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diff --git a/8432-8.txt b/8432-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8eee301 --- /dev/null +++ b/8432-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4066 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Black Rebellion, by Thomas Wentworth Higginson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Black Rebellion + Five Slave Revolts + +Author: Thomas Wentworth Higginson + + +Release Date: July, 2005 [EBook #8432] +This file was first posted on July 9, 2003 +Last updated: April 29, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACK REBELLION *** + + + + +Produced by Eric Eldred, Thomas Berger, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + + + + +BLACK REBELLION: FIVE SLAVE REVOLTS + +From Travellers and Outlaws + +Episodes In American History + + +By Thomas Wentworth Higginson + + +With An Appendix Of Authorities + + + +[Transcriber's note: This text contains five chapters of T.W. Higgison's +'Travellers and Outlaws'. This collection is commonly referred to as +'Black Rebellion: five slave revolts'.] + + + + +AUTHOR'S NOTE: + +The author would express his thanks to the proprietors and editors of the +_Atlantic Monthly_, _Harper's Magazine_, and the _Century_, for their +permission to reprint such portions of this volume as were originally +published in those periodicals. + +CAMBRIDGE, MASS. + + + +CONTENTS. + +THE MAROONS OF JAMAICA + +THE MAROONS OF SURINAM + +GABRIEL'S DEFEAT + +DENMARK VESEY + +NAT TURNER'S INSURRECTION + +APPENDIX + + + + + +THE MAROONS OF JAMAICA + + +The Maroons! it was a word of peril once; and terror spread along the +skirts of the blue mountains of Jamaica when some fresh foray of those +unconquered guerrillas swept down from the outlying plantations, startled +the Assembly from its order, Gen. Williamson from his billiards, and Lord +Balcarres from his diplomatic ease,--endangering, according to the +official statement, "public credit," "civil rights," and "the prosperity, +if not the very existence, of the country," until they were "persuaded to +make peace" at last. They were the Circassians of the New World, but they +were black, instead of white; and as the Circassians refused to be +transferred from the Sultan to the Czar, so the Maroons refused to be +transferred from Spanish dominion to English, and thus their revolt +began. The difference is, that while the white mountaineers numbered four +hundred thousand, and only defied Nicholas, the black mountaineers +numbered less than two thousand, and defied Cromwell; and while the +Circassians, after years of revolt, were at last subdued, the Maroons, on +the other hand, who rebelled in 1655, were never conquered, but only made +a compromise of allegiance, and exist as a separate race to-day. + +When Admirals Penn and Venables landed in Jamaica, in 1655, there was not +a remnant left of the sixty thousand natives whom the Spaniards had found +there a century and a half before. Their pitiful tale is told only by +those caves, still known among the mountains, where thousands of human +skeletons strew the ground. In their place dwelt two foreign races,--an +effeminate, ignorant, indolent white community of fifteen hundred, with a +black slave population quite as large and infinitely more hardy and +energetic. The Spaniards were readily subdued by the English: the negroes +remained unsubdued. The slaveholders were banished from the island: the +slaves only exiled themselves to the mountains; thence the English could +not dislodge them, nor the buccaneers whom the English employed. And when +Jamaica subsided into a British colony, and peace was made with Spain, +and the children of Cromwell's Puritan soldiers were beginning to grow +rich by importing slaves for Roman-Catholic Spaniards, the Maroons still +held their own wild empire in the mountains, and, being sturdy heathens +every one, practised Obeah rites in approved pagan fashion. + +The word Maroon is derived, according to one etymology, from the Spanish +word _Marrano_, a wild boar,--these fugitives being all boar-hunters; +according to another, from _Marony_, a river separating French and Dutch +Guiana, where a colony of them dwelt and still dwells; and by another +still, from _Cimarron_, a word meaning untamable, and used alike for apes +and runaway slaves. But whether these rebel marauders were regarded as +monkeys or men, they made themselves equally formidable. As early as +1663, the Governor and Council of Jamaica offered to each Maroon, who +should surrender, his freedom and twenty acres of land; but not one +accepted the terms. During forty years, forty-four Acts of Assembly were +passed in respect to them, and at least a quarter of a million pounds +sterling were expended in the warfare against them. In 1733, the force +employed in this service consisted of two regiments of regular troops, +and the whole militia of the island; but the Assembly said that "the +Maroons had within a few years greatly increased, notwithstanding all the +measures that had been concerted for their suppression," "to the great +terror of his Majesty's subjects," and "to the manifest weakening and +preventing the further increase of strength and inhabitants of the +island." + +The special affair in progress, at the time of these statements, was +called Cudjoe's War. Cudjoe was a gentleman of extreme brevity and +blackness, whose full-length portrait can hardly be said to adorn +Dallas's History of the Maroons; but he was as formidable a guerrilla as +Marion. Under his leadership, the various bodies of fugitives were +consolidated into one force, and thoroughly organized. Cudjoe, like +Schamyl, was religious as well as military head of his people; by Obeah +influence he established a thorough freemasonry among both slaves and +insurgents; no party could be sent forth, by the government, but he knew +it in time to lay an ambush, or descend with fire and sword on the region +left unprotected. He was thus always supplied with arms and ammunition; +and as his men were perfect marksmen, never wasted a shot, and never +risked a battle, his forces naturally increased, while those of his +opponents were decimated. His men were never captured, and never took a +prisoner; it was impossible to tell when they were defeated; in dealing +with them, as Pelissier said of the Arabs, "peace was not purchased by +victory;" and the only men who could obtain the slightest advantage +against them were the imported Mosquito Indians, or the "Black Shot," a +company of Government negroes. For nine full years this particular war +continued unchecked, Gen. Williamson ruling Jamaica by day and Cudjoe by +night. + +The rebels had every topographical advantage, for they held possession of +the "Cockpits." Those highlands are furrowed through and through, as by +an earthquake, with a series of gaps or ravines, resembling the +California cañons, or those similar fissures in various parts of the +Atlantic States, known to local fame either poetically as ice-glens, or +symbolically as purgatories. These Jamaica chasms vary from two hundred +yards to a mile in length; the rocky walls are fifty or a hundred feet +high, and often absolutely inaccessible, while the passes at each end +admit but one man at a time. They are thickly wooded, wherever trees can +grow; water flows within them; and they often communicate with one +another, forming a series of traps for an invading force. Tired and +thirsty with climbing, the weary soldiers toil on, in single file, +without seeing or hearing an enemy, up the steep and winding path they +traverse one "cockpit," then enter another. Suddenly a shot is fired from +the dense and sloping forest on the right, then another and another, each +dropping its man; the startled troops face hastily in that direction, +when a more murderous volley is poured from the other side; the heights +above flash with musketry, while the precipitous path by which they came +seems to close in fire behind them. By the time the troops have formed in +some attempt at military order, the woods around them are empty, and +their agile and noiseless foes have settled themselves into ambush again, +farther up the defile, ready for a second attack, if needed. But one is +usually sufficient; disordered, exhausted, bearing their wounded with +them, the soldiers retreat in panic, if permitted to escape at all, and +carry fresh dismay to the barracks, the plantations, and the Government +House. + +It is not strange, then, that high military authorities, at that period, +should have pronounced the subjugation of the Maroons a thing more +difficult than to obtain a victory over any army in Europe. Moreover, +these people were fighting for their liberty, with which aim no form of +warfare seemed to them unjustifiable; and the description given by +Lafayette of the American Revolution was true of this one,--"the grandest +of causes, won by contests of sentinels and outposts." The utmost hope of +a British officer, ordered against the Maroons, was to lay waste a +provision-ground, or cut them off from water. But there was little +satisfaction in this: the wild-pine leaves and the grapevine-withes +supplied the rebels with water; and their plantation-grounds were the +wild pineapple and the plantain-groves, and the forests, where the wild +boars harbored, and the ringdoves were as easily shot as if they were +militiamen. Nothing but sheer weariness of fighting seems to have brought +about a truce at last, and then a treaty, between those high contracting +parties, Cudjoe and Gen. Williamson. + +But how to execute a treaty between these wild Children of the Mist and +respectable diplomatic Englishmen? To establish any official relations +without the medium of a preliminary bullet, required some ingenuity of +manoeuvring. Cudjoe was willing, but inconveniently cautious: he would +not come halfway to meet any one; nothing would content him but an +interview in his own chosen cockpit. So he selected one of the most +difficult passes, posting in the forests a series of outlying parties, to +signal with their horns, one by one, the approach of the +plenipotentiaries, and then to retire on the main body. Through this line +of dangerous sentinels, therefore, Col. Guthrie and his handful of men +bravely advanced; horn after horn they heard sounded, but there was no +other human noise in the woods, and they had advanced till they saw the +smoke of the Maroon huts before they caught a glimpse of a human form. + +A conversation was at last opened with the invisible rebels. On their +promise of safety, Dr. Russell advanced alone to treat with them; then +several Maroons appeared, and finally Cudjoe himself. The formidable +chief was not highly military in appearance, being short, fat, +humpbacked, dressed in a tattered blue coat without skirts or sleeves, +and an old felt hat without a rim. But if he had blazed with regimental +scarlet, he could not have been treated with more distinguished +consideration; indeed, in that case, "the exchange of hats" with which +Dr. Russell finally volunteered, in Maroon fashion, to ratify +negotiations, might have been a less severe test of good fellowship. This +fine stroke of diplomacy had its effect, however; the rebel captains +agreed to a formal interview with Col. Guthrie and Capt. Sadler, and a +treaty was at last executed with all due solemnity, under a large +cotton-tree at the entrance of Guthrie's Defile. This treaty recognized +the military rank of "Capt. Cudjoe," "Capt. Accompong," and the rest; +gave assurance that the Maroons should be "forever hereafter in a perfect +state of freedom and liberty;" ceded to them fifteen hundred acres of +land; and stipulated only that they should keep the peace, should harbor +no fugitive from justice or from slavery, and should allow two white +commissioners to remain among them, simply to represent the British +Government. + +During the following year a separate treaty was made with another large +body of insurgents, called the Windward Maroons. This was not effected, +however, until after an unsuccessful military attempt, in which the +mountaineers gained a signal triumph. By artful devices,--a few fires +left burning with old women to watch them,--a few provision-grounds +exposed by clearing away the bushes,--they lured the troops far up among +the mountains, and then surprised them by an ambush. The militia all +fled, and the regulars took refuge under a large cliff in a stream, where +they remained four hours up to their waists in water, until finally they +forded the river, under full fire, with terrible loss. Three months after +this, however, the Maroons consented to an amicable interview, exchanging +hostages first. The position of the white hostage, at least, was not the +most agreeable; he complained that he was beset by the women and children +with indignant cries of "Buckra, Buckra," while the little boys pointed +their fingers at him as if stabbing him, and that with evident relish. +However, Capt. Quao, like Capt. Cudjoe, made a treaty at last; and hats +were interchanged, instead of hostages. + +Independence being thus won and acknowledged, there was a suspension of +hostilities for some years. Among the wild mountains of Jamaica, the +Maroons dwelt in a savage freedom. So healthful and beautiful was the +situation of their chief town, that the English Government has erected +barracks there of late years, as being the most salubrious situation on +the island. They breathed an air ten degrees cooler than that inhaled by +the white population below; and they lived on a daintier diet, so that +the English epicures used to go up among them for good living. The +mountaineers caught the strange land-crabs, plodding in companies of +millions their sidelong path from mountain to ocean, and from ocean to +mountain again. They hunted the wild boars, and prepared the flesh by +salting and smoking it in layers of aromatic leaves, the delicious +"jerked hog" of buccaneer annals. They reared cattle and poultry, +cultivated corn and yams, plantains and cocoas, guavas, and papaws and +mameys, and avocados, and all luxurious West-Indian fruits; the very +weeds of their orchards had tropical luxuriance in their fragrance and in +their names; and from the doors of their little thatched huts they looked +across these gardens of delight to the magnificent lowland forests, and +over those again to the faint line of far-off beach, the fainter +ocean-horizon, and the illimitable sky. + +They had senses like those of American Indians; tracked each other by the +smell of the smoke of fires in the air, and called to each other by +horns, using a special note to designate each of their comrades, and +distinguishing it beyond the range of ordinary hearing. They spoke +English diluted with Spanish and African words, and practised Obeah rites +quite undiluted with Christianity. Of course they associated largely with +the slaves, without any very precise regard to treaty stipulations; +sometimes brought in fugitives, and sometimes concealed them; left their +towns and settled on the planters lands when they preferred them: but +were quite orderly and luxuriously happy. During the formidable +insurrection of the Koromantyn slaves, in 1760, they played a dubious +part. When left to go on their own way, they did something towards +suppressing it; but when placed under the guns of the troops, and ordered +to fire on those of their own color, they threw themselves on the ground +without discharging a shot. Nevertheless, they gradually came up into +reputable standing; they grew more and more industrious and steady; and +after they had joined very heartily in resisting D'Estaing's threatened +invasion of the island in 1779, it became the fashion to speak of "our +faithful and affectionate Maroons." + +In 1795, their position was as follows: Their numbers had not materially +increased, for many had strayed off and settled on the outskirts of +plantations; nor materially diminished, for many runaway slaves had +joined them; while there were also separate settlements of fugitives, who +had maintained their freedom for twenty years. The white superintendents +had lived with the Maroons in perfect harmony, without the slightest +official authority, but with a great deal of actual influence. But there +was an "irrepressible conflict" behind all this apparent peace, and the +slightest occasion might, at any moment, revive all the old terror. That +occasion was close at hand. + +Capt. Cudjoe and Capt. Accompong, and the other founders of Maroon +independence, had passed away; and "Old Montagu" reigned in their stead, +in Trelawney Town. Old Montagu had all the pomp and circumstance of +Maroon majesty: he wore a laced red coat, and a hat superb with gold lace +and plumes; none but captains could sit in his presence; he was helped +first at meals, and no woman could eat beside him; he presided at +councils as magnificently as at table, though with less appetite; and +possessed, meanwhile, not an atom of the love or reverence of any human +being. The real power lay entirely with Major James, the white +superintendent, who had been brought up among the Maroons by his father +(and predecessor), and who was the idol of this wild race. In an evil +hour, the Government removed him, and put a certain unpopular Capt. +Craskell in his place; and as there happened to be, about the same time, +a great excitement concerning a hopeful pair of young Maroons, who had +been seized and publicly whipped on a charge of hog-stealing, their +kindred refused to allow the new superintendent to remain in the town. A +few attempts at negotiation only brought them to a higher pitch of wrath, +which ended in their despatching the following peculiar diplomatic note +to the Earl of Balcarres: "The Maroons wishes nothing else from the +country but battle, and they desires not to see Mr. Craskell up here at +all. So they are waiting every moment for the above on Monday. Mr. David +Schaw will see you on Sunday morning for an answer. They will wait till +Monday, nine o'clock, and if they don't come up, they will come down +themselves." Signed, "Col. Montagu and all the rest." + +It turned out, at last, that only two or three of the Maroons were +concerned in this remarkable defiance; but meanwhile it had its effect. +Several ambassadors were sent among the insurgents, and were so favorably +impressed by their reception as to make up a subscription of money for +their hosts, on departing; only the "gallant Col. Gallimore," a Jamaica +Camillus, gave iron instead of gold, by throwing some bullets into the +contribution-box. And it was probably in accordance with his view of the +subject, that, when the Maroons sent ambassadors in return, they were at +once imprisoned, most injudiciously and unjustly; and when Old Montagu +himself and thirty-seven others, following, were seized and imprisoned +also, it is not strange that the Maroons, joined by many slaves, were +soon in open insurrection. + +Martial law was instantly proclaimed throughout the island. The fighting +men among the insurgents were not, perhaps, more than five hundred; +against whom the Government could bring nearly fifteen hundred regular +troops and several thousand militiamen. Lord Balcarres himself took the +command, and, eager to crush the affair, promptly marched a large force +up to Trelawney Town, and was glad to march back again as expeditiously +as possible. In his very first attack, he was miserably defeated, and had +to fly for his life, amid a perfect panic of the troops, in which some +forty or fifty were killed,--including Col. Sandford, commanding the +regulars, and the bullet-loving Col. Gallimore, in command of the +militia,--while not a single Maroon was even wounded, so far as could be +ascertained. + +After this a good deal of bush-fighting took place. The troops gradually +got possession of several Maroon villages, but not till every hut had +been burnt by its owner. It was in the height of the rainy season; and, +between fire and water, the discomfort of the soldiers was enormous. +Meanwhile the Maroons hovered close around them in the woods, heard all +their orders, picked off their sentinels, and, penetrating through their +lines at night, burned houses and destroyed plantations far below. The +only man who could cope with their peculiar tactics was Major James, the +superintendent just removed by Government; and his services were not +employed, as he was not trusted. On one occasion, however, he led a +volunteer party farther into the mountains than any of the assailants had +yet penetrated, guided by tracks known to himself only, and by the smell +of the smoke of Maroon fires. After a very exhausting march, including a +climb of a hundred and fifty feet up the face of a precipice, he brought +them just within the entrance of Guthrie's Defile. "So far," said he, +pointing to the entrance, "you may pursue, but no farther; no force can +enter here; no white man except myself, or some soldier of the Maroon +establishment, has ever gone beyond this. With the greatest difficulty I +have penetrated four miles farther, and not ten Maroons have gone so far +as that. There are two other ways of getting into the defile, practicable +for the Maroons, but not for any one of you. In neither of them can I +ascend or descend with my arms, which must be handed to me, step by step, +as practised by the Maroons themselves. One of the ways lies to the +eastward, and the other to the westward; and they will take care to have +both guarded, if they suspect that I am with you; which, from the route +you have come to-day, they will. They now see you, and if you advance +fifty paces more, they will convince you of it." At this moment a Maroon +horn sounded the notes indicating his name; and, as he made no answer, a +voice was heard, inquiring if he were among them. "If he is," said the +voice, "let him go back, we do not wish to hurt him, but as for the rest +of you, come on and try battle if you choose." But the gentlemen did not +choose. + +In September the House of Assembly met. Things were looking worse and +worse. For five months a handful of negroes and mulattoes had defied the +whole force of the island, and they were defending their liberty by +precisely the same tactics through which their ancestors had won it. Half +a million pounds sterling had been spent within this time, besides the +enormous loss incurred by the withdrawal of so many able-bodied men from +their regular employments. "Cultivation was suspended," says an +eye-witness; "the courts of law had long been shut up; and the island at +large seemed more like a garrison under the power of law-martial, than a +country of agriculture and commerce, of civil judicature, industry, and +prosperity." Hundreds of the militia had died of fatigue, large numbers +had been shot down, the most daring of the British officers had fallen; +while the insurgents had been invariably successful, and not one of them +was known to have been killed. Capt. Craskell, the banished +superintendent, gave it to the Assembly as his opinion, that the whole +slave population of the island was in sympathy with the Maroons, and +would soon be beyond control. More alarming still, there were rumors of +French emissaries behind the scenes; and though these were explained +away, the vague terror remained. Indeed, the lieutenant-governor +announced in his message that he had satisfactory evidence that the +French Convention was concerned in the revolt. A French prisoner, named +Murenson, had testified that the French agent at Philadelphia (Fauchet) +had secretly sent a hundred and fifty emissaries to the island, and +threatened to land fifteen hundred negroes. And though Murenson took it +all back at last, yet the Assembly was moved to make a new offer of three +hundred dollars for killing or taking a Trelawney Maroon, and a hundred +and fifty dollars for killing or taking any fugitive slave who had joined +them. They also voted five hundred pounds as a gratuity to the Accompong +tribe of Maroons, who had thus far kept out of the insurrection; and +various prizes and gratuities were also offered by the different +parishes, with the same object of self-protection. + +The commander-in-chief being among the killed, Col. Walpole was promoted +in his stead, and brevetted as general, by way of incentive. He found a +people in despair, a soldiery thoroughly intimidated, and a treasury not +empty, but useless. But the new general had not served against the +Maroons for nothing, and was not ashamed to go to school to his +opponents. First, he waited for the dry season; then he directed all his +efforts towards