similar to a rebellion, he was arrested and imprisoned aboard a ship. In response to letters to London, the king ordered in June 1682 that Beverley be put out of all his employment: Clerk of the House, attorney, surveyor and deputy auditor general.

In a complicated sequence of events he escaped and went home, was confined again, charged with many petty offenses, and finally released on a year's probation. When the "plant cutters" were pardoned, Beverley by name was one of those excepted. After a year's quiet and an abject apology to the Council, he was finally pardoned whereupon he was again elected Clerk of the House. When the new governor, Lord Howard of Effingham, demanded of the House authority to lay a new tax there was renewed conflict. James II, frustrated and perceiving Beverley to be a leader in opposition, directed on August 1, 1686 that he be declared incapable of holding any office in the colony. Beverley's old friend Philip Ludwell then arranged that his oldest son, Peter, be given his father's place as surveyor. Robert Beverley died in 1687, in the opinion of many due to these persecutions. Many of his sons were very prominent in later years.

References: 
"Robert Beverley and His Descendants",  Virginia Magazine of History
         and Biography, Vol 2, p405
"The Beverley Family of Virginia", by John McGill; R L Bryan Co, Columbia, SC, 1956

Nov 03