cutting off his opponents from water, and, most effectual +move of all, he attacked each successive cockpit by dragging up a +howitzer, with immense labor, and throwing in shells. Shells were a +visitation not dreamed of in Maroon philosophy, and their quaint +compliments to their new opponent remain on record. "Damn dat little +buckra!" they said, "he cunning more dan dem toder. Dis here da new +fashion for fight: him fire big ball arter you, and when big ball 'top, +de damn sunting [something] fire arter you again." With which Parthian +arrows of rhetoric the mountaineers retreated. + +But this did not last long. The Maroons soon learned to keep out of the +way of the shells, and the island relapsed into terror again. It was +deliberately resolved at last, by a special council convoked for the +purpose, "to persuade the rebels to make peace." But as they had not as +yet shown themselves very accessible to softer influences, it was thought +best to combine as many arguments as possible, and a certain Col. +Quarrell had hit upon a wholly new one. His plan simply was, since men, +however well disciplined, had proved powerless against Maroons, to try a +Spanish fashion against them, and use dogs. The proposition was met, in +some quarters, with the strongest hostility. England, it was said, had +always denounced the Spaniards as brutal and dastardly for hunting down +the natives of that very soil with hounds; and should England now follow +the humiliating example? On the other side, there were plenty who eagerly +quoted all known instances of zoölogical warfare: all Oriental nations, +for instance, used elephants in war, and, no doubt, would gladly use +lions and tigers also, but for their extreme carnivorousness, and their +painful indifference to the distinction between friend and foe; why not, +then, use these dogs, comparatively innocent and gentle creatures? At any +rate, "something must be done;" the final argument always used, when a +bad or desperate project is to be made palatable. So it was voted at last +to send to Havana for an invoice of Spanish dogs, with their accompanying +chasseurs; and the efforts at persuading the Maroons were postponed till +the arrival of these additional persuasives. And when Col. Quarrell +finally set sail as commissioner to obtain the new allies, all scruples +of conscience vanished in the renewal of public courage and the chorus of +popular gratitude; a thing so desirable must be right; thrice they were +armed who knew their Quarrell just. + +But after the parting notes of gratitude died away in the distance, the +commissioner began to discover that he was to have a hard time of it. He +sailed for Havana in a schooner manned with Spanish renegadoes, who +insisted on fighting every thing that came in their way,--first a Spanish +schooner, then a French one. He landed at Batabano, struck across the +mountains towards Havana, stopped at Besucal to call on the wealthy +Marquesa de San Felipe y San Jorge, grand patroness of dogs and +chasseurs, and finally was welcomed to Havana by Don Luis de las Casas, +who overlooked, for this occasion only, an injunction of his court +against admitting foreigners within his government; "the only accustomed +exception being," as Don Luis courteously assured him, "in favor of +foreign traders who came with new negroes." To be sure, the commissioner +had not brought any of these commodities; but then he had come to obtain +the means of capturing some, and so might pass for an irregular +practitioner of the privileged profession. + +Accordingly, Don Guillermo Dawes Quarrell (so ran his passport) found no +difficulty in obtaining permission from the governor to buy as many dogs +as he desired. When, however, he carelessly hinted at the necessity of +taking, also, a few men who should have care of the dogs,--this being, +after all, the essential part of his expedition,--Don Luis de las Casas +put on instantly a double force of courtesy, and assured him of the +entire impossibility of recruiting a single Spaniard for English service. +Finally, however, he gave permission and passports for six chasseurs. +Under cover of this, the commissioner lost no time in enlisting forty; he +got them safe to Batabano; but at the last moment, learning the state of +affairs, they refused to embark on such very irregular authority. When he +had persuaded them, at length, the officer of the fort interposed +objections. This was not to be borne, so Don Guillermo bribed him and +silenced him; a dragoon was, however, sent to report to the governor; Don +Guillermo sent a messenger after him, and bribed him too; and thus at +length, after myriad rebuffs, and after being obliged to spend the last +evening at a puppet-show in which the principal figure was a burlesque on +his own personal peculiarities, the weary Don Guillermo, with his crew of +renegadoes, and his forty chasseurs and their one hundred and four +muzzled dogs, set sail for Jamaica. + +These new allies were certainly something formidable, if we may trust the +pictures and descriptions in Dallas's History. The chasseur was a tall, +meagre, swarthy Spaniard or mulatto, lightly clad in cotton shirt and +drawers, with broad straw hat, and moccasins of raw-hide; his belt +sustaining his long, straight, flat sword or _machete_, like an iron bar +sharpened at one end; and he wore by the same belt three cotton leashes +for his three dogs, sometimes held also by chains. The dogs were a fierce +breed, crossed between hound and mastiff, never unmuzzled but for attack, +and accompanied by smaller dogs called _finders_. It is no wonder, when +these wild and powerful creatures were landed at Montego Bay, that terror +ran through the town, doors were everywhere closed, and windows crowded; +not a negro dared to stir; and the muzzled dogs, infuriated by +confinement on shipboard, filled the silent streets with their noisy +barking and the rattling of their chains. + +How much would have come of all this in actual conflict, does not appear. +The Maroons had already been persuaded to make peace upon certain +conditions and guaranties,--a decision probably accelerated by the +terrible rumors of the bloodhounds, though they never saw them. It was +the declared opinion of the Assembly, confirmed by that of Gen. Walpole, +that "nothing could be clearer than that, if they had been off the +island, the rebels could not have been induced to surrender." +Nevertheless, a treaty was at last made, without the direct intervention +of the quadrupeds. Again commissioners went up among the mountains to +treat with negotiators at first invisible; again were hats and jackets +interchanged, not without coy reluctance on the part of the well-dressed +Englishmen; and a solemn agreement was effected. The most essential part +of the bargain was a guaranty of continued independence, demanded by the +suspicious Maroons. Gen. Walpole, however, promptly pledged himself that +no such unfair advantage should be taken of them as had occurred with the +hostages previously surrendered, who were placed in irons; nor should any +attempt be made to remove them from the island. It is painful to add, +that this promise was outrageously violated by the Colonial Government, +to the lasting grief of Gen. Walpole, on the ground that the Maroons had +violated the treaty by a slight want of punctuality in complying with its +terms, and by remissness in restoring the fugitive slaves who had taken +refuge among them. As many of the tribe as surrendered, therefore, were +at once placed in confinement, and ultimately shipped from Port Royal to +Halifax, to the number of six hundred, on the 6th of June, 1796. For the +credit of English honor, we rejoice to know that Gen. Walpole not merely +protested against this utter breach of faith, but indignantly declined +the sword of honor which the Assembly had voted him, in its gratitude, +and then retired from military service forever. + +The remaining career of this portion of the Maroons is easily told. They +were first dreaded by the inhabitants of Halifax, then welcomed when +seen, and promptly set to work on the citadel, then in process of +reconstruction, where the "Maroon Bastion" still remains,--their only +visible memorial. Two commissioners had charge of them, one being the +redoubtable Col. Quarrell; and twenty-five thousand pounds were +appropriated for their temporary support. Of course they did not prosper; +pensioned colonists never do, for they are not compelled into habits of +industry. After their delicious life in the mountains of Jamaica, it +seemed rather monotonous to dwell upon that barren soil,--for theirs was +such that two previous colonies had deserted it,--and in a climate where +winter lasts seven months in the year. They had a schoolmaster, and he +was also a preacher; but they did not seem to appreciate that luxury of +civilization, utterly refusing, on grounds of conscience, to forsake +polygamy, and, on grounds of personal comfort, to listen to the doctrinal +discourses of their pastor, who was an ardent Sandemanian. They smoked +their pipes during service time, and left Old Montagu, who still +survived, to lend a vicarious attention to the sermon. One discourse he +briefly reported as follows, very much to the point: "Massa parson say no +mus tief, no mus meddle wid somebody wife, no mus quarrel, mus set down +softly." So they sat down very softly, and showed an extreme +unwillingness to get up again. But, not being naturally an idle race,--at +least, in Jamaica the objection lay rather on the other side,--they soon +grew tired of this inaction. Distrustful of those about them, suspicious +of all attempts to scatter them among the community at large, frozen by +the climate, and constantly petitioning for removal to a milder one, they +finally wearied out all patience. A long dispute ensued between the +authorities of Nova Scotia and Jamaica, as to which was properly +responsible for their support; and thus the heroic race, that for a +century and a half had sustained themselves in freedom in Jamaica, were +reduced to the position of troublesome and impracticable paupers, +shuttlecocks between two selfish parishes. So passed their unfortunate +lives, until, in 1800, their reduced population was transported to Sierra +Leone, at a cost of six thousand pounds; since which they disappear from +history. + +It was judged best not to interfere with those bodies of Maroons which +had kept aloof from the late outbreak, at the Accompong settlement, and +elsewhere. They continued to preserve a qualified independence, and +retain it even now. In 1835, two years after the abolition of slavery in +Jamaica, there were reported sixty families of Maroons as residing at +Accompong Town, eighty families at Moore Town, one hundred and ten +families at Charles Town, and twenty families at Scott Hall, making two +hundred and seventy families in all,--each station being, as of old, +under the charge of a superintendent. But there can be little doubt, +that, under the influences of freedom, they are rapidly intermingling +with the mass of colored population in Jamaica. + +The story of the exiled Maroons attracted attention in high quarters, in +its time: the wrongs done to them were denounced in Parliament by +Sheridan, and mourned by Wilberforce; while the employment of bloodhounds +against them was vindicated by Dundas, and the whole conduct of the +Colonial Government defended, through thick and thin, by Bryan Edwards. +This thorough partisan even had the assurance to tell Mr. Wilberforce, in +Parliament, that he knew the Maroons, from personal knowledge, to be +cannibals, and that, if a missionary were sent among them in Nova Scotia, +they would immediately eat him; a charge so absurd that he did not +venture to repeat it in his History of the West Indies, though his +injustice to the Maroons is even there so glaring as to provoke the +indignation of the more moderate Dallas. But, in spite of Mr. Edwards, +the public indignation ran quite high in England, against the bloodhounds +and their employers, so that the home ministry found it necessary to send +a severe reproof to the Colonial Government. For a few years the tales of +the Maroons thus emerged from mere colonial annals, and found their way +into annual registers and parliamentary debates; but they have long since +vanished from popular memory. Their record still retains its interest, +however, as that of one of the heroic races of the world; and all the +more, because it is with their kindred that the American nation has to +deal, in solving one of the most momentous problems of its future career. + + + + +THE MAROONS OF SURINAM. + + +When that eccentric individual, Capt. John Gabriel Stedman, resigned his +commission in the English Navy, took the oath of abjuration, and was +appointed ensign in the Scots brigade employed for two centuries by +Holland, he little knew that "their High Mightinesses the States of the +United Provinces" would send him out, within a year, to the forests of +Guiana, to subdue rebel negroes. He never imagined that the year 1773 +would behold him beneath the rainy season in a tropical country, wading +through marshes and splashing through lakes, exploring with his feet for +submerged paths, commanding impracticable troops, and commanded by an +insufferable colonel, feeding on greegree worms and fed upon by +mosquitos, howled at by jaguars, hissed at by serpents, and shot at by +those exceedingly unattainable gentlemen, "still longed for, never seen," +the Maroons of Surinam. + +Yet, as our young ensign sailed up the Surinam River, the world of tropic +beauty came upon him with enchantment. Dark, moist verdure was close +around him, rippling waters below; the tall trees of the jungle and the +low mangroves beneath were all hung with long vines and lianas, a maze of +cordage, like a fleet at anchor; lithe monkeys travelled ceaselessly up +and down these airy paths, in armies, bearing their young, like +knapsacks, on their backs; macaws and humming-birds, winged jewels, flew +from tree to tree. As they neared Paramaribo, the river became a smooth +canal among luxuriant plantations; the air was perfumed music, redolent +of orange-blossoms and echoing with the songs of birds and the sweet +plash of oars; gay barges came forth to meet them; "while groups of naked +boys and girls were promiscuously playing and flouncing, like so many +tritons and mermaids, in the water." And when the troops +disembarked,--five hundred fine young men, the oldest not thirty, all +arrayed in new uniforms and bearing orange-flowers in their caps, a +bridal wreath for beautiful Guiana,--it is no wonder that the Creole +ladies were in ecstasy; and the boyish recruits little foresaw the day, +when, reduced to a few dozens, barefooted and ragged as filibusters, +their last survivors would gladly re-embark from a country beside which +even Holland looked dry and even Scotland comfortable. + +For over all that earthly paradise there brooded not alone its terrible +malaria, its days of fever and its nights of deadly chill, but the worse +shadows of oppression and of sin, which neither day nor night could +banish. The first object which met Stedman's eye, as he stepped on shore, +was the figure of a young girl stripped to receive two hundred lashes, +and chained to a hundred-pound weight. And the few first days gave a +glimpse into a state of society worthy of this exhibition,--men without +mercy, women without modesty, the black man a slave to the white man's +passions, and the white man a slave to his own. The later West-Indian +society in its worst forms is probably a mere dilution of the utter +profligacy of those early days. Greek or Roman decline produced nothing +more debilitating or destructive than the ordinary life of a Surinam +planter, and his one virtue of hospitality only led to more unbridled +excesses and completed the work of vice. No wonder that Stedman himself, +who, with all his peculiarities, was essentially simple and manly, soon +became disgusted, and made haste to get into the woods and cultivate the +society of the Maroons. + +The rebels against whom this expedition was sent were not the original +Maroons of Surinam, but a later generation. The originals had long since +established their independence, and their leaders were flourishing their +honorary silver-mounted canes in the streets of Paramaribo. Fugitive +negroes had begun to establish themselves in the woods from the time when +the colony was finally ceded by the English to the Dutch, in 1674. The +first open outbreak occurred in 1726, when the plantations on the +Seramica River revolted; it was found impossible to subdue them, and the +government very imprudently resolved to make an example of eleven +captives, and thus terrify the rest of the rebels. They were tortured to +death, eight of the eleven being women: this drove the others to madness, +and plantation after plantation was visited with fire and sword. After a +long conflict, their chief, Adoe, was induced to make a treaty, in 1749. +The rebels promised to keep the peace, and in turn were promised freedom, +money, tools, clothes, and, finally, arms and ammunition. + +But no permanent peace was ever made upon a barrel of gunpowder as a +basis; and, of course, an explosion followed this one. The colonists +naturally evaded the last item of the bargain; and the rebels, receiving +the gifts, and remarking the omission of the part of Hamlet, asked +contemptuously if the Europeans expected negroes to subsist on combs and +looking-glasses? New hostilities at once began; a new body of slaves on +the Ouca River revolted; the colonial government was changed in +consequence, and fresh troops shipped from Holland; and after four +different embassies had been sent into the woods, the rebels began to +listen to reason. The black generals, Capt. Araby and Capt. Boston, +agreed upon a truce for a year, during which the colonial government +might decide for peace or war, the Maroons declaring themselves +indifferent. Finally the government chose peace, delivered ammunition, +and made a treaty, in 1761; the white and black plenipotentiaries +exchanged English oaths and then negro oaths, each tasting a drop of the +other's blood during the latter ceremony, amid a volley of remarkable +incantations from the black _gadoman_ or priest. After some final +skirmishes, in which the rebels almost always triumphed, the treaty was +at length accepted by all the various villages of Maroons. Had they known +that at this very time five thousand slaves in Berbice were just rising +against their masters, and were looking to them for assistance, the +result might have been different; but this fact had not reached them, nor +had the rumors of insurrection in Brazil among negro and Indian slaves. +They consented, therefore, to the peace. "They write from Surinam," says +the "Annual Register" for Jan. 23, 1761, "that the Dutch governor, +finding himself unable to subdue the rebel negroes of that country by +force, hath wisely followed the example of Gov. Trelawney at Jamaica, and +concluded an amicable treaty with them; in consequence of which, all the +negroes of the woods are acknowledged to be free, and all that is passed +is buried in oblivion." So ended a war of thirty-six years; and in +Stedman's day the original three thousand Ouca and Seramica Maroons had +multiplied, almost incredibly, to fifteen thousand. + +But for those slaves not sharing in this revolt it was not so easy to +"bury the whole past in oblivion." The Maroons had told some very plain +truths to the white ambassadors, and had frankly advised them, if they +wished for peace, to mend their own manners and treat their chattels +humanely. But the planters learned nothing by experience,--and, indeed, +the terrible narrations of Stedman were confirmed by those of Alexander, +so lately as 1831. Of course, therefore, in a colony comprising eighty +thousand blacks to four thousand whites, other revolts were stimulated by +the success of this one. They reached their highest point in 1772, when +an insurrection on the Cottica River, led by a negro named Baron, almost +gave the finishing blow to the colony; the only adequate protection being +found in a body of slaves liberated expressly for that purpose,--a +dangerous and humiliating precedent. "We have been obliged to set three +or four hundred of our stoutest negroes free to defend us," says an +honest letter from Surinam, in the "Annual Register" for Sept. 5, 1772. +Fortunately for the safety of the planters, Baron presumed too much upon +his numbers, and injudiciously built a camp too near the seacoast, in a +marshy fastness, from which he was finally ejected by twelve hundred +Dutch troops, though the chief work was done, Stedman thinks, by the +"black rangers" or liberated slaves. Checked by this defeat, he again +drew back into the forests, resuming his guerrilla warfare against the +plantations. Nothing could dislodge him; blood-hounds were proposed, but +the moisture of the country made them useless: and thus matters stood +when Stedman came sailing, amid orange-blossoms and music, up the winding +Surinam. + +Our young officer went into the woods in the condition of Falstaff, +"heinously unprovided." Coming from the unbounded luxury of the +plantations, he found himself entering "the most horrid and impenetrable +forests, where no kind of refreshment was to be had,"--he being +provisioned only with salt pork and pease. After a wail of sorrow for +this inhuman neglect, he bursts into a gush of gratitude for the private +generosity which relieved his wants at the last moment by the following +list of supplies: "24 bottles best claret, 12 ditto Madeira, 12 ditto +porter, 12 ditto cider, 12 ditto rum, 2 large loaves white sugar, 2 +gallons brandy, 6 bottles muscadel, 2 gallons lemon-juice, 2 gallons +ground coffee, 2 large Westphalia hams, 2 salted bullocks' tongues, 1 +bottle Durham mustard, 6 dozen spermaceti candles." The hams and tongues +seem, indeed, rather a poor halfpennyworth to this intolerable deal of +sack; but this instance of Surinam privation in those days may open some +glimpse at the colonial standards of comfort. "From this specimen," +moralizes our hero, "the reader will easily perceive, that, if some of +the inhabitants of Surinam show themselves the disgrace of the creation +by their cruelties and brutality, others, by their social feelings, +approve themselves an ornament to the human species. With this instance +of virtue and generosity I therefore conclude this chapter." + +But the troops soon had to undergo worse troubles than those of the +commissariat. The rainy season had just set in. "As for the negroes," +said Mr. Klynhaus, the last planter with whom they parted, "you may +depend on never seeing a soul of them, unless they attack you off guard; +but the climate, the climate, will murder you all." Bringing with them +constitutions already impaired by the fevers and dissipation of +Paramaribo, the poor boys began to perish long before they began to +fight. Wading in water all day, hanging their hammocks over water at +night, it seemed a moist existence, even compared with the climate of +England and the soil of Holland. It was a case of "Invent a shovel, and +be a magistrate," even more than Andrew Marvell found it in the United +Provinces. In fact, Raynal evidently thinks that nothing but Dutch +experience in hydraulics could ever have cultivated Surinam. + +The two gunboats which held one division of the expedition were merely +old sugar-barges, roofed over with boards, and looking like coffins. They +were pleasantly named the "Charon" and the "Cerberus," but Stedman +thought that the "Sudden Death" and the "Wilful Murder" would have been +titles more appropriate. The chief duty of the troops consisted in lying +at anchor at the intersections of wooded streams, waiting for rebels who +never came. It was dismal work, and the raw recruits were full of the +same imaginary terrors which have haunted other heroes less severely +tested: the monkeys never rattled the cocoa-nuts against the trees, but +they all heard the axes of Maroon wood-choppers; and when a sentinel +declared, one night, that he had seen a negro go down the river in a +canoe, with his pipe lighted, the whole force was called to arms--against +a firefly. In fact, the insect race brought by far the most substantial +dangers. The rebels eluded the military, but the chigres, locusts, +scorpions, and bush-spiders were ever ready to come half-way to meet +them; likewise serpents and alligators proffered them the freedom of the +forests, and exhibited a hospitality almost excessive. Snakes twenty feet +long hung their seductive length from the trees; jaguars volunteered +their society through almost impenetrable marshes; vampire bats perched +by night with lulling endearments upon the toes of the soldiers. When +Stedman describes himself as killing thirty-eight mosquitoes at one +stroke, we must perhaps pardon something to the spirit of martyrdom. But +when we add to these the other woes of his catalogue,--prickly-heat, +ringworm, putrid-fever, "the growling of Col. Fougeaud, dry sandy +savannas, unfordable marshes, burning hot days, cold and damp nights, +heavy rains, and short allowance,"--we can hardly wonder that three +captains died in a month, and that in two months his detachment of +forty-two was reduced to a miserable seven. + +Yet, through all this, Stedman himself kept his health. His theory of the +matter almost recalls the time-honored prescription of "A light heart and +a thin pair of breeches," for he attributes his good condition to his +keeping up his spirits and kicking off his shoes. Daily bathing in the +river had also something to do with it; and, indeed, hydropathy was first +learned of the West-India Maroons,--who did their "packing" in wet +clay,--and was carried by Dr. Wright to England. But his extraordinary +personal qualities must have contributed most to his preservation. Never +did a "meagre, starved, black, burnt, and ragged tatterdemalion," as he +calls himself, carry about him such a fund of sentiment, philosophy, +poetry, and art. He had a great faculty for sketching, as the engravings +in his volumes, with all their odd peculiarities, show; his deepest woes +he coined always into couplets, and fortified himself against hopeless +despair with Ovid and Valerius Flaccus, Pope's Homer and Thomson's +"Seasons." Above all reigned his passion for natural history, a ready +balm for every ill. Here he was never wanting to the occasion; and, to do +justice to Dutch Guiana, the occasion never was wanting to him. Were his +men sickening, the peccaries were always healthy without the camp, and +the cockroaches within; just escaping from a she-jaguar, he satisfies +himself, ere he flees, that the print of her claws on the sand is +precisely the size of a pewter dinner-plate; bitten by a scorpion, he +makes sure of a scientific description in case he should expire of the +bite; is the water undrinkable, there is at least some rational interest +in the number of legs possessed by the centipedes which pre-occupy it. +This is the highest triumph of man over his accidents, when he thus turns +his pains to gains, and becomes an entomologist in the tropics. + +Meanwhile the rebels kept their own course in the forests, and +occasionally descended upon plantations beside the very river on whose +upper waters the useless troops were sickening and dying. Stedman himself +made several campaigns, with long intervals of illness, before he came +any nearer to the enemy than to burn a deserted village or destroy a +rice-field. Sometimes they left the "Charon" and the "Cerberus" moored by +grape-vines to the pine-trees, and made expeditions into the woods, +single file. Our ensign, true to himself, gives the minutest schedule of +the order of march, and the oddest little diagram of manikins with cocked +hats, and blacker manikins bearing burdens. First, negroes with +bill-hooks to clear the way; then the van-guard; then the main body, +interspersed with negroes bearing boxes of ball-cartridges; then the +rear-guard, with many more negroes, bearing camp-equipage, provisions, +and new rum, surnamed "kill-devil," and appropriately followed by a sort +of palanquin for the disabled. Thus arrayed, they marched valorously +forth into the woods, to some given point; then they turned, marched back +to the boats, then rowed back to camp, and straightway went into the +hospital. Immediately upon this, the coast being clear, Baron and his +rebels marched out again, and proceeded to business. + +In the course of years, these Maroons had acquired their own peculiar +tactics. They built stockaded fortresses on marshy islands, accessible by +fords which they alone could traverse. These they defended further by +sharp wooden pins, or crows'-feet, concealed beneath the surface of the +miry ground,--and, latterly, by the more substantial protection of +cannon, which they dragged into the woods, and learned to use. Their +bush-fighting was unique. Having always more men than weapons, they +arranged their warriors in threes,--one to use the musket, another to +take his place if wounded or slain, and a third to drag away the body. +They had Indian stealthiness and swiftness, with more than Indian +discipline; discharged their fire with some approach to regularity, in +three successive lines, the signals being given by the captain's horn. +They were full of ingenuity: marked their movements for each other by +scattered leaves and blazed trees; ran zigzag, to dodge bullets; gave +wooden guns to their unarmed men, to frighten the plantation negroes on +their guerrilla expeditions; and borrowed the red caps of the black +rangers whom they slew, to bewilder the aim of the others. One of them, +finding himself close to the muzzle of a ranger's gun, threw up his hand +hastily. "What!" he exclaimed, "will you fire on one of your own party?" +"God forbid!" cried the ranger, dropping his piece, and was instantly +shot through the body by the Maroon, who the next instant had disappeared +in the woods. + +These rebels were no saints: their worship was obi-worship; the women had +not far outgrown the plantation standard of chastity, and the men drank +"kill-devil" like their betters. Stedman was struck with the difference +between the meaning of the word "good" in rebellious circles and in +reputable. "It must, however, be observed, that what we Europeans call a +good character was by the Africans looked upon as detestable, especially +by those born in the woods, whose only crime consisted in avenging the +wrongs done to their forefathers." But if martial virtues be virtues, +such were theirs. Not a rebel ever turned traitor or informer, ever +flinched in battle or under torture, ever violated a treaty or even a +private promise. But it was their power of endurance which was especially +astounding; Stedman is never weary of paying tribute to this, or of +illustrating it in sickening detail; indeed, the records of the world +show nothing to surpass it; "the lifted axe, the agonizing wheel," proved +powerless to subdue it; with every limb lopped, every bone broken, the +victims yet defied their tormentors, laughed, sang, and died triumphant. + +Of course they repaid these atrocities in kind. If they had not, it would +have demonstrated the absurd paradox, that slavery educates higher +virtues than freedom. It bewilders all the relations of human +responsibility, if we expect the insurrectionary slave to commit no +outrages; if slavery has not depraved him, it has done him little harm. +If it be the normal tendency of bondage to produce saints like Uncle Tom, +let us all offer ourselves at auction immediately. It is Cassy and Dred +who are the normal protest of human nature against systems which degrade +it. Accordingly, these poor, ignorant Maroons, who had seen their +brothers and sisters flogged, burned, mutilated, hanged on iron hooks, +broken on the wheel, and had been all the while solemnly assured that +this was paternal government, could only repay the paternalism in the +same fashion, when they had the power. Stedman saw a negro chained to a +red-hot distillery-furnace; he saw disobedient slaves, in repeated +instances, punished by the amputation of a leg, and sent to boat-service +for the rest of their lives; and of course the rebels borrowed these +suggestions. They could bear to watch their captives expire under the +lash, for they had previously watched their parents. If the government +rangers received twenty-five florins for every rebel right-hand which +they brought in, of course they risked their own right hands in the +pursuit. The difference was, that the one brutality was that of a mighty +state, and the other was only the retaliation of the victims. And after +all, Stedman never ventures to assert that the imitation equalled the +original, or that the Maroons had inflicted nearly so much as they had +suffered. + +The leaders of the rebels, especially, were men who had each his own +story of wrongs to tell. Baron, the most formidable, had been the slave +of a Swedish gentleman, who had taught him to read and write, taken him +to Europe, promised to manumit him on his return--and then, breaking his +word, sold him to a Jew. Baron refused to work for his new master, was +publicly flogged under the gallows, fled to the woods next day, and +became the terror of the colony. Joli Coeur, his first captain, was +avenging the cruel wrongs of his mother. Bonny, another leader, was born +in the woods, his mother having taken refuge there just previously, to +escape from his father, who was also his master. Cojo, another, had +defended his master against the insurgents until he was obliged by ill +usage to take refuge among them; and he still bore upon his wrist, when +Stedman saw him, a silver band, with the inscription,--"True to the +Europeans." In dealing with wrongs like these, Mr. Carlyle would have +found the despised negroes quite as ready as himself to take the +total-abstinence pledge against rose-water. + +In his first two-months' campaign, Stedman never saw the trace of a +Maroon; in the second, he once came upon their trail; in the third, one +captive was brought in, two surrendered themselves voluntarily, and a +large party was found to have crossed a river within a mile of the camp, +ferrying themselves on palm-trunks, according to their fashion. Deep +swamps and scorching sands, toiling through briers all day, and sleeping +at night in hammocks suspended over stagnant water, with weapons +supported on sticks crossed beneath,--all this was endured for two years +and a half, before Stedman personally came in sight of the enemy. + +On Aug. 20, 1775, the troops found themselves at last in the midst of the +rebel settlements. These villages and forts bore a variety of expressive +names, such as "Hide me, O thou surrounding verdure," "I shall be taken," +"The woods lament for me," "Disturb me, if you dare," "Take a tasting, if +you like it," "Come, try me, if you be men," "God knows me, and none +else," "I shall moulder before I shall be taken." Some were only +plantation-grounds with a few huts, and were easily laid waste; but all +were protected more or less by their mere situations. Quagmires +surrounded them, covered by a thin crust of verdure, sometimes broken +through by one man's weight, when the victim sank hopelessly into the +black and bottomless depths below. In other directions there was a solid +bottom, but inconveniently covered by three or four feet of water, +through which the troops waded breast-deep, holding their muskets high in +the air, unable to reload them when once discharged, and liable to be +picked off by rebel scouts, who ingeniously posted themselves in the tops +of palm-trees. + +Through this delectable region Col. Fougeaud and his followers slowly +advanced, drawing near the fatal shore where Capt. Meyland's detachment +had just been defeated, and where their mangled remains still polluted +the beach. Passing this point of danger without attack, they suddenly met +a small party of rebels, each bearing on his back a beautifully woven +hamper of snow-white rice: these loads they threw down, and disappeared. +Next appeared an armed body from the same direction, who fired upon them +once, and swiftly retreated; and in a few moments the soldiers came upon +a large field of standing rice, beyond which lay, like an amphitheatre, +the rebel village. But between the village and the field had been piled +successive defences of logs and branches, behind which simple redoubts +the Maroons lay concealed. A fight ensued, lasting forty minutes, during +which nearly every soldier and ranger was wounded; but, to their great +amazement, not one was killed. This was an enigma to them until after the +skirmish, when the surgeon found that most of them had been struck, not +by bullets, but by various substitutes, such as pebbles, coat-buttons, +and bits of silver coin, which had penetrated only skin deep. "We also +observed that several of the poor rebel negroes, who had been shot, had +only the shards of Spa-water cans instead of flints, which could seldom +do execution; and it was certainly owing to these circumstances that we +came off so well." + +The rebels at length retreated, first setting fire to their village; a +hundred or more lightly built houses, some of them two stories high, were +soon in flames; and as this conflagration occupied the only neck of land +between two impassable morasses, the troops were unable to follow, and +the Maroons had left nothing but rice-fields to be pillaged. That night +the military force was encamped in the woods; their ammunition was almost +gone, so they were ordered to lie flat on the ground, even in case of +attack; they could not so much as build a fire. Before midnight an attack +was made on them, partly with bullets, and partly with words. The Maroons +were all around them in the forest, but their object was a puzzle; they +spent most of the night in bandying compliments with the black rangers, +whom they alternately denounced, ridiculed, and challenged to single +combat. At last Fougeaud and Stedman joined in the conversation, and +endeavored to make this midnight volley of talk the occasion for a +treaty. This was received with inextinguishable laughter, which echoed +through the woods like a concert of screech-owls, ending in a _charivari_ +of horns and hallooing. The colonel, persisting, offered them "life, +liberty, victuals, drink, and all they wanted;" in return, they ridiculed +him unmercifully. He was a half-starved Frenchman, who had run away from +his own country, and would soon run away from theirs; they profoundly +pitied him and his soldiers; they would scorn to spend powder on such +scarecrows; they would rather feed and clothe them, as being poor white +slaves, hired to be shot at, and starved for fourpence a day. But as for +the planters, overseers, and rangers, they should die, every one of them, +and Bonny should be governor of the colony. "After this, they tinkled +their bill-hooks, fired a volley, and gave three cheers; which, being +answered by the rangers, the clamor ended, and the rebels dispersed with +the rising sun." + +Very aimless nonsense it certainly appeared. But the next day put a new +aspect on it; for it was found, that, under cover of all this noise, the +Maroons had been busily occupied all night, men, women, and children, in +preparing and filling great hampers of the finest rice, yams, and +cassava, from the adjacent provision-grounds, to be used for subsistence +during their escape, leaving only chaff and refuse for the hungry +soldiers. "This was certainly such a masterly trait of generalship in a +savage people, whom we affected to despise, as would have done honor to +any European commander." + +From this time the Maroons fulfilled their threats. Shooting down without +mercy every black ranger who came within their reach,--one of these +rangers being, in Stedman's estimate, worth six white soldiers,--they +left Col. Fougeaud and his regulars to die of starvation and fatigue. The +enraged colonel, "finding himself thus foiled by a naked negro, swore he +would pursue Bonny to the world's end." But he never got any nearer than +to Bonny's kitchen-gardens. He put the troops on half-allowance, sent +back for provisions and ammunition,--and within ten days changed his +mind, and retreated to the settlements in despair. Soon after, this very +body of rebels, under Bonny's leadership, plundered two plantations in +the vicinity, and nearly captured a powder-magazine, which was, however, +successfully defended by some armed slaves. + +For a year longer these expeditions continued. The troops never gained a +victory, and they lost twenty men for every rebel killed; but they +gradually checked the plunder of plantations, destroyed villages and +planting-grounds, and drove the rebels, for the time at least, into the +deeper recesses of the woods, or into the adjacent province of Cayenne. +They had the slight satisfaction of burning Bonny's own house, a +two-story wooden hut, built in the fashion of our frontier guardhouses. +They often took single prisoners,--some child, born and bred in the +woods, and frightened equally by the first sight of a white man and of a +cow,--or some warrior, who, on being threatened with torture, stretched +forth both hands in disdain, and said, with Indian eloquence, "These +hands have made tigers tremble." As for Stedman, he still went +barefooted, still quarrelled with his colonel, still sketched the scenery +and described the reptiles, still reared greegree worms for his private +kitchen, still quoted good poetry and wrote execrable, still pitied all +the sufferers around him, black, white, and red, until finally he and his +comrades were ordered back to Holland in 1776. + +Among all that wasted regiment of weary and broken-down men, there was +probably no one but Stedman who looked backward with longing as they +sailed down the lovely Surinam. True, he bore all his precious +collections with him,--parrots and butterflies, drawings on the backs of +old letters, and journals kept on bones and cartridges. But he had left +behind him a dearer treasure; for there runs through all his eccentric +narrative a single thread of pure romance, in his love for his beautiful +quadroon wife and his only son. + +Within a month after his arrival in the colony, our susceptible ensign +first saw Joanna, a slave-girl of fifteen, at the house of an intimate +friend. Her extreme beauty and modesty first fascinated him, and then her +piteous narrative,--for she was the daughter of a planter, who had just +gone mad and died in despair from the discovery that he could not legally +emancipate his own children from slavery. Soon after, Stedman was +dangerously ill, was neglected and alone; fruits and cordials were +anonymously sent to him, which proved at last to have come from Joanna; +and she came herself, ere long, and nursed him, grateful for the visible +sympathy he had shown to her. This completed the conquest; the passionate +young Englishman, once recovered, loaded her with presents which she +refused; talked of purchasing her, and educating her in Europe, which she +also declined as burdening him too greatly; and finally, amid the +ridicule of all good society in Paramaribo, surmounted all legal +obstacles, and was united to the beautiful girl in honorable marriage. He +provided a cottage for her, where he spent his furloughs, in perfect +happiness, for four years. + +The simple idyl of their loves was unbroken by any stain or +disappointment, and yet always shadowed with the deepest anxiety for the +future. Though treated with the utmost indulgence, she was legally a +slave, and so was the boy of whom she became the mother. Cojo, her uncle, +was a captain among the rebels against whom her husband fought. And up to +the time when Stedman was ordered back to Holland, he was unable to +purchase her freedom; nor could he, until the very last moment, procure +the emancipation of his boy. His perfect delight at this last triumph, +when obtained, elicited some satire from his white friends. "While the +well-thinking few highly applauded my sensibility, many not only blamed +but publicly derided me for my paternal affection, which was called a +weakness, a whim." "Nearly forty beautiful boys and girls were left to +perpetual slavery by their parents of my acquaintance, and many of them +without being so much as once inquired after at all." + +But Stedman was a true-hearted fellow, if his sentiment did sometimes run +to rodomontade; he left his Joanna only in the hope that a year or two in +Europe would repair his ruined fortunes, and he could return to treat +himself to the purchase of his own wedded wife. He describes, with +unaffected pathos, their parting scene,--though, indeed, there were +several successive partings,--and closes the description in a +characteristic manner: "My melancholy having surpassed all description, I +at last determined to weather one or two painful years in her absence; +and in the afternoon went to dissipate my mind at a Mr. Roux' cabinet of +Indian curiosities; where, as my eye chanced to fall on a rattlesnake, I +will, before I leave the colony, describe this dangerous reptile." + +It was impossible to write the history of the Maroons of Surinam except +through the biography of our ensign (at last promoted captain), because +nearly all we know of them is through his quaint and picturesque +narrative, with its profuse illustrations by his own hand. It is not +fair, therefore, to end without chronicling his safe arrival in Holland, +on June 3, 1777. It is a remarkable fact, that, after his life in the +woods, even the Dutch looked slovenly to his eyes. "The inhabitants, who +crowded about us, appeared but a disgusting assemblage of ill-formed and +ill-dressed rabble,--so much had my prejudices been changed by living +among Indians and blacks: their eyes seemed to resemble those of a pig; +their complexions were like the color of foul linen; they seemed to have +no teeth, and to be covered over with rags and dirt. This prejudice, +however, was not against these people only, but against all Europeans in +general, when compared to the sparkling eyes, ivory teeth, shining skin, +and remarkable cleanliness of those I had left behind me." Yet, in spite +of these superior attractions, he never recrossed the Atlantic; for his +Joanna died soon after, and his promising son, being sent to the father, +was educated in England, became a midshipman in the navy, and was lost at +sea. With his elegy, in which the last depths of bathos are sadly sounded +by a mourning parent,--who is induced to print them only by "the effect +they had on the sympathetic and ingenious Mrs. Cowley,"--the "Narrative +of a Five Years' Expedition" closes. + +The war, which had cost the government forty thousand pounds a year, was +ended, and left both parties essentially as when it began. The Maroons +gradually returned to their old abodes, and, being unmolested themselves, +left others unmolested thenceforward. Originally three thousand,--in +Stedman's time, fifteen thousand,--they were estimated at seventy +thousand by Capt. Alexander, who saw Guiana in 1831; and a later American +scientific expedition, having visited them in their homes, reported them +as still enjoying their wild freedom, and multiplying, while the Indians +on the same soil decay. The beautiful forests of Surinam still make the +morning gorgeous with their beauty, and the night deadly with their +chill; the stately palm still rears, a hundred feet in air, its straight +gray shaft and its head of verdure; the mora builds its solid, buttressed +trunk, a pedestal for the eagle; the pine of the tropics holds out its +myriad hands with water-cups for the rain and dews, where all the birds +and the monkeys may drink their fill; the trees are garlanded with +epiphytes and convolvuli, and anchored to the earth by a thousand vines. +High among their branches, the red and yellow mocking-birds still build +their hanging nests, uncouth storks and tree-porcupines cling above, and +the spotted deer and the tapir drink from the sluggish stream below. The +night is still made noisy with a thousand cries of bird and beast; and +the stillness of the sultry noon is broken by the slow tolling of the +_campañero_, or bell-bird, far in the deep, dark woods, like the chime of +some lost convent. And as Nature is unchanged there, so apparently is +man; the Maroons still retain their savage freedom, still shoot their +wild game and trap their fish, still raise their rice and cassava, yams +and plantains,--still make cups from the gourd-tree and hammocks from the +silk-grass plant, wine from the palm-tree's sap, brooms from its leaves, +fishing-lines from its fibres, and salt from its ashes. Their life does +not yield, indeed, the very highest results of spiritual culture; its +mental and moral results may not come up to the level of civilization, +but they rise far above the level of slavery. In the changes of time, the +Maroons may yet elevate themselves into the one, but they will never +relapse into the other. + + + + +GABRIEL'S DEFEAT + + +In exploring among dusty files of newspapers for the true records of +Denmark Vesey and Nat Turner, I have caught occasional glimpses of a plot +perhaps more wide in its outlines than that of either, which has lain +obscure in the darkness of half a century, traceable only in the +political events which dated from it, and the utter incorrectness of the +scanty traditions which assumed to preserve it. And though researches in +public libraries have only proved to me how rapidly the materials for +American history are vanishing,--since not one of our great institutions +possessed, a few years since, a file of any Southern newspaper of the +year 1800,--yet the little which I have gained may have an interest that +makes it worth preserving. Three times, at intervals of thirty years, did +a wave of unutterable terror sweep across the Old Dominion, bringing +thoughts of agony to every Virginian master, and of vague hope to every +Virginian slave. Each time did one man's name become a spell of dismay +and a symbol of deliverance. Each time did that name eclipse its +predecessor, while recalling it for a moment to fresher memory: John +Brown revived the story of Nat Turner, as in his day Nat Turner recalled +the vaster schemes of Gabriel. + +On Sept. 8, 1800, a Virginia correspondent wrote thus to the Philadelphia +_United-States Gazette:_-- + + "For the week past, we have been under momentary expectation of a + rising among the negroes, who have assembled to the number of + nine hundred or a thousand, and threatened to massacre all the + whites. They are armed with desperate weapons, and secrete + themselves in the woods. God only knows our fate: we have strong + guards every night under arms." + +It was no wonder, if there were foundation for such rumors. Liberty was +the creed or the cant of the day. France was being disturbed by +revolution, and England by Clarkson. In America, slavery was habitually +recognized as a misfortune and an error, only to be palliated by the +nearness of its expected end. How freely anti-slavery pamphlets had been +circulated in Virginia, we know from the priceless volumes collected and +annotated by Washington, and now preserved in the Boston Athenaeum. +Jefferson's "Notes on Virginia," itself an anti-slavery tract, had passed +through seven editions. Judge St. George Tucker, law-professor in William +and Mary College, had recently published his noble work, "A Dissertation +on Slavery, with a Proposal for the Gradual Abolition of it in the State +of Virginia." From all this agitation, a slave insurrection was a mere +corollary. With so much electricity in the air, a single flash of +lightning foreboded all the terrors of the tempest. Let but a single +armed negro be seen or suspected, and at once, on many a lonely +plantation, there were trembling hands at work to bar doors and windows +that seldom had been even closed before, and there was shuddering when a +gray squirrel scrambled over the roof, or a shower of walnuts came down +clattering from the overhanging boughs. + +Early in September, 1800, as a certain Mr. Moseley Sheppard, of Henrico +County in Virginia, was one day sitting in his counting-room, two negroes +knocked at the door, and were let in. They shut the door themselves, and +began to unfold an insurrectionary plot, which was subsequently repeated +by one of them, named Ben Woodfolk or Woolfolk, in presence of the court, +on the 15th of the same month. + +He stated, that about the first of the preceding June, he had been asked +by a negro named Colonel George whether he would like to be made a Mason. +He refused; but George ultimately prevailed on him to have an interview +with a certain leading man among the blacks, named Gabriel. Arrived at +the place of meeting, he found many persons assembled, to whom a +preliminary oath was administered, that they would keep secret all which +they might hear. The leaders then began, to the dismay of this witness, +to allude to a plan of insurrection, which, as they stated, was already +far advanced toward maturity. Presently a man named Martin, Gabriel's +brother, proposed religious services, caused the company to be duly +seated, and began an impassioned exposition of Scripture, bearing upon +the perilous theme. The Israelites were glowingly portrayed as a type of +successful resistance to tyranny; and it was argued, that now, as then, +God would stretch forth his arm to save, and would strengthen a hundred +to overthrow a thousand. Thus passed, the witness stated, this +preparatory meeting. At a subsequent gathering the affair was brought to +a point; and the only difficult question was, whether to rise in +rebellion upon a certain Saturday, or upon the Sunday following. Gabriel +said that Saturday was the day already fixed, and that it must not be +altered; but George was for changing it to Sunday, as being more +convenient for the country negroes, who could travel on that day without +suspicion. Gabriel, however, said decisively that they had enough to +carry Richmond without them; and Saturday was therefore retained as the +momentous day. + +This was the confession, so far as it is now accessible; and on the +strength of it, Ben Woolfolk was promptly pardoned by the court for all +his sins, past, present, or to come, and they proceeded with their +investigation. Of Gabriel little appeared to be known, except that he had +been the property of Thomas Prosser, a young man who had recently +inherited a plantation a few miles from Richmond, and who had the +reputation among his neighbors of "behaving with great barbarity to his +slaves." Gabriel was, however, reported to be "a fellow of courage and +intellect above his rank in life," to be about twenty-five years of age, +and to be guiltless of the alphabet. + +Further inquiry made it appear that the preparations of the insurgents +were hardly adequate to any grand revolutionary design,--at least, if +they proposed to begin with open warfare. The commissariat may have been +well organized, for black Virginians are apt to have a prudent eye to the +larder; but the ordnance department and the treasury were as low as if +Secretary Floyd had been in charge of them. A slave called "Prosser's +Ben" testified that he went with Gabriel to see Ben Woolfolk, who was +going to Caroline County to enlist men, and that "Gabriel gave him three +shillings for himself and three other negroes, to be expended in +recruiting men." Their arms and ammunition, so far as reported, consisted +of a peck of bullets, ten pounds of powder, and twelve scythe-swords, +made by Gabriel's brother Solomon, and fitted with handles by Gabriel +himself. "These cutlasses," said subsequently a white eye-witness, "are +made of scythes cut in two and fixed into well-turned handles. I have +never seen arms so murderous. Those who still doubt the importance of the +conspiracy which has been so fortunately frustrated would shudder with +horror at the sight of these instruments of death." And as it presently +appeared that a conspirator named Scott had astonished his master by +accidentally pulling ten dollars from a ragged pocket which seemed +inadequate to the custody of ten cents, it was agreed that the plot might +still be dangerous, even though the resources seemed limited. + +And indeed, as was soon discovered, the effective weapon of the +insurgents lay in the very audacity of their plan. If the current +statements of all the Virginia letter-writers were true, "nothing could +have been better contrived." It was to have taken effect on the first day +of September. The rendezvous for the blacks was to be a brook six miles +from Richmond. Eleven hundred men were to assemble there, and were to be +divided into three columns, their officers having been designated in +advance. All were to march on Richmond,--then a town of eight thousand +inhabitants,--under cover of night. The right wing was instantly to seize +upon the penitentiary building, just converted into an arsenal; while the +left wing was to take possession of the powder-house. These two columns +were to be armed chiefly with clubs, as their undertaking depended for +success upon surprise, and was expected to prevail without hard fighting. +But it was the central force, armed with muskets, cutlasses, knives, and +pikes, upon which the chief responsibility rested; these men were to +enter the town at both ends simultaneously, and begin a general carnage, +none being excepted save the French inhabitants, who were supposed for +some reason to be friendly to the negroes. In a very few hours, it was +thought, they would have entire control of the metropolis. And that this +hope was not in the least unreasonable, was shown by the subsequent +confessions of weakness from the whites. "They could scarcely have failed +of success," wrote the Richmond correspondent of the Boston _Chronicle_; +"for, after all, we could only muster four or five hundred men, of whom +not more than thirty had muskets." + +For the insurgents, if successful, the penitentiary held several thousand +stand of arms; the powder-house was well stocked; the Capitol contained +the State treasury; the mills would give them bread; the control of the +bridge across James River would keep off enemies from beyond. Thus +secured and provided, they planned to issue proclamations summoning to +their standard "their fellow-negroes and the friends of humanity +throughout the continent." In a week, it was estimated, they would have +fifty thousand men on their side, with which force they could easily +possess themselves of other towns; and, indeed, a slave named John +Scott--possibly the dangerous possessor of the ten dollars--was already +appointed to head the attack on Petersburg. But in case of final failure, +the project included a retreat to the mountains, with their new-found +property. John Brown was therefore anticipated by Gabriel, sixty years +before, in believing the Virginia mountains to have been "created, from +the foundation of the world, as a place of refuge for fugitive slaves." + +These are the statements of the contemporary witnesses; they are repeated +in many newspapers of the year 1800, and are in themselves clear and +consistent. Whether they are on the whole exaggerated or under-stated, it +is now impossible to say. It is certain that a Richmond paper of Sept. 12 +(quoted in the New-York _Gazette_ of Sept. 18) declares that "the plot +has been entirely exploded, which was shallow; and, had the attempt been +made to carry it into execution, but little resistance would have been +required to render the scheme entirely abortive." But it is necessary to +remember that this is no more than the Charleston newspapers said at the +very crisis of Denmark Vesey's formidable plot. "Last evening," wrote a +lady from Charleston in 1822, "twenty-five hundred of our citizens were +under arms to guard our property and lives. But it is a subject _not to +be mentioned_ [so underscored]; and unless you hear of it elsewhere, say +nothing about it." Thus it is always hard to know whether to assume the +facts of an insurrection as above or below the estimates. This Virginian +excitement also happened at a period of intense political agitation, and +was seized upon as a boon by the Federalists. The very article above +quoted is ironically headed "Holy Insurrection," and takes its motto from +Jefferson, with profuse capital letters: "The Spirit of the Master is +abating, that of the Slave rising from the dust, his condition +mollifying." + +In view of the political aspect thus given to the plot, and of its +ingenuity and thoroughness likewise, the Virginians were naturally +disposed to attribute to white men some share in it; and speculation +presently began to run wild. The newspapers were soon full of theories, +no two being alike, and no one credible. The plot originated, some said, +in certain handbills written by Jefferson's friend Callender, then in +prison at Richmond on a charge of sedition; these were circulated by two +French negroes, aided by a "United Irishman" calling himself a Methodist +preacher, and it was in consideration of these services that no Frenchman +was to be injured by the slaves. When Gabriel was arrested, the editor of +the _United-States Gazette_ affected much diplomatic surprise that no +letters were _yet_ found upon his person "from Fries, Gallatin, or Duane, +nor was he at the time of his capture accompanied by any United +Irishman." "He, however, acknowledges that there are others concerned, +and that he is not the principal instigator." All Federalists agreed that +the Southern Democratic talk was constructive insurrection,--which it +certainly was,---and they painted graphic pictures of noisy "Jacobins" +over their wine, and eager dusky listeners behind their chairs. "It is +evident that the French principles of liberty and equality have been +effused into the minds of the negroes, and that the incautious and +intemperate use of the words by some whites among us have inspired them +with hopes of success." "While the fiery Hotspurs of the State vociferate +their _French babble_ of the natural equality of man, the insulted negro +will be constantly stimulated to cast away his cords, and to sharpen his +pike." "It is, moreover, believed, though not positively known, that a +great many of our profligate and abandoned whites (who are distinguished +by the burlesque appellation of _Democrats_) are implicated with the +blacks, and would have joined them if they had commenced their +operations.... The Jacobin printers and their friends are panic-struck. +Never was terror more strongly depicted in the countenances of men." +These extracts from three different Federalist newspapers show the +amiable emotions of that side of the house; while Democratic Duane, in +the _Aurora_, could find no better repartee than to attribute the whole +trouble to the policy of the administration in renewing commercial +intercourse with San Domingo. + +I have discovered in the Norfolk _Epitome of the Times_, for Oct. 9, +1800, a remarkable epistle written from Richmond Jail by the unfortunate +Callender himself. He indignantly denies the charges against the +Democrats, of complicity in dangerous plots, boldly retorting them upon +the Federalists. "An insurrection at this critical moment by the negroes +of the Southern States would have thrown every thing into confusion, and +consequently it was to have prevented the choice of electors in the whole +or the greater part of the States to the south of the Potomac. Such a +disaster must have tended directly to injure the interests of Mr. +Jefferson, and to promote the slender possibility of a second election of +Mr. Adams." And, to be sure, the _United-States Gazette_ followed up the +thing with a good, single-minded party malice which cannot be surpassed +in these present days, ending in such altitudes of sublime coolness as +the following: "The insurrection of the negroes in the Southern States, +which appears to be organized on the true French plan, must be decisive, +with every reflecting man in those States, of the election of Mr. Adams +and Gen. Pinckney. The military skill and approved bravery of the general +must be peculiarly valuable to his countrymen at these trying moments." +Let us have a military Vice-President, by all means, to meet this +formidable exigency of Gabriel's peck of bullets, and this unexplained +three shillings in the pocket of "Prosser's Ben"! + +But Gabriel's campaign failed, like that of the Federalists; and the +appointed day brought disasters more fatal than even the sword of Gen. +Pinckney. The affrighted negroes declared that "the stars in their +courses fought against Sisera." The most furious tempest ever known in +Virginia burst upon the land that day, instead of an insurrection. Roads +and plantations were submerged. Bridges were carried away. The fords, +which then, as now, were the frequent substitutes for bridges in that +region, were rendered wholly impassable. The Brook Swamp, one of the most +important strategic points of the insurgents, was entirely inundated, +hopelessly dividing Prosser's farm from Richmond; the country negroes +could not get in, nor those from the city get out. The thousand men +dwindled to a few hundred, and these half paralyzed by superstition; +there was nothing to do but to dismiss them, and before they could +re-assemble they were betrayed. + +That the greatest alarm was instantly created throughout the community, +there is no question. All the city of Richmond was in arms, and in all +large towns of the State the night-patrol was doubled. It is a little +amusing to find it formally announced, that "the Governor, impressed with +the magnitude of the danger, has appointed for himself three +aides-de-camp." A troop of United-States cavalry was ordered to Richmond. +Numerous arrests were made. Men were convicted on one day, and hanged on +the next,--five, six, ten, fifteen at a time, almost without evidence. +Three hundred dollars were offered by Gov. Monroe for the arrest of +Gabriel; as much more for another chief named Jack Bowler, _alias_ +Ditcher; whereupon Bowler _alias_ Ditcher surrendered himself, but it +took some weeks to get upon the track of Gabriel. He was finally captured +at Norfolk, on board a schooner just arrived from Richmond, in whose hold +he had concealed himself for eleven days, having thrown overboard a +bayonet and bludgeon, which were his only arms. Crowds of people +collected to see him, including many of his own color. He was arrested on +Sept. 24, convicted on Oct. 3, and executed on Oct. 7; and it is known of +him further, only, that, like almost all leaders of slave insurrections, +he showed a courage which his enemies could not gainsay. "When he was +apprehended, he manifested the greatest marks of firmness and confidence, +showing not the least disposition to equivocate, or screen himself from +justice,"--but making no confession that could implicate any one else. +"The behavior of Gabriel under his misfortunes," said the Norfolk +_Epitome_ of Sept. 25, "was such as might be expected from a mind capable +of forming the daring project which he had conceived." The _United-States +Gazette_ for Oct. 9 states, more sarcastically, that "the general is said +to have manifested the utmost composure, and with the true spirit of +heroism seems ready to resign his high office, and even his life, rather +than gratify the officious inquiries of the Governor." + +Some of these newspapers suggest that the authorities found it good +policy to omit the statement made by Gabriel, whatever it was. At any +rate, he assured them that he was by no means the sole instigator of the +affair; he could name many, even in Norfolk, who were more deeply +concerned. To his brother Solomon he is said to have stated that the real +head of the plot was Jack Bowler. Still another leader was "Gen. John +Scott," already mentioned, the slave of Mr. Greenhow, hired by Mr. +McCrea. He was captured by his employer in Norfolk, just as he was boldly +entering a public conveyance to escape; and the Baltimore _Telegraphe_ +declared that he had a written paper directing him to apply to Alexander +Biddenhurst or Weddenhurst in Philadelphia, "corner of Coats Alley and +Budd Street, who would supply his needs." What became of this military +individual, or of his Philadelphia sympathizers, does not appear. But it +was noticed, as usually happens in such cases, that all the insurgents +had previously passed for saints. "It consists within my knowledge," says +one letter-writer, "that many of these wretches who were or would have +been partakers in the plot have been treated with the utmost tenderness +by their masters, and were more like children than slaves." + +These appear to be all the details now accessible of this once famous +plot. They were not very freely published, even at the time. "The +minutiae of the conspiracy have not been detailed to the public," said +the Salem (Mass.) _Gazette_ of Oct. 7, "and perhaps, through a mistaken +notion of prudence and policy, will not be detailed in the Richmond +papers." The New-York _Commercial Advertiser_ of Oct. 13 was still more +explicit. "The trials of the negroes concerned in the late insurrection +are suspended until the opinions of the Legislature can be had on the +subject. This measure is said to be owing to the immense numbers who are +interested in the plot, whose death, should they all be found guilty and +be executed, will nearly produce the annihilation of the blacks in this +part of the country." And in the next issue of the same journal a +Richmond correspondent makes a similar statement, with the following +addition: "A conditional amnesty is perhaps expected. At the next session +of the Legislature [of Virginia], they took into consideration the +subject referred to them, in secret session, with closed doors. The whole +result of their deliberations has never yet been made public, as the +injunction of secrecy has never been removed. To satisfy the court, the +public, and themselves, they had a task so difficult to perform, that it +is not surprising that their deliberations were in secret." + +It is a matter of historical interest to know that in these mysterious +sessions lay the germs of the American Colonization Society. A +correspondence was at once secretly commenced between the Governor of +Virginia and the President of the United States, with a view to securing +a grant of land whither troublesome slaves might be banished. Nothing +came of it then; but in 1801, 1802, and 1804, these attempts were +renewed. And finally, on Jan. 22, 1805, the following vote was passed, +still in secret session: "_Resolved_, that the Senators of this State in +the Congress of the United States be instructed, and the Representatives +be requested, to use their best efforts for the obtaining from the +General Government a competent portion of territory in the State of +Louisiana, to be appropriated to the residence of such people of color as +have been or shall be emancipated, or hereafter may become dangerous to +the public safety," etc. But of all these efforts nothing was known till +their record was accidentally discovered by Charles Fenton Mercer in +1816. He at once brought the matter to light, and moved a similar +resolution in the Virginia Legislature; it was almost unanimously +adopted, and the first formal meeting of the Colonization Society, in +1817, was called "in aid" of this Virginia movement. But the whole +correspondence was never made public until the Nat Turner insurrection of +1831 recalled the previous excitement; and these papers were demanded by +Mr. Summers, a member of the Legislature, who described them as "having +originated in a convulsion similar to that which had recently, but more +terribly, occurred." + +But neither these subsequent papers, nor any documents which now appear +accessible, can supply any authentic or trustworthy evidence as to the +real extent of the earlier plot. It certainly was not confined to the +mere environs of Richmond. The Norfolk _Epitome_ of Oct. 6 states that on +the 6th and 7th of the previous month one hundred and fifty blacks, +including twenty from Norfolk, were assembled near Whitlock's Mills in +Suffolk County, and remained in the neighborhood till the failure of the +Richmond plan became known. Petersburg newspapers also had letters +containing similar tales. Then the alarm spread more widely. Near +Edenton, N.C., there was undoubtedly a real insurrection, though promptly +suppressed; and many families ultimately removed from that vicinity in +consequence. In Charleston, S.C., there was still greater excitement, if +the contemporary press may be trusted; it was reported that the +freeholders had been summoned to appear in arms, on penalty of a fine of +fifteen pounds, which many preferred to pay rather than risk taking the +fever which then prevailed. These reports were, however, zealously +contradicted in letters from Charleston, dated Oct. 8; and the Charleston +newspapers up to Sept. 17 had certainly contained no reference to any +especial excitement. This alone might not settle the fact, for reasons +already given. But the omission of any such affair from the valuable +pamphlet published in 1822 by Edwin C. Holland, containing reminiscences +of insurrections in South Carolina, is presumptive evidence that no very +extended agitation occurred. + +But wherever there was a black population, slave or emancipated, men's +startled consciences made cowards of them all, and recognized the negro +as a dangerous man, because an injured one. In Philadelphia it was +seriously proposed to prohibit the use of sky-rockets for a time, because +they had been employed as signals in San Domingo. "Even in Boston," said +the New-York _Daily Advertiser_ of Sept. 20, "fears are expressed, and +measures of prevention adopted." This probably refers to a singular +advertisement which appeared in some of the Boston newspapers on Sept. +16, and runs as follows:-- + + "NOTICE TO BLACKS. + + "The officers of the police having made returns to the subscriber + of the names of the following persons who are Africans or + negroes, not subjects of the Emperor of Morocco nor citizens of + any of the United States, the same are hereby warned and directed + to depart out of this Commonwealth before the tenth day of + October next, as they would avoid the pains and penalties of the + law in that case provided, which was passed by the Legislature + March 26, 1788. + + "CHARLES BULFINCH, Superintendent. + + "By order and direction of the Selectmen." + +The names annexed are about three hundred, with the places of their +supposed origin, and they occupy a column of the paper. So at least +asserts the _United-States Gazette_ of Sept. 23. "It seems probable," +adds the editor, "from the nature of the notice, that some suspicion of +the design of the negroes is entertained; and we regret to say there is +too much cause." The law of 1788 above mentioned was "An Act for +suppressing rogues, vagabonds, and the like," which forbade all persons +of African descent, unless citizens of some one of the United States or +subjects of the Emperor of Morocco, from remaining more than two months +within the Commonwealth, on penalty of imprisonment and hard labor. This +singular statute remained unrepealed until 1834. + +Amid the general harmony in the contemporary narratives of Gabriel's +insurrection, it would be improper to pass by one exceptional legend, +which by some singular fatality has obtained more circulation than all +the true accounts put together. I can trace it no farther back than Nat +Turner's time, when it was published in the Albany _Evening Journal_; +thence transferred to the _Liberator_ of Sept. 17, 1831, and many other +newspapers; then refuted in detail by the _Richmond Enquirer_ of Oct. 21; +then resuscitated in the John-Brown epoch by the Philadelphia _Press_, +and extensively copied. It is fresh, spirited, and full of graphic and +interesting details, nearly every one of which is altogether false. + +Gabriel in this narrative becomes a rather mythical being, of vast +abilities and life-long preparations. He bought his freedom, it is +stated, at the age of twenty-one, and then travelled all over the +Southern States, enlisting confederates and forming stores of arms. At +length his plot was discovered, in consequence of three negroes having +been seen riding out of a stable-yard together; and the Governor offered +a reward of ten thousand dollars for further information, to which a +Richmond gentleman added as much more. Gabriel concealed himself on board +the "Sally Ann," a vessel just sailing for San Domingo, and was revealed +by his little nephew, whom he had sent for a jug of rum. Finally, the +narrative puts an eloquent dying speech into Gabriel's mouth, and, to +give a properly tragic consummation, causes him to be torn to death by +four wild horses. The last item is, however, omitted in the more recent +reprints of the story. + +Every one of these statements appears to be absolutely erroneous. Gabriel +lived and died a slave, and was probably never out of Virginia. His plot +was voluntarily revealed by accomplices. The rewards offered for his +arrest amounted to three hundred dollars only. He concealed himself on +board the schooner "Mary," bound to Norfolk, and was discovered by the +police. He died on the gallows, with ten associates, having made no +address to the court or the people. All the errors of the statement were +contradicted when it was first made public, but they have proved very +hard to kill. + +Some of these events were embodied in a song bearing the same title with +this essay, "Gabriel's Defeat," and set to a tune of the same name, both +being composed by a colored man. Several witnesses have assured me of +having heard this sung in Virginia, as a favorite air at the dances of +the white people, as well as in the huts of the slaves. It is surely one +of history's strange parallelisms, that this fatal enterprise, like that +of John Brown afterwards, should thus have embalmed itself in music. And +twenty-two years after these events, their impression still remained +vivid enough for Benjamin Lundy, in Tennessee, to write: "So well had +they matured their plot, and so completely had they organized their +system of operations, that nothing but a seemingly miraculous +intervention of the arm of Providence was supposed to have been capable +of saving the city from pillage and flames, and the inhabitants thereof +from butchery. So dreadful was the alarm and so great the consternation +produced on this occasion, that a member of Congress from that State was +some time after heard to express himself in his place as follows: 'The +night-bell is never heard to toll in the city of Richmond, but the +anxious mother presses her infant more closely to her bosom.'" The +Congressman was John Randolph of Roanoke, and it was Gabriel who had +taught him the lesson. + +And longer than the melancholy life of that wayward statesman,--down even +to the beginning of the American civil war,--there lingered in Richmond a +memorial of those days, most peculiar and most instructive. Before the +days of secession, when the Northern traveller in Virginia, after +traversing for weary leagues its miry ways, its desolate fields, and its +flowery forests, rode at last into its metropolis, he was sure to be +guided ere long to visit its stately Capitol, modelled by Jefferson, when +French minister, from the Maison Carrée. Standing before it, he might +admire undisturbed the Grecian outline of its exterior; but he found +himself forbidden to enter, save by passing an armed and uniformed +sentinel at the doorway. No other State of the Union then found it +necessary to protect its State House by a permanent cordon of bayonets. +Yet there for half a century stood sentinel the "Public Guard" of +Virginia; and when the traveller asked the origin of the precaution, he +was told that it was the lasting memorial of Gabriel's Defeat. + + + + +DENMARK VESEY + + +On Saturday afternoon, May 25, 1822, a slave named Devany, belonging to +Col. Prioleau of Charleston, S.C., was sent to market by his +mistress,--the colonel being absent in the country. After doing his +errands, he strolled down upon the wharves in the enjoyment of that +magnificent wealth of leisure which usually characterized the former +"house-servant" of the South, when beyond hail of the street-door. He +presently noticed a small vessel lying in the stream, with a peculiar +flag flying; and while looking at it, he was accosted by a slave named +William, belonging to Mr. John Paul, who remarked to him, "I have often +seen a flag with the number 76, but never one with the number 96 upon it +before." After some further conversation on this trifling point, William +suddenly inquired, "Do you know that something serious is about to take +place?" Devany disclaiming the knowledge of any graver impending crisis +than the family dinner, the other went on to inform him that many of the +slaves were "determined to right themselves." "We are determined," he +added, "to shake off our bondage, and for that purpose we stand on a good +foundation; many have joined, and if you will go with me, I will show you +the man who has the list of names, and who will take yours down." + +This startling disclosure was quite too much for Devany: he was made of +the wrong material for so daring a project; his genius was culinary, not +revolutionary. Giving some excuse for breaking off the conversation, he +went forthwith to consult a free colored man, named Pensil or Pencell, +who advised him to warn his master instantly. So he lost no time in +telling the secret to his mistress and her young son; and on the return +of Col. Prioleau from the country, five days afterward, it was at once +revealed to him. Within an hour or two he stated the facts to Mr. +Hamilton, the intendant, or, as he would now be called, mayor; Mr. +Hamilton at once summoned the corporation, and by five o'clock Devany and +William were under examination. + +This was the first warning of a plot which ultimately filled Charleston +with terror. And yet so thorough and so secret was the organization of +the negroes, that a fortnight passed without yielding the slightest +information beyond the very little which was obtained from these two. +William Paul was, indeed, put in confinement, and soon gave evidence +inculpating two slaves as his employers,--Mingo Harth and Peter Poyas. +But these men, when arrested, behaved with such perfect coolness, and +treated the charge with such entire levity;--their trunks and premises, +when searched, were so innocent of all alarming contents;--that they were +soon discharged by the wardens. William Paul at length became alarmed for +his own safety, and began to let out further facts piecemeal, and to +inculpate other men. But some of those very men came voluntarily to the +intendant, on hearing that they were suspected, and indignantly offered +themselves for examination. Puzzled and bewildered, the municipal +government kept the thing as secret as possible, placed the city guard in +an efficient condition, provided sixteen hundred rounds of ball +cartridges, and ordered the sentinels and patrols to be armed with loaded +muskets. "Such had been our fancied security, that the guard had +previously gone on duty without muskets, and with only sheathed bayonets +and bludgeons." + +It has since been asserted, though perhaps on questionable authority, +that the Secretary of War was informed of the plot, even including some +details of the plan and the leader's name, before it was known in +Charleston. If so, he utterly disregarded it; and, indeed, so well did +the negroes play their part, that the whole report was eventually +disbelieved, while--as was afterwards proved--they went on to complete +their secret organization, and hastened by a fortnight the appointed day +of attack. Unfortunately for their plans, however, another betrayal took +place at the very last moment, from a different direction. A class-leader +in a Methodist church had been persuaded or bribed by his master to +procure further disclosures. He at length came and stated, that, about +three months before, a man named Rolla, slave of Gov. Bennett, had +communicated to a friend of his the fact of an intended insurrection, and +had said that the time fixed for the outbreak was the following Sunday +night, June 16. As this conversation took place on Friday, it gave but a +very short time for the city authorities to act, especially as they +wished neither to endanger the city nor to alarm it. + +Yet so cautiously was the game played on both sides that the whole thing +was still kept a secret from the Charleston public; and some members of +the city government did not fully appreciate their danger till they had +passed it. "The whole was concealed," wrote the governor afterwards, +"until the time came; but secret preparations were made. Saturday night +and Sunday morning passed without demonstrations; doubts were excited, +and counter orders issued for diminishing the guard." It afterwards +proved that these preparations showed to the slaves that their plot was +betrayed, and so saved the city without public alarm. Newspaper +correspondence soon was full of the story, each informant of course +hinting plainly that he had been behind the scenes all along, and had +withheld it only to gratify the authorities in their policy of silence. +It was "now no longer a secret," they wrote; adding, that, for five or +six weeks, but little attention had been paid by the community to these +rumors, the city council having kept it carefully to themselves until a +number of suspicious slaves had been arrested. This refers to ten +prisoners who were seized on June 18, an arrest which killed the plot, +and left only the terrors of what might have been. The investigation, +thus publicly commenced, soon revealed a free colored man named Denmark +Vesey as the leader of the enterprise,--among his chief coadjutors being +that innocent Peter and that unsuspecting Mingo who had been examined and +discharged nearly three weeks before. + +It is matter of demonstration, that, but for the military preparations on +the appointed Sunday night, the attempt would have been made. The +ringleaders had actually met for their final arrangements, when, by +comparing notes, they found themselves foiled; and within another week +they were prisoners on trial. Nevertheless, the plot which they had laid +was the most elaborate insurrectionary project ever formed by American +slaves, and came the nearest to a terrible success. In boldness of +conception and thoroughness of organization there has been nothing to +compare with it; and it is worth while to dwell somewhat upon its +details, first introducing the _dramatis personae_. + +Denmark Vesey had come very near figuring as a revolutionist in Hayti, +instead of South Carolina. Capt. Vesey, an old resident of Charleston, +commanded a ship that traded between St. Thomas and Cape Français, during +our Revolutionary War, in the slave-transportation line. In the year 1781 +he took on board a cargo of three hundred and ninety slaves, and sailed +for the Cape. On the passage, he and his officers were much attracted by +the beauty and intelligence of a boy of fourteen, whom they unanimously +adopted into the cabin as a pet. They gave him new clothes, and a new +name, Télémaque, which was afterwards gradually corrupted into Telmak and +Denmark. They amused themselves with him until their arrival at Cape +Français, and then, "having no use for the boy," sold their pet as if he +had been a macaw or a monkey. Capt. Vesey sailed for St. Thomas; and, +presently making another trip to Cape Français, was surprised to hear +from his consignee that Télémaque would be returned on his hands as being +"unsound,"--not in theology nor in morals, but in body,--subject to +epileptic fits, in fact. According to the custom of that place, the boy +was examined by the city physician, who required Capt. Vesey to take him +back; and Denmark served him faithfully, with no trouble from epilepsy, +for twenty years, travelling all over the world with him, and learning to +speak various languages. In 1800 he drew a prize of fifteen hundred +dollars in the East Bay-street Lottery, with which he bought his freedom +from his master for six hundred dollars,--much less than his market +value. From that time, the official report says, he worked as a carpenter +in Charleston, distinguished for physical strength and energy. "Among +those of his color he was looked up to with awe and respect. His temper +was impetuous and domineering in the extreme, qualifying him for the +despotic rule of which he was ambitious. All his passions were +ungovernable and savage; and to his numerous wives and children he +displayed the haughty and capricious cruelty of an Eastern bashaw." + +"For several years before he disclosed his intentions to any one, he +appears to have been constantly and assiduously engaged in endeavoring to +imbitter the minds of the colored population against the white. He +rendered himself perfectly familiar with all those parts of the +Scriptures which he thought he could pervert to his purpose, and would +readily quote them to prove that slavery was contrary to the laws of God; +that slaves were bound to attempt their emancipation, however shocking +and bloody might be the consequences; and that such efforts would not +only be pleasing to the Almighty, but were absolutely enjoined, and their +success predicted, in the Scriptures. His favorite texts when he +addressed those of his own color were Zech. xiv. 1-3, and Josh. vi. 21; +and in all his conversations he identified their situation with that of +the Israelites. The number of inflammatory pamphlets on slavery brought +into Charleston from some of our sister States within the last four years +(and once from Sierra Leone), and distributed amongst the colored +population of the city, for which there was a great facility, in +consequence of the unrestricted intercourse allowed to persons of color +between the different States in the Union, and the speeches in Congress +of those opposed to the admission of Missouri into the Union, perhaps +garbled and misrepresented, furnished him with ample means for inflaming +the minds of the colored population of the State; and by distorting +certain parts of those speeches, or selecting from them particular +passages, he persuaded but too many that Congress had actually declared +them free, and that they were held in bondage contrary to the laws of the +land. Even whilst walking through the streets in company with another, he +was not idle; for if his companion bowed to a white person, he would +rebuke him, and observe that all men were born equal, and that he was +surprised that any one would degrade himself by such conduct; that he +would never cringe to the whites, nor ought any one who had the feelings +of a man. When answered, 'We are slaves,' he would sarcastically and +indignantly reply, 'You deserve to remain slaves;' and if he were further +asked, 'What can we do?' he would remark, 'Go and buy a spelling-book, +and read the fable of Hercules and the Wagoner,' which he would then +repeat, and apply it to their situation. He also sought every opportunity +of entering into conversation with white persons, when they could be +overheard by negroes near by, especially in grog-shops,--during which +conversation he would artfully introduce some bold remark on slavery; and +sometimes, when, from the character he was conversing with, he found he +might still be bolder, he would go so far, that, had not his declarations +in such situations been clearly proved, they would scarcely have been +credited. He continued this course until some time after the commencement +of the last winter; by which time he had not only obtained incredible +influence amongst persons of color, but many feared him more than their +owners, and, one of them declared, even more than his God." + +It was proved against him, that his house had been the principal place of +meeting for the conspirators, that all the others habitually referred to +him as the leader, and that he had shown great address in dealing with +different temperaments and overcoming a variety of scruples. One witness +testified that Vesey had read to him from the Bible about the deliverance +of the children of Israel; another, that he had read to him a speech +which had been delivered "in Congress by a Mr. King" on the subject of +slavery, and Vesey had said that "this Mr. King was the black man's +friend; that he, Mr. King, had declared he would continue to speak, +write, and publish pamphlets against slavery the longest day he lived, +until the Southern States consented to emancipate their slaves, for that +slavery was a great disgrace to the country." But among all the reports +there are only two sentences which really reveal the secret soul of +Denmark Vesey, and show his impulses and motives. "He said he did not go +with Creighton to Africa, because he had not a will; he wanted to stay +and see what he could do for his fellow-creatures." The other takes us +still nearer home. Monday Gell stated in his confession, that Vesey, on +first broaching the plan to him, said "he was satisfied with his own +condition, being free; but, as all his children were slaves, he wished to +see what could be done for them." + +It is strange to turn from this simple statement of a perhaps intelligent +preference, on the part of a parent, for seeing his offspring in a +condition of freedom, to the _naïve_ astonishment of his judges. "It is +difficult to imagine," says the sentence finally passed on Denmark Vesey, +"what infatuation could have prompted you to attempt an enterprise so +wild and visionary. You were a free man, comparatively wealthy, and +enjoyed every comfort compatible with your situation. You had, therefore, +much to risk and little to gain." Yet one witness testified: "Vesey said +the negroes were living such an abominable life, they ought to rise. I +said, I was living well; he said, though I was, others were not, and that +'twas such fools as I that were in the way and would not help them, and +that after all things were well he would mark me." "His general +conversation," said another witness, a white boy, "was about religion, +which he would apply to slavery; as, for instance, he would speak of the +creation of the world, in which he would say all men had equal rights, +blacks as well as whites, etc.; all his religious remarks were mingled +with slavery." And the firmness of this purpose did not leave him, even +after the betrayal of his cherished plans. "After the plot was +discovered," said Monday Gell, in his confession, "Vesey said it was all +over, unless an attempt were made to rescue those who might be condemned, +by rushing on the people and saving the prisoners, or all dying +together." + +The only person to divide with Vesey the claim of leadership was Peter +Poyas. Vesey was the missionary of the cause, but Peter was the +organizing mind. He kept the register of "candidates," and decided who +should or should not be enrolled. "We can't live so," he often reminded +his confederates; "we must break the yoke." "God has a hand in it; we +have been meeting for four years, and are not yet betrayed." Peter was a +ship-carpenter, and a slave of great value. He was to be the military +leader. His plans showed some natural generalship: he arranged the +night-attack; he planned the enrolment of a mounted troop to scour the +streets; and he had a list of all the shops where arms and ammunition +were kept for sale. He voluntarily undertook the management of the most +difficult part of the enterprise,--the capture of the main +guard-house,--and had pledged himself to advance alone and surprise the +sentinel. He was said to have a magnetism in his eyes, of which his +confederates stood in great awe; if he once got his eye upon a man, there +was no resisting it. A white witness has since narrated, that, after his +arrest, he was chained to the floor in a cell, with another of the +conspirators. Men in authority came, and sought by promises, threats, and +even tortures, to ascertain the names of other accomplices. His +companion, wearied out with pain and suffering, and stimulated by the +hope of saving his own life, at last began to yield. Peter raised +himself, leaned upon his elbow, looked at the poor fellow, saying +quietly, "Die like a man," and instantly lay down again. It was enough; +not another word was extorted. + +One of the most notable individuals in the plot was a certain Jack +Purcell, commonly called Gullah Jack,--Gullah signifying Angola, the +place of his origin. A conjurer by profession and by lineal heritage in +his own country, he had resumed the practice of his vocation on this side +the Atlantic. For fifteen years he had wielded in secret an immense +influence among a sable constituency in Charleston; and as he had the +reputation of being invulnerable, and of teaching invulnerability as an +art, he was very good at beating up recruits for insurrection. Over those +of Angolese descent, especially, he was a perfect king, and made them +join in the revolt as one man. They met him monthly at a place called +Bulkley's Farm, selected because the black overseer on that plantation +was one of the initiated, and because the farm was accessible by water, +thus enabling them to elude the patrol. There they prepared cartridges +and pikes, and had primitive banquets, which assumed a melodramatic +character under the inspiriting guidance of Jack. If a fowl was privately +roasted, that mystic individual muttered incantations over it; and then +they all grasped at it, exclaiming, "Thus we pull Buckra to pieces!" He +gave them parched corn and ground-nuts to be eaten as internal safeguards +on the day before the outbreak, and a consecrated _cullah_, or crab's +claw, to be carried in the mouth by each, as an amulet. These rather +questionable means secured him a power which was very unquestionable; the +witnesses examined in his presence all showed dread of his conjurations, +and referred to him indirectly, with a kind of awe, as "the little man +who can't be shot." + +When Gullah Jack was otherwise engaged, there seems to have been a sort +of deputy seer employed in the enterprise, a blind man named Philip. He +was a preacher; was said to have been born with a caul on his head, and +so claimed the gift of second-sight. Timid adherents were brought to his +house for ghostly counsel. "Why do you look so timorous?" he said to +William Garner, and then quoted Scripture, "Let not your heart be +troubled." That a blind man should know how he looked, was beyond the +philosophy of the visitor; and this piece of rather cheap ingenuity +carried the day. + +Other leaders were appointed also. Monday Gell was the scribe of the +enterprise; he was a native African, who had learned to read and write. +He was by trade a harness-maker, working chiefly on his own account. He +confessed that he had written a letter to President Boyer of the new +black republic; "the letter was about the sufferings of the blacks, and +to know if the people of St. Domingo would help them if they made an +effort to free themselves." This epistle was sent by the black cook of a +Northern schooner, and the envelope was addressed to a relative of the +bearer. + +Tom Russell was the armorer, and made pikes "on a very improved model," +the official report admits. Polydore Faber fitted the weapons with +handles. Bacchus Hammett had charge of the fire-arms and ammunition, not +as yet a laborious duty. William Garner and Mingo Harth were to lead the +horse-company. Lot Forrester was the courier, and had done, no one ever +knew how much, in the way of enlisting country negroes, of whom Ned +Bennett was to take command when enlisted. Being the governor's servant, +Ned was probably credited with some official experience. These were the +officers: now for the plan of attack. + +It was the custom then, as later, for the country negroes to flock +largely into Charleston on Sunday. More than a thousand came, on ordinary +occasions, and a far larger number might at any time make their +appearance without exciting any suspicion. They gathered in, especially +by water, from the opposite sides of Ashley and Cooper Rivers, and from +the neighboring islands; and they came in a great number of canoes of +various sizes,--many of which could carry a hundred men,--which were +ordinarily employed in bringing agricultural products to the Charleston +market. To get an approximate knowledge of the number, the city +government once ordered the persons thus arriving to be counted,--and +that during the progress of the trials, at a time when the negroes were +rather fearful of coming into town; and it was found, that, even then, +there were more than five hundred visitors on a single Sunday. This fact, +then, was the essential point in the plan of insurrection. Whole +plantations were found to have been enlisted among the "candidates," as +they were termed; and it was proved that the city negroes, who lived +nearest the place of meeting, had agreed to conceal these confederates in +their houses to a large extent, on the night of the proposed outbreak. + +The details of the plan, however, were not rashly committed to the mass +of the confederates; they were known only to a few, and were finally to +be announced only after the evening prayer-meetings on the appointed +Sunday. But each leader had his own company enlisted, and his own work +marked out. When the clock struck twelve, all were to move. Peter Poyas +was to lead a party ordered to assemble at South Bay, and to be joined by +a force from James's Island; he was then to march up and seize the +arsenal and guard-house opposite St. Michael's Church, and detach a +sufficient number to cut off all white citizens who should appear at the +alarm-posts. A second body of negroes, from the country and the Neck, +headed by Ned Bennett, was to assemble on the Neck, and seize the arsenal +there. A third was to meet at Gov. Bennett's Mills, under command of +Rolla, and, after putting the governor and intendant to death, to march +through the city, or be posted at Cannon's Bridge, thus preventing the +inhabitants of Cannonsborough from entering the city. A fourth, partly +from the country, and partly from the neighboring localities in the city, +was to rendezvous on Gadsden's Wharf, and attack the upper guard-house. A +fifth, composed of country and Neck negroes, was to assemble at Bulkley's +Farm, two miles and a half from the city, seize the upper +powder-magazine, and then march down; and a sixth was to assemble at +Denmark Vesey's, and obey his orders. A seventh detachment, under Gullah +Jack, was to assemble in Boundary Street, at the head of King Street, to +capture the arms of the Neck company of militia, and to take an +additional supply from Mr. Duquercron's shop. The naval stores on Mey's +Wharf were also to be attacked. Meanwhile, a horse-company, consisting of +many draymen, hostlers, and butcher-boys, was to meet at Lightwood's +Alley, and then scour the streets to prevent the whites from assembling. +Every white man coming out of his own door was to be killed; and, if +necessary, the city was to be fired in several places,--slow-match for +this purpose having been purloined from the public arsenal, and placed in +an accessible position. + +Beyond this, the plan of action was either unformed or undiscovered; some +slight reliance seems to have been placed on English aid,--more on +assistance from St. Domingo. At any rate, all the ships in the harbor +were to be seized; and in these, if the worst came to the worst, those +most deeply inculpated could set sail, bearing with them, perhaps, the +spoils of shops and of banks. It seems to be admitted by the official +narrative, that they might have been able, at that season of the year, +and with the aid of the fortifications on the Neck and around the harbor, +to retain possession of the city for some time. + +So unsuspicious were the authorities, so unprepared the citizens, so open +to attack lay the city, that nothing seemed necessary to the success of +the insurgents except organization and arms. Indeed, the plan of +organization easily covered a supply of arms. By their own contributions +they had secured enough to strike the first blow,--a few hundred pikes +and daggers, together with swords and guns for the leaders. But they had +carefully marked every place in the city where weapons were to be +obtained. On King-street Road, beyond the municipal limits, in a common +wooden shop, were left unguarded the arms of the Neck company of militia, +to the number of several hundred stand; and these were to be secured by +Bacchus Hammett, whose master kept the establishment. In Mr. Duquercron's +shop there were deposited for sale as many more weapons; and they had +noted Mr. Schirer's shop in Queen Street, and other gunsmiths' +establishments. Finally, the State arsenal in Meeting Street, a building +with no defences except ordinary wooden doors, was to be seized early in +the outbreak. Provided, therefore, that the first moves proved +successful, all the rest appeared sure. + +Very little seems to have been said among the conspirators in regard to +any plans of riot or debauchery, subsequent to the capture of the city. +Either their imaginations did not dwell on them, or the witnesses did not +dare to give testimony, or the authorities to print it. Death was to be +dealt out, comprehensive and terrible; but nothing more is mentioned. One +prisoner, Rolla, is reported in the evidence to have dropped hints in +regard to the destiny of the women; and there was a rumor in the +newspapers of the time, that he or some other of Gov. Bennett's slaves +was to have taken the governor's daughter, a young girl of sixteen, for +his wife, in the event of success; but this is all. On the other hand, +Denmark Vesey was known to be for a war of immediate and total +extermination; and when some of the company opposed killing "the +ministers and the women and children," Vesey read from the Scriptures +that all should be cut off, and said that "it was for their safety not to +leave one white skin alive, for this was the plan they pursued at St. +Domingo." And all this was not a mere dream of one lonely enthusiast, but +a measure which had been maturing for four full years among several +confederates, and had been under discussion for five months among +multitudes of initiated "candidates." + +As usual with slave-insurrections, the best men and those most trusted +were deepest in the plot. Rolla was the only prominent conspirator who +was not an active church-member. "Most of the ringleaders," says a +Charleston letter-writer of that day, "were the rulers or class-leaders +in what is called the African Society, and were considered faithful, +honest fellows. Indeed, many of the owners could not be convinced, till +the fellows confessed themselves, that they were concerned, and that the +first object of all was to kill their masters." And the first official +report declares that it would not be difficult to assign a motive for the +insurrectionists, "if it had not been distinctly proved, that, with +scarcely an exception, they had no individual hardship to complain of, +and were among the most humanely treated negroes in the city. The +facilities for combining and confederating in such a scheme were amply +afforded by the extreme indulgence and kindness which characterize the +domestic treatment of our slaves. Many slave-owners among us, not +satisfied with ministering to the wants of their domestics by all the +comforts of abundant food and excellent clothing, with a misguided +benevolence have not only permitted their instruction, but lent to such +efforts their approbation and applause." + +"I sympathize most sincerely," says the anonymous author of a pamphlet of +the period, "with the very respectable and pious clergyman whose heart +must still bleed at the recollection that his confidential class-leader, +but a week or two before his just conviction, had received the communion +of the Lord's Supper from his hand. This wretch had been brought up in +his pastor's family, and was treated with the same Christian attention as +was shown to their own children." "To us who are accustomed to the base +and proverbial ingratitude of these people, this ill return of kindness +and confidence is not surprising; but they who are ignorant of their real +character will read and wonder." + +One demonstration of this "Christian attention" had lately been the +closing of the African Church,--of which, as has been stated, most of the +leading revolutionists were members,--on the ground that it tended to +spread the dangerous infection of the alphabet. On Jan. 15, 1821, the +city marshal, John J. Lafar, had notified "ministers of the gospel and +others who keep night--and Sunday-schools for slaves, that the education +of such persons is forbidden by law, and that the city government feel +imperiously bound to enforce the penalty." So that there were some +special as well as general grounds for disaffection among these +ungrateful favorites of fortune, the slaves. Then there were fancied +dangers. An absurd report had somehow arisen,--since you cannot keep men +ignorant without making them unreasonable also,--that on the ensuing +Fourth of July the whites were to create a false alarm, and that every +black man coming out was to be killed, "in order to thin them;" this +being done to prevent their joining an imaginary army supposed to be on +its way from Hayti. Others were led to suppose that Congress had ended +the Missouri Compromise discussion by making them all free, and that the +law would protect their liberty if they could only secure it. Others, +again, were threatened with the vengeance of the conspirators, unless +they also joined; on the night of attack, it was said, the initiated +would have a countersign, and all who did not know it would share the +fate of the whites. Add to this the reading of Congressional speeches, +and of the copious magazine of revolution to be found in the Bible,--and +it was no wonder, if they for the first time were roused, under the +energetic leadership of Vesey, to a full consciousness of their own +condition. + +"Not only were the leaders of good character, and very much indulged by +their owners; but this was very generally the case with all who were +convicted,--many of them possessing the highest confidence of their +owners, and not one of bad character." In one case it was proved that +Vesey had forbidden his followers to trust a certain man, because he had +once been seen intoxicated. In another case it was shown that a slave +named George had made every effort to obtain their confidence, but was +constantly excluded from their meetings as a talkative fellow who could +not be trusted,--a policy which his levity of manner, when examined in +court, fully justified. They took no women into counsel,--not from any +distrust apparently, but in order that their children might not be left +uncared-for in case of defeat and destruction. House-servants were rarely +trusted, or only when they had been carefully sounded by the chief +leaders. Peter Poyas, in commissioning an agent to enlist men, gave him +excellent cautions: "Don't mention it to those waiting-men who receive +presents of old coats, etc., from their masters, or they'll betray us; I +will speak to them." When he did speak, if he did not convince them, he +at least frightened them. But the chief reliance was on those slaves who +were hired out, and therefore more uncontrolled,--and also upon the +country negroes. + +The same far-sighted policy directed the conspirators to disarm suspicion +by peculiarly obedient and orderly conduct. And it shows the precaution +with which the thing was carried on, that, although Peter Poyas was +proved to have had a list of some six hundred persons, yet not one of his +particular company was ever brought to trial. As each leader kept to +himself the names of his proselytes, and as Monday Gell was the only one +of these leaders who turned traitor, any opinion as to the numbers +actually engaged must be altogether conjectural. One witness said nine +thousand; another, six thousand six hundred. These statements were +probably extravagant, though not more so than Gov. Bennett's assertion, +on the other side, that "all who were actually concerned had been brought +to justice,"--unless by this phrase he designates only the ringleaders. +The avowed aim of the governor's letter, indeed, is to smooth the thing +over, for the credit and safety of the city; and its evasive tone +contrasts strongly with the more frank and thorough statements of the +judges, made after the thing could no longer be hushed up. These high +authorities explicitly acknowledge that they had failed to detect more +than a small minority of those concerned in the project, and seem to +admit, that, if it had once been brought to a head, the slaves generally +would have joined in. + +"We cannot venture to say," says the intendant's pamphlet, "to how many +the knowledge of the intended effort was communicated, who without +signifying their assent, or attending any of the meetings, were yet +prepared to profit by events. That there are many who would not have +permitted the enterprise to have failed at a critical moment, for the +want of their co-operation, we have the best reason for believing." So +believed the community at large; and the panic was in proportion, when +the whole danger was finally made public. "The scenes I witnessed," says +one who has since narrated the circumstances, "and the declaration of the +impending danger that met us at all times and on all occasions, forced +the conviction that never were an entire people more thoroughly alarmed +than were the people of Charleston at that time.... During the +excitement, and the trial of the supposed conspirators, rumor proclaimed +all, and doubtless more than all, the horrors of the plot. The city was +to be fired in every quarter; the arsenal in the immediate vicinity was +to be broken open, and the arms distributed to the insurgents, and a +universal massacre of the white inhabitants to take place. Nor did there +seem to be any doubt in the mind of the people, that such would actually +have been the result had not the plot fortunately been detected before +the time appointed for the outbreak. It was believed, as a matter of +course, that every black in the city would join in the insurrection, and +that if the original design had been attempted, and the city taken by +surprise, the negroes would have achieved a complete and easy victory. +Nor does it seem at all impossible that such might have been, or yet may +be, the case, if any well-arranged and resolute rising should take +place." + +Indeed, this universal admission, that all the slaves were ready to take +part in any desperate enterprise, was one of the most startling aspects +of the affair. The authorities say that the two principal State's +evidence declared that "they never spoke to any person of color on the +subject, or knew of any one who had been spoken to by the other leaders, +who had withheld his assent." And the conspirators seem to have been +perfectly satisfied that all the remaining slaves would enter their ranks +upon the slightest success. "Let us assemble a sufficient number to +commence the work with spirit, and we'll not want men; they'll fall in +behind us fast enough." And as an illustration of this readiness, the +official report mentions a slave who had belonged to one master for +sixteen years, sustaining a high character for fidelity and affection, +who had twice travelled with him through the Northern States, resisting +every solicitation to escape, and who yet was very deeply concerned in +the insurrection, though knowing it to involve the probable destruction +of the whole family with whom he lived. + +One singular circumstance followed the first rumors of the plot. Several +white men, said to be of low and unprincipled character, at once began to +make interest with the supposed leaders among the slaves, either from +genuine sympathy, or with the intention of betraying them for money, or +by profiting by the insurrection, should it succeed. Four of these were +brought to trial; but the official report expresses the opinion that many +more might have been discovered but for the inadmissibility of slave +testimony against whites. Indeed, the evidence against even these four +was insufficient for a capital conviction, although one was overheard, +through stratagem, by the intendant himself, and arrested on the spot. +This man was a Scotchman, another a Spaniard, a third a German, and the +fourth a Carolinian. The last had for thirty years kept a shop in the +neighborhood of Charleston; he was proved to have asserted that "the +negroes had as much right to fight for their liberty as the white +people," had offered to head them in the enterprise, and had said that in +three weeks he would have two thousand men. But in no case, it appears, +did these men obtain the confidence of the slaves; and the whole plot was +conceived and organized, so far as appears, without the slightest +co-operation from any white man. + +The trial of the conspirators began on Wednesday, June 19. At the request +of the intendant, Justices Kennedy and Parker summoned five freeholders +(Messrs. Drayton, Heyward, Pringle, Legaré, and Turnbull) to constitute a +court, under the provisions of the Act "for the better ordering and +governing negroes and other slaves." The intendant laid the case before +them, with a list of prisoners and witnesses. By a vote of the court, all +spectators were excluded, except the owners and counsel of the slaves +concerned. No other colored person was allowed to enter the jail, and a +strong guard of soldiers was kept always on duty around the building. +Under these general arrangements the trials proceeded with elaborate +formality, though with some variations from ordinary usage,--as was, +indeed, required by the statute. + +For instance, the law provided that the testimony of any Indian or slave +could be received, without oath, against a slave or free colored person, +although it was not valid, even under oath, against a white. But it is +best to quote the official language in respect to the rules adopted: "As +the court had been organized under a statute of a peculiar and local +character, and intended for the government of a distinct class of persons +in the community, they were bound to conform their proceedings to its +provisions, which depart in many essential features from the principles +of the common law and some of the settled rules of evidence. The court, +however, determined to adopt those rules, whenever they were not +repugnant to nor expressly excepted by that statute, nor inconsistent +with the local situation and policy of the State; and laid down for their +own government the following regulations: First, that no slave should be +tried except in the presence of his owner or his counsel, and that notice +should be given in every case at least one day before the trial; second, +that the testimony of one witness, unsupported by additional evidence or +by circumstances, should lead to no conviction of a capital nature; +third, that the witnesses should be confronted with the accused and with +each other in every case, except where testimony was given under a solemn +pledge that the names of the witnesses should not be divulged,--as they +declared, in some instances, that they apprehended being murdered by the +blacks, if it was known that they had volunteered their evidence; fourth, +that the prisoners might be represented by counsel, whenever this was +requested by the owners of the slaves, or by the prisoners themselves if +free; fifth, that the statements or defences of the accused should be +heard in every case, and they be permitted themselves to examine any +witness they thought proper." + +It is singular to observe how entirely these rules seem to concede that a +slave's life has no sort of value to himself, but only to his master. His +master, not he himself, must choose whether it be worth while to employ +counsel. His master, not his mother or his wife, must be present at the +trial. So far is this carried, that the provision to exclude "persons who +had no particular interest in the slaves accused" seems to have excluded +every acknowledged relative they had in the world, and admitted only +those who had invested in them so many dollars. And yet the very first +section of that part of the statute under which they were tried lays down +an explicit recognition of their humanity: "And whereas natural justice +forbids that any _person_, of what condition soever, should be condemned +unheard." So thoroughly, in the whole report, are the ideas of person and +chattel intermingled, that when Gov. Bennett petitions for mitigation of +sentence in the case of his slave Batteau, and closes, "I ask this, +gentlemen, as an individual incurring a severe and distressing loss," it +is really impossible to decide whether the predominant emotion be +affectional or financial. + +It is a matter of painful necessity to acknowledge that the proceedings +of most slave-tribunals have justified the honest admission of Gov. Adams +of South Carolina, in his legislative message of 1855: "The +administration of our laws, in relation to our colored population, by our +courts of magistrates and freeholders, as these courts are at present +constituted, calls loudly for reform. Their decisions are rarely in +conformity with justice or humanity." This trial, as reported by the +justices themselves, seems to have been no worse than the +average,--perhaps better. In all, thirty-five were sentenced to death, +thirty-four to transportation, twenty-seven acquitted by the court, and +twenty-five discharged without trial, by the Committee of +Vigilance,--making in all one hundred and twenty-one. + +The sentences pronounced by Judge Kennedy upon the leading rebels, while +paying a high tribute to their previous character, of course bring all +law and all Scripture to prove the magnitude of their crime. "It is a +melancholy fact," he says, "that those servants in whom we reposed the +most unlimited confidence have been the principal actors in this wicked +scheme." Then he rises into earnest appeals. "Are you incapable of the +heavenly influence of that gospel, all whose paths are peace? It was to +reconcile us to our destiny on earth, and to enable us to discharge with +fidelity all our duties, whether as master or servant, that those +inspired precepts were imparted by Heaven to fallen man." + +To these reasonings the prisoners had, of course, nothing to say; but the +official reports bear the strongest testimony to their fortitude. "Rolla, +when arraigned, affected not to understand the charge against him, and, +when it was at his request further explained to him, assumed, with +wonderful adroitness, astonishment and surprise. He was remarkable, +throughout his trial, for great presence and composure of mind. When he +was informed he was convicted, and was advised to prepare for death, +though he had previously (but after his trial) confessed his guilt, he +appeared perfectly confounded, but exhibited no signs of fear. In Ned's +behavior there was nothing remarkable; but his countenance was stern and +immovable, even whilst he was receiving the sentence of death: from his +looks it was impossible to discover or conjecture what were his feelings. +Not so with Peter: for in his countenance were strongly marked +disappointed ambition, revenge, indignation, and an anxiety to know how +far the discoveries had extended; and the same emotions were exhibited in +his conduct. He did not appear to fear personal consequences, for his +whole behavior indicated the reverse; but exhibited an evident anxiety +for the success of their plan, in which his whole soul was embarked. His +countenance and behavior were the same when he received his sentence; and +his only words were, on retiring, 'I suppose you'll let me see my wife +and family before I die?' and that not in a supplicating tone. When he +was asked, a day or two after, if it was possible he could wish to see +his master and family murdered, who had treated him so kindly, he only +replied to the question by a smile. Monday's behavior was not peculiar. +When he was before the court, his arms were folded; he heard the +testimony given against him, and received his sentence, with the utmost +firmness and composure. But no description can accurately convey to +others the impression which the trial, defence, and appearance of Gullah +Jack made on those who witnessed the workings of his cunning and rude +address. When arrested and brought before the court, in company with +another African named Jack, the property of the estate of Pritchard, he +assumed so much ignorance, and looked and acted the fool so well, that +some of the court could not believe that this was the necromancer who was +sought after. This conduct he continued when on his trial, until he saw +the witnesses and heard the testimony as it progressed against him; when, +in an instant, his countenance was lighted up as if by lightning, and his +wildness and vehemence of gesture, and the malignant glance with which he +eyed the witnesses who appeared against him, all indicated the savage, +who indeed had been _caught_, but not _tamed_. His courage, however, soon +forsook him. When he received sentence of death, he earnestly implored +that a fortnight longer might be allowed him, and then a week longer, +which he continued earnestly to solicit until he was taken from the +court-room to his cell; and when he was carried to execution, he gave up +his spirit without firmness or composure." + +Not so with Denmark Vesey. The plans of years were frustrated; his own +life and liberty were thrown away; many others were sacrificed through +his leadership; and one more was added to the list of unsuccessful +insurrections. All these disastrous certainties he faced calmly, and gave +his whole mind composedly to the conducting of his defence. With his arms +tightly folded, and his eyes fixed on the floor, he attentively followed +every item of the testimony. He heard the witnesses examined by the +court, and cross-examined by his own counsel; and it is evident from the +narrative of the presiding judge, that he showed no small skill and +policy in the searching cross-examination which he then applied. The +fears, the feelings, the consciences, of those who had betrayed him, all +were in turn appealed to; but the facts were quite overpowering, and it +was too late to aid his comrades or himself. Then turning to the court, +he skilfully availed himself of the point which had so much impressed the +community: the intrinsic improbability that a man in his position of +freedom and prosperity should sacrifice every thing to free other people. +If they thought it so incredible, why not give him the benefit of the +incredibility? The act being, as they stated, one of infatuation, why +convict him of it on the bare word of men who, by their own showing, had +not only shared the infatuation, but proved traitors to it? An ingenious +defence,--indeed, the only one which could by any possibility be +suggested, anterior to the days of Choate and somnambulism; but in vain. +He was sentenced; and it was not, apparently, till the judge reproached +him for the destruction he had brought on his followers, that he showed +any sign of emotion. Then the tears came into his eyes. But he said not +another word. + +The executions took place on five different days; and, bad as they were, +they might have been worse. After the imaginary Negro Plot of New York, +in 1741, thirteen negroes had been judicially burned alive; two had +suffered the same sentence at Charleston in 1808; and it was undoubtedly +some mark of progress, that in this case the gallows took the place of +the flames. Six were hanged on July 2, upon Blake's lands, near +Charleston,--Denmark Vesey, Peter Poyas, Jesse, Ned, Rolla, and +Batteau,--the last three being slaves of the governor himself. Gullah +Jack and John were executed "on the Lines," near Charleston, on July 12; +and twenty-two more on July 26. Four others suffered their fate on July +30; and one more, William Garner, effected a temporary escape, was +captured, and tried by a different court, and was finally executed on +Aug. 9. + +The self-control of these men did not desert them at their execution. +When the six leaders suffered death, the report says, Peter Poyas +repeated his charge of secrecy: "Do not open your lips; die silent, as +you shall see me do;" and all obeyed. And though afterwards, as the +particulars of the plot became better known, there was less inducement to +conceal, yet every one of the thirty-five seems to have met his fate +bravely, except the conjurer. Gov. Bennett, in his letter, expresses much +dissatisfaction at the small amount learned from the participators. "To +the last hour of the existence of several who appeared to be conspicuous +actors in the drama, they were pressingly importuned to make further +confessions,"--this "importuning" being more clearly defined in a letter +of Mr. Ferguson, owner of two of the slaves, as "having them severely +corrected." Yet so little was obtained, that the governor was compelled +to admit at last that the really essential features of the plot were not +known to any of the informers. + +It is to be remembered, that the plot failed because a man unauthorized +and incompetent, William Paul, undertook to make enlistments on his own +account. He happened on one of precisely that class of men,--favored +house-servants,--whom his leaders had expressly reserved for more skilful +manipulations. He being thus detected, one would have supposed that the +discovery of many accomplices would at once have followed. The number +enlisted was counted by thousands; yet for twenty-nine days after the +first treachery, and during twenty days of official examination, only +fifteen of the conspirators were ferreted out. Meanwhile the informers' +names had to be concealed with the utmost secrecy; they were in peril of +their lives from the slaves,--William Paul scarcely dared to go beyond +the doorstep,--and the names of important witnesses examined in June were +still suppressed in the official report published in October. That a +conspiracy on so large a scale should have existed in embryo during four +years, and in an active form for several months, and yet have been so +well managed, that, after actual betrayal, the authorities were again +thrown off their guard, and the plot nearly brought to a head +again,--this certainly shows extraordinary ability in the leaders, and a +talent for concerted action on the part of slaves generally, with which +they have hardly been credited. + +And it is also to be noted, that the range of the conspiracy extended far +beyond Charleston. It was proved that Frank, slave of Mr. Ferguson, +living nearly forty miles from the city, had boasted of having enlisted +four plantations in his immediate neighborhood. It was in evidence that +the insurgents "were trying all round the country, from Georgetown and +Santee round about to Combahee, to get people;" and, after the trials, it +was satisfactorily established that Vesey "had been in the country as far +north as South Santee, and southwardly as far as the Euhaws, which is +between seventy and eighty miles from the city." Mr. Ferguson himself +testified that the good order of any gang was no evidence of their +ignorance of the plot, since the behavior of his own initiated slaves had +been unexceptionable, in accordance with Vesey's directions. + +With such an organization and such materials, there was nothing in the +plan which could be pronounced incredible or impracticable. There is no +reason why they should not have taken the city. After all the governor's +entreaties as to moderate language, the authorities were obliged to admit +that South Carolina had been saved from a "horrible catastrophe." "For, +although success could not possibly have attended the conspirators, yet, +before their suppression, Charleston would probably have been wrapped in +flames, many valuable lives would have been sacrificed, and an immense +loss of property sustained by the citizens, even though no other +distressing occurrences were experienced by them; while the plantations +in the lower country would have been disorganized, and the agricultural +interests have sustained an enormous loss." The Northern journals had +already expressed still greater anxieties. "It appears," said the +New-York _Commercial Advertiser_, "that, but for the timely disclosure, +the whole of that State would in a few days have witnessed the horrid +spectacle once witnessed in St. Domingo." + +My friend, David Lee Child, has kindly communicated to me a few memoranda +of a conversation held long since with a free colored man who had worked +in Vesey's shop during the time of the insurrection; and these generally +confirm the official narratives. "I was a young man then," he said; "and, +owing to the policy of preventing communication between free colored +people and slaves, I had little opportunity of ascertaining how the +slaves felt about it. I know that several of them were abused in the +street, and some put in prison, for appearing in sackcloth. There was an +ordinance of the city, that any slave who wore a badge of mourning should +be imprisoned and flogged. They generally got the law, which is +thirty-nine lashes; but sometimes it was according to the decision of the +court." "I heard, at the time, of arms being buried in coffins at +Sullivan's Island." "In the time of the insurrection, the slaves were +tried in a small room in the jail where they were confined. No colored +person was allowed to go within two squares of the prison. Those two +squares were filled with troops, five thousand of whom were on duty day +and night. I was told, Vesey said to those that tried him, that the work +of insurrection would go on; but as none but white persons were permitted +to be present, I cannot tell whether he said it." + +During all this time there was naturally a silence in the Charleston +journals, which strongly contrasts with the extreme publicity at last +given to the testimony. Even the _National Intelligencer_, at Washington, +passed lightly over the affair, and deprecated the publication of +particulars. The Northern editors, on the other hand, eager for items, +were constantly complaining of this reserve, and calling for further +intelligence. "The Charleston papers," said the Hartford _Courant_ of +July 16, "have been silent on the subject of the insurrection; but +letters from this city state that it has created much alarm, and that two +brigades of troops were under arms for some time to suppress any risings +that might have taken place." "You will doubtless hear," wrote a +Charleston correspondent of the same paper, just before, "many reports, +and some exaggerated ones." "There was certainly a disposition to revolt, +and some preparations made, principally by the plantation negroes, to +take the city." "We hoped they would progress so far as to enable us to +ascertain and punish the ringleaders." "Assure my friends that we feel in +perfect security, although the number of nightly guards, and other +demonstrations, may induce a belief among strangers to the contrary." + +The strangers would have been very blind strangers, if they had not been +more influenced by the actions of the Charleston citizens than by their +words. The original information was given on May 25, 1822. The time +passed, and the plot failed on June 16. A plan for its revival on July 2 +proved abortive. Yet a letter from Charleston, in the Hartford _Courant_ +of Aug. 6, represented the panic as unabated: "Great preparations are +making, and all the military are put in preparation to guard against any +attempt of the same kind again; but we have no apprehension of its being +repeated." On Aug. 10, Gov. Bennett wrote the letter already mentioned, +which was printed and distributed as a circular, its object being to +deprecate undue alarm. "Every individual in the State is interested, +whether in regard to his own property, or the reputation of the State, in +giving no more importance to the transaction than it justly merits." Yet, +five days after this,--two months after the first danger had passed,--a +re-enforcement of United-States troops arrived at Fort Moultrie; and, +during the same month, several different attempts were made by small +parties of armed negroes to capture the mails between Charleston and +Savannah, and a reward of two hundred dollars was offered for their +detection. + +The first official report of the trials was prepared by the intendant, by +request of the city council. It passed through four editions in a few +months,--the first and fourth being published in Charleston, and the +second and third in Boston. Being, however, but a brief pamphlet, it did +not satisfy the public curiosity; and in October of the same year (1822), +a larger volume appeared at Charleston, edited by the magistrates who +presided at the trials,--Lionel H. Kennedy and Thomas Parker. It contains +the evidence in full, and a separate narrative of the whole affair, more +candid and lucid than any other which I have found in the newspapers or +pamphlets of the day. It exhibits that rarest of all qualities in a +slave-community, a willingness to look facts in the face. This narrative +has been faithfully followed, with the aid of such cross-lights as could +be secured from many other quarters, in preparing the present history. + +The editor of the first official report racked his brains to discover the +special causes of the revolt, and never trusted himself to allude to the +general one. The negroes rebelled because they were deluded by +Congressional eloquence; or because they were excited by a church +squabble; or because they had been spoilt by mistaken indulgences, such +as being allowed to learn to read,--"a misguided benevolence," as he +pronounces it. So the Baptist Convention seems to have thought it was +because they were not Baptists; and an Episcopal pamphleteer, because +they were not Episcopalians. It never seems to occur to any of these +spectators, that these people rebelled simply because they were slaves, +and wished to be free. + +No doubt, there were enough special torches with which a man so skilful +as Denmark Vesey could kindle up these dusky powder-magazines; but, after +all, the permanent peril lay in the powder. So long as that existed, +every thing was incendiary. Any torn scrap in the street might contain a +Missouri-Compromise speech, or a report of the last battle in St. +Domingo, or one of those able letters of Boyer's which were winning the +praise of all, or one of John Randolph's stirring speeches in England +against the slave-trade. The very newspapers which reported the happy +extinction of the insurrection by the hanging of the last conspirator, +William Garner, reported also, with enthusiastic indignation, the +massacre of the Greeks at Constantinople and at Scio; and then the +Northern editors, breaking from their usual reticence, pointed out the +inconsistency of Southern journals in printing, side by side, +denunciations of Mohammedan slave-sales, and advertisements of those of +Christians. + +Of course the insurrection threw the whole slavery question open to the +public. "We are sorry to see," said the _National Intelligencer_ of Aug. +31, "that a discussion of the hateful Missouri question is likely to be +revived, in consequence of the allusions to its supposed effect in +producing the late servile insurrection in South Carolina." A member of +the Board of Public Works of South Carolina published in the Baltimore +_American Farmer_ an essay urging the encouragement of white laborers, +and hinting at the ultimate abolition of slavery "if it should ever be +thought desirable." More boldly still, a pamphlet appeared in Charleston, +under the signature of "Achates," arguing with remarkable sagacity and +force against the whole system of slave-labor _in towns_; and proposing +that all slaves in Charleston should be sold or transferred to the +plantations, and their places supplied by white labor. It is interesting +to find many of the facts and arguments of Helper's "Impending Crisis" +anticipated in this courageous tract, written under the pressure of a +crisis which had just been so narrowly evaded. The author is described in +the preface as "a soldier and patriot of the Revolution, whose name, did +we feel ourselves at liberty to use it, would stamp a peculiar weight and +value on his opinions." It was commonly attributed to Gen. Thomas +Pinckney. + +Another pamphlet of the period, also published in Charleston, recommended +as a practical cure for insurrection the copious administration of +Episcopal-Church services, and the prohibition of negroes from attending +Fourth-of-July celebrations. On this last point it is more consistent +than most pro-slavery arguments. "The celebration of the Fourth of July +belongs _exclusively_ to the white population of the United States. The +American Revolution was _a family quarrel among equals_. In this the +negroes had no concern; their condition remained, and must remain, +unchanged. They have no more to do with the celebration of that day than +with the landing of the Pilgrims on the rock at Plymouth. It therefore +seems to me improper to allow these people to be present on these +occasions. In our speeches and orations, much, and sometimes more than is +politically necessary, is said about personal liberty, which negro +auditors know not how to apply except by running the parallel with their +own condition. They therefore imbibe false notions of their own personal +rights, and give reality in their minds to what has no real existence. +The peculiar state of our community must be steadily kept in view. This, +I am gratified to learn, will in some measure be promoted by the +institution of the South Carolina Association." + +On the other hand, more stringent laws became obviously necessary to keep +down the advancing intelligence of the Charleston slaves. Dangerous +knowledge must be excluded from without and from within. For the first +purpose the South Carolina Legislature passed, in December, 1822, the Act +for the imprisonment of Northern colored seamen, which afterwards +produced so much excitement. For the second object, the Grand Jury, about +the same time, presented as a grievance "the number of schools which are +kept within the city by persons of color," and proposed their +prohibition. This was the encouragement given to the intellectual +progress of the slaves; while, as a reward for betraying them, Pensil, +the free colored man who advised with Devany, received a present of one +thousand dollars; and Devany himself had what was rightly judged to be +the higher gift of freedom, and was established in business, with liberal +means, as a drayman. He lived long in Charleston, thriving greatly in his +vocation, and, according to the newspapers, enjoyed the privilege of +being the only man of property in the State whom a special statute +exempted from taxation. + +More than half a century has passed since the incidents of this true +story closed. It has not vanished from the memories of South Carolinians, +though the printed pages which once told it have gradually disappeared +from sight. The intense avidity which at first grasped at every incident +of the great insurrectionary plot was succeeded by a prolonged distaste +for the memory of the tale; and the official reports which told what +slaves had once planned and dared have now come to be among the rarest of +American historical documents. In 1841, a friend of the writer, then +visiting South Carolina, heard from her hostess, for the first time, the +events which are recounted here. On asking to see the reports of the +trials, she was cautiously told that the only copy in the house, after +being carefully kept for years under lock and key, had been burnt at +last, lest it should reach the dangerous eyes of the slaves. The same +thing had happened, it was added, in many other families. This partially +accounts for the great difficulty now to be found in obtaining a single +copy of either publication; and this is why, to the readers of American +history, Denmark Vesey and Peter Poyas have commonly been but the shadows +of names. + + + + +NAT TURNER'S INSURRECTION + + +During the year 1831, up to the 23d of August, the Virginia newspapers +seem to have been absorbed in the momentous problems which then occupied +the minds of intelligent American citizens: What Gen. Jackson should do +with the scolds, and what with the disreputables? should South Carolina +be allowed to nullify? and would the wives of cabinet ministers call on +Mrs. Eaton? It is an unfailing opiate to turn over the drowsy files of +the Richmond _Enquirer_, until the moment when those dry and dusty pages +are suddenly kindled into flame by the torch of Nat Turner. Then the +terror flared on increasing, until the remotest Southern States were +found shuddering at nightly rumors of insurrection; until far-off +European colonies--Antigua, Martinique, Caraccas, Tortola--recognized by +some secret sympathy the same epidemic alarms; until the very boldest +words of freedom were reported as uttered in the Virginia House of +Delegates with unclosed doors; until an obscure young man named Garrison +was indicted at common law in North Carolina, and had a price set upon +his head by the Legislature of Georgia. + +Near the south-eastern border of Virginia, in Southampton County, there +is a neighborhood known as "The Cross Keys." It lies fifteen miles from +Jerusalem, the county-town, or "court-house," seventy miles from Norfolk, +and about as far from Richmond. It is some ten or fifteen miles from +Murfreesborough in North Carolina, and about twenty-five from the Great +Dismal Swamp. Up to Sunday, the 21st of August, 1831, there was nothing +to distinguish it from any other rural, lethargic, slipshod Virginia +neighborhood, with the due allotment of mansion-houses and log huts, +tobacco-fields and "old-fields," horses, dogs, negroes, "poor white +folks," so called, and other white folks, poor without being called so. +One of these last was Joseph Travis, who had recently married the widow +of one Putnam Moore, and had unfortunately wedded to himself her negroes +also. + +In the woods on the plantation of Joseph Travis, upon the Sunday just +named, six slaves met at noon for what is called in the Northern States a +picnic, and in the Southern a barbecue. The bill of fare was to be +simple: one brought a pig, and another some brandy, giving to the meeting +an aspect so cheaply convivial that no one would have imagined it to be +the final consummation of a conspiracy which had been for six months in +preparation. In this plot four of the men had been already +initiated--Henry, Hark or Hercules, Nelson, and Sam. Two others were +novices, Will and Jack by name. The party had remained together from +twelve to three o'clock, when a seventh man joined them,--a short, stout, +powerfully built person, of dark mulatto complexion, and strongly marked +African features, but with a face full of expression and resolution. This +was Nat Turner. + +He was at this time nearly thirty-one years old, having been born on the +2d of October, 1800. He had belonged originally to Benjamin Turner,--from +whom he took his last name, slaves having usually no patronymic;--had +then been transferred to Putnam Moore, and then to his present owner. He +had, by his own account, felt himself singled out from childhood for some +great work; and he had some peculiar marks on his person, which, joined +to his mental precocity, were enough to occasion, among his youthful +companions, a superstitious faith in his gifts and destiny. He had some +mechanical ingenuity also; experimentalized very early in making paper, +gunpowder, pottery, and in other arts, which, in later life, he was found +thoroughly to understand. His moral faculties appeared strong, so that +white witnesses admitted that he had never been known to swear an oath, +to drink a drop of spirits, or to commit a theft. And, in general, so +marked were his early peculiarities that people said "he had too much +sense to be raised; and, if he was, he would never be of any use as a +slave." This impression of personal destiny grew with his growth: he +fasted, prayed, preached, read the Bible, heard voices when he walked +behind his plough, and communicated his revelations to the awe-struck +slaves. They told him, in return, that, "if they had his sense, they +would not serve any master in the world." + +The biographies of slaves can hardly be individualized; they belong to +the class. We know bare facts; it is only the general experience of human +beings in like condition which can clothe them with life. The outlines +are certain, the details are inferential. Thus, for instance, we know +that Nat Turner's young wife was a slave; we know that she belonged to a +different master from himself; we know little more than this, but this is +much. For this is equivalent to saying, that, by day or by night, her +husband had no more power to protect her than the man who lies bound upon +a plundered vessel's deck has power to protect his wife on board the +pirate schooner disappearing in the horizon. She may be well treated, she +may be outraged; it is in the powerlessness that the agony lies. There +is, indeed, one thing more which we do know of this young woman: the +Virginia newspapers state that she was tortured under the lash, after her +husband's execution, to make her produce his papers: this is all. + +What his private experiences and special privileges or wrongs may have +been, it is therefore now impossible to say. Travis was declared to be +"more humane and fatherly to his slaves than any man in the county;" but +it is astonishing how often this phenomenon occurs in the contemporary +annals of slave insurrections. The chairman of the county court also +stated, in pronouncing sentence, that Nat Turner had spoken of his master +as "only too indulgent;" but this, for some reason, does not appear in +his printed Confession, which only says, "He was a kind master, and +placed the greatest confidence in me." It is very possible that it may +have been so, but the printed accounts of Nat Turner's person look +suspicious: he is described in Gov. Floyd's proclamation as having a scar +on one of his temples, also one on the back of his neck, and a large knot +on one of the bones of his right arm, produced by a blow; and although +these were explained away in Virginia newspapers as having been produced +by fights with his companions, yet such affrays are entirely foreign to +the admitted habits of the man. It must therefore remain an open +question, whether the scars and the knot were produced by black hands or +by white. + +Whatever Nat Turner's experiences of slavery might have been, it is +certain that his plans were not suddenly adopted, but that he had brooded +over them for years. To this day there are traditions among the Virginia +slaves of the keen devices of "Prophet Nat." If he was caught with lime +and lampblack in hand, conning over a half-finished county-map on the +barn-door, he was always "planning what to do if he were blind"; or, +"studying how to get to Mr. Francis's house." When he had called a +meeting of slaves, and some poor whites came eavesdropping, the poor +whites at once became the subjects for discussion: he incidentally +mentioned that the masters had been heard threatening to drive them away; +one slave had been ordered to shoot Mr. Jones's pigs, another to tear +down Mr. Johnson's fences. The poor whites, Johnson and Jones, ran home +to see to their homesteads, and were better friends than ever to Prophet +Nat. + +He never was a Baptist preacher, though such vocation has often been +attributed to him. The impression arose from his having immersed himself, +during one of his periods of special enthusiasm, together with a poor +white man named Brantley. "About this time," he says in his Confession, +"I told these things to a white man, on whom it had a wonderful effect; +and he ceased from his wickedness, and was attacked immediately with a +cutaneous eruption, and the blood oozed from the pores of his skin, and +after praying and fasting nine days he was healed. And the Spirit +appeared to me again, and said, as the Saviour had been baptized, so +should we be also; and when the white people would not let us be baptized +by the church, we went down into the water together, in the sight of many +who reviled us, and were baptized by the Spirit. After this I rejoiced +greatly, and gave thanks to God." + +The religious hallucinations narrated in his Confession seem to have been +as genuine as the average of such things, and are very well expressed. +The account reads quite like Jacob Behmen. He saw white spirits and black +spirits contending in the skies; the sun was darkened, the thunder +rolled. "And the Holy Ghost was with me, and said, 'Behold me as I stand +in the heavens!' And I looked, and saw the forms of men in different +attitudes. And there were lights in the sky, to which the children of +darkness gave other names than what they really were; for they were the +lights of the Saviour's hands, stretched forth from east to west, even as +they were extended on the cross on Calvary, for the redemption of +sinners." He saw drops of blood on the corn: this was Christ's blood, +shed for man. He saw on the leaves in the woods letters and numbers and +figures of men,--the same symbols which he had seen in the skies. On May +12, 1828, the Holy Spirit appeared to him, and proclaimed that the yoke +of Jesus must fall on him, and he must fight against the serpent when the +sign appeared. Then came an eclipse of the sun in February, 1831: this +was the sign; then he must arise and prepare himself, and slay his +enemies with their own weapons; then also the seal was removed from his +lips, and then he confided his plans to four associates. + +When he came, therefore, to the barbecue on the appointed Sunday, and +found not these four only, but two others, his first question to the +intruders was, how they came thither. To this Will answered manfully, +that his life was worth no more than the others, and "his liberty was as +dear to him." This admitted him to confidence; and as Jack was known to +be entirely under Hark's influence, the strangers were no bar to their +discussion. Eleven hours they remained there, in anxious consultation: +one can imagine those dusky faces, beneath the funereal woods, and amid +the flickering of pine-knot torches, preparing that stern revenge whose +shuddering echoes should ring through the land so long. Two things were +at last decided: to begin their work that night; and to begin it with a +massacre so swift and irresistible as to create in a few days more terror +than many battles, and so spare the need of future bloodshed. "It was +agreed that we should commence at home on that night, and, until we had +armed and equipped ourselves and gained sufficient force, neither age nor +sex was to be spared: which was invariably adhered to." + +John Brown invaded Virginia with nineteen men, and with the avowed +resolution to take no life but in self-defence. Nat Turner attacked +Virginia from within, with six men, and with the determination to spare +no life until his power was established. John Brown intended to pass +rapidly through Virginia, and then retreat to the mountains. Nat Turner +intended to "conquer Southampton County as the white men did in the +Revolution, and then retreat, if necessary, to the Dismal Swamp." Each +plan was deliberately matured; each was in its way practicable; but each +was defeated by a single false step, as will soon appear. + +We must pass over the details of horror, as they occurred during the next +twenty-four hours. Swift and stealthy as Indians, the black men passed +from house to house,--not pausing, not hesitating, as their terrible work +went on. In one thing they were humaner than Indians, or than white men +fighting against Indians: there was no gratuitous outrage beyond the +death-blow itself, no insult, no mutilation; but in every house they +entered, that blow fell on man, woman, and child,--nothing that had a +white skin was spared. From every house they took arms and ammunition, +and from a few money. On every plantation they found recruits: those +dusky slaves, so obsequious to their master the day before, so prompt to +sing and dance before his Northern visitors, were all swift to transform +themselves into fiends of retribution now; show them sword or musket, and +they grasped it, though it were an heirloom from Washington himself. The +troop increased from house to house,--first to fifteen, then to forty, +then to sixty. Some were armed with muskets, some with axes, some with +scythes, some came on their masters' horses. As the numbers increased, +they could be divided, and the awful work was carried on more rapidly +still. The plan then was for an advanced guard of horsemen to approach +each house at a gallop, and surround it till the others came up. +Meanwhile, what agonies of terror must have taken place within, shared +alike by innocent and by guilty! what memories of wrongs inflicted on +those dusky creatures, by some,--what innocent participation, by others, +in the penance! The outbreak lasted for but forty-eight hours; but, +during that period, fifty-five whites were slain, without the loss of a +single slave. + +One fear was needless, which to many a husband and father must have +intensified the last struggle. These negroes had been systematically +brutalized from childhood; they had been allowed no legalized or +permanent marriage; they had beheld around them an habitual +licentiousness, such as can scarcely exist except under slavery; some of +them had seen their wives and sisters habitually polluted by the husbands +and the brothers of these fair white women who were now absolutely in +their power. Yet I have looked through the Virginia newspapers of that +time in vain for one charge of an indecent outrage on a woman against +these triumphant and terrible slaves. Wherever they went, there went +death, and that was all. It is reported by some of the contemporary +newspapers, that a portion of this abstinence was the result of +deliberate consultation among the insurrectionists; that some of them +were resolved on taking the white women for wives, but were overruled by +Nat Turner. If so, he is the only American slave-leader of whom we know +certainly that he rose above the ordinary level of slave vengeance; and +Mrs. Stowe's picture of Dred's purposes is then precisely typical of his: +"Whom the Lord saith unto us, 'Smite,' them will we smite. We will not +torment them with the scourge and fire, nor defile their women as they +have done with ours. But we will slay them utterly, and consume them from +off the face of the earth." + +When the number of adherents had increased to fifty or sixty, Nat Turner +judged it time to strike at the county-seat, Jerusalem. Thither a few +white fugitives had already fled, and couriers might thence be despatched +for aid to Richmond and Petersburg, unless promptly intercepted. Besides, +he could there find arms, ammunition, and money; though they had already +obtained, it is dubiously reported, from eight hundred to one thousand +dollars. On the way it was necessary to pass the plantation of Mr. +Parker, three miles from Jerusalem. Some of the men wished to stop here +and enlist some of their friends. Nat Turner objected, as the delay might +prove dangerous; he yielded at last, and it proved fatal. + +He remained at the gate with six or eight men; thirty or forty went to +the house, half a mile distant. They remained too long, and he went alone +to hasten them. During his absence a party of eighteen white men came up +suddenly, dispersing the small guard left at the gate; and when the main +body of slaves emerged from the house, they encountered, for the first +time, their armed masters. The blacks halted; the whites advanced +cautiously within a hundred yards, and fired a volley; on its being +returned, they broke into disorder, and hurriedly retreated, leaving some +wounded on the ground. The retreating whites were pursued, and were saved +only by falling in with another band of fresh men from Jerusalem, with +whose aid they turned upon the slaves, who in their turn fell into +confusion. Turner, Hark, and about twenty men on horseback retreated in +some order; the rest were scattered. The leader still planned to reach +Jerusalem by a private way, thus evading pursuit; but at last decided to +stop for the night, in the hope of enlisting additional recruits. + +During the night the number increased again to forty, and they encamped +on Major Ridley's plantation. An alarm took place during the +darkness,--whether real or imaginary, does not appear,--and the men +became scattered again. Proceeding to make fresh enlistments with the +daylight, they were resisted at Dr. Blunt's house, where his slaves, +under his orders, fired upon them; and this, with a later attack from a +party of white men near Capt. Harris's, so broke up the whole force that +they never re-united. The few who remained together agreed to separate +for a few hours to see if any thing could be done to revive the +insurrection, and meet again that evening at their original rendezvous. +But they never reached it. + +Gloomily came Nat Turner at nightfall into those gloomy woods where +forty-eight hours before he had revealed the details of his terrible plot +to his companions. At the outset all his plans had succeeded; every thing +was as he predicted: the slaves had come readily at his call; the masters +had proved perfectly defenceless. Had he not been persuaded to pause at +Parker's plantation, he would have been master before now of the arms and +ammunition at Jerusalem; and with these to aid, and the Dismal Swamp for +a refuge, he might have sustained himself indefinitely against his +pursuers. + +Now the blood was shed, the risk was incurred, his friends were killed or +captured, and all for what? Lasting memories of terror, to be sure, for +his oppressors; but, on the other hand, hopeless failure for the +insurrection, and certain death for him. What a watch he must have kept +that night! To that excited imagination, which had always seen spirits in +the sky and blood-drops on the corn and hieroglyphic marks on the dry +leaves, how full the lonely forest must have been of signs and solemn +warnings! Alone with the fox's bark, the rabbit's rustle, and the +screech-owl's scream, the self-appointed prophet brooded over his +despair. Once creeping to the edge of the wood, he saw men stealthily +approach on horseback. He fancied them some of his companions; but before +he dared to whisper their ominous names, "Hark" or "Dred,"--for the +latter was the name, since famous, of one of his more recent +recruits,--he saw them to be white men, and shrank back stealthily +beneath his covert. + +There he waited two days and two nights,--long enough to satisfy himself +that no one would rejoin him, and that the insurrection had hopelessly +failed. The determined, desperate spirits who had shared his plans were +scattered forever, and longer delay would be destruction for him also. He +found a spot which he judged safe, dug a hole under a pile of fence-rails +in a field, and lay there for six weeks, only leaving it for a few +moments at midnight to obtain water from a neighboring spring. Food he +had previously provided, without discovery, from a house near by. + +Meanwhile an unbounded variety of rumors went flying through the State. +The express which first reached the governor announced that the militia +were retreating before the slaves. An express to Petersburg further fixed +the number of militia at three hundred, and of blacks at eight hundred, +and invented a convenient shower of rain to explain the dampened ardor of +the whites. Later reports described the slaves as making three desperate +attempts to cross the bridge over the Nottoway between Cross Keys and +Jerusalem, and stated that the leader had been shot in the attempt. Other +accounts put the number of negroes at three hundred, all well mounted and +armed, with two or three white men as leaders. Their intention was +supposed to be to reach the Dismal Swamp, and they must be hemmed in from +that side. + +Indeed, the most formidable weapon in the hands of slave insurgents is +always this blind panic they create, and the wild exaggerations which +follow. The worst being possible, every one takes the worst for granted. +Undoubtedly a dozen armed men could have stifled this insurrection, even +after it had commenced operations; but it is the fatal weakness of a +rural slaveholding community, that it can never furnish men promptly for +such a purpose. "My first intention was," says one of the most +intelligent newspaper narrators of the affair, "to have attacked them +with thirty or forty men; but those who had families here were strongly +opposed to it." + +As usual, each man was pinioned to his own hearth-stone. As usual, aid +had to be summoned from a distance; and, as usual, the United-States +troops were the chief reliance. Col. House, commanding at Fort Monroe, +sent at once three companies of artillery under Lieut.-Col. Worth, and +embarked them on board the steamer "Hampton" for Suffolk. These were +joined by detachments from the United States ships "Warren" and +"Natchez," the whole amounting to nearly eight hundred men. Two volunteer +companies went from Richmond, four from Petersburg, one from Norfolk, one +from Portsmouth, and several from North Carolina. The militia of Norfolk, +Nansemond, and Princess Anne Counties, and the United States troops at +Old Point Comfort, were ordered to scour the Dismal Swamp, where it was +believed that two or three thousand fugitives were preparing to join the +insurgents. It was even proposed to send two companies from New York and +one from New London to the same point. + +When these various forces reached Southampton County, they found all +labor paralyzed and whole plantations abandoned. A letter from Jerusalem, +dated Aug. 24, says, "The oldest inhabitant of our county has never +experienced such a distressing time as we have had since Sunday night +last.... Every house, room, and corner in this place is full of women and +children, driven from home, who had to take the woods until they could +get to this place." "For many miles around their track," says another +"the county is deserted by women and children." Still another writes, +"Jerusalem is full of women, most of them from the other side of the +river,--about two hundred at Vix's." Then follow descriptions of the +sufferings of these persons, many of whom had lain night after night in +the woods. But the immediate danger was at an end, the short-lived +insurrection was finished, and now the work of vengeance was to begin. In +the frank phrase of a North Carolina correspondent, "The massacre of the +whites was over, and the white people had commenced the destruction of +the negroes, which was continued after our men got there, from time to +time, as they could fall in with them, all day yesterday." A postscript +adds, that "passengers by the Fayetteville stage say, that, by the latest +accounts, one hundred and twenty negroes had been killed,"--this being +little more than one day's work. + +These murders were defended as Nat Turner defended his: a fearful blow +must be struck. In shuddering at the horrors of the insurrection, we have +forgotten the far greater horrors of its suppression. + +The newspapers of the day contain many indignant protests against the +cruelties which took place. "It is with pain," says a correspondent of +the _National Intelligencer_, Sept. 7, 1831, "that we speak of another +feature of the Southampton Rebellion; for we have been most unwilling to +have our sympathies for the sufferers diminished or affected by their +misconduct. We allude to the slaughter of many blacks without trial and +under circumstances of great barbarity.... We met with an individual of +intelligence who told us that he himself had killed between ten and +fifteen.... We [the Richmond troop] witnessed with surprise the +sanguinary temper of the population, who evinced a strong disposition to +inflict immediate death on every prisoner." + +There is a remarkable official document from Gen. Eppes, the officer in +command, to be found in the Richmond _Enquirer_ for Sept. 6, 1831. It is +an indignant denunciation of precisely these outrages; and though he +refuses to give details, he supplies their place by epithets: +"revolting,"--"inhuman and not to be justified,"--"acts of barbarity and +cruelty,"--"acts of atrocity,"--"this course of proceeding dignifies the +rebel and the assassin with the sanctity of martyrdom." And he ends by +threatening martial law upon all future transgressors. Such general +orders are not issued except in rather extreme cases. And in the parallel +columns of the newspaper the innocent editor prints equally indignant +descriptions of Russian atrocities in Lithuania, where the Poles were +engaged in active insurrection, amid profuse sympathy from Virginia. + +The truth is, it was a Reign of Terror. Volunteer patrols rode in all +directions, visiting plantations. "It was with the greatest difficulty," +said Gen. Brodnax before the House of Delegates, "and at the hazard of +personal popularity and esteem, that the coolest and most judicious among +us could exert an influence sufficient to restrain an indiscriminate +slaughter of the blacks who were suspected." A letter from the Rev. G. W. +Powell declares, "There are thousands of troops searching in every +direction, and many negroes are killed every day: the exact number will +never be ascertained." Petition after petition was subsequently presented +to the Legislature, asking compensation for slaves thus assassinated +without trial. + +Men were tortured to death, burned, maimed, and subjected to nameless +atrocities. The overseers were called on to point out any slaves whom +they distrusted, and if any tried to escape they were shot down. Nay, +worse than this. "A party of horsemen started from Richmond with the +intention of killing every colored person they saw in Southampton County. +They stopped opposite the cabin of a free colored man, who was hoeing in +his little field. They called out, 'Is this Southampton County?' He +replied, 'Yes, sir, you have just crossed the line, by yonder tree.' They +shot him dead, and rode on." This is from the narrative of the editor of +the Richmond _Whig_, who was then on duty in the militia, and protested +manfully against these outrages. "Some of these scenes," he adds, "are +hardly inferior in barbarity to the atrocities of the insurgents." + +These were the masters' stories. If even these conceded so much, it would +be interesting to hear what the slaves had to report. I am indebted to my +honored friend, Lydia Maria Child, for some vivid recollections of this +terrible period, as noted down from the lips of an old colored woman, +once well known in New York, Charity Bowery. "At the time of the old +Prophet Nat," she said, "the colored folks was afraid to pray loud; for +the whites threatened to punish 'em dreadfully, if the least noise was +heard. The patrols was low drunken whites; and in Nat's time, if they +heard any of the colored folks praying, or singing a hymn, they would +fall upon 'em and abuse 'em, and sometimes kill 'em, afore master or +missis could get to 'em. The brightest and best was killed in Nat's time. +The whites always suspect such ones. They killed a great many at a place +called Duplon. They killed Antonio, a slave of Mr. J. Stanley, whom they +shot; then they pointed their guns at him, and told him to confess about +the insurrection. He told 'em he didn't know any thing about any +insurrection. They shot several balls through him, quartered him, and put +his head on a pole at the fork of the road leading to the court." (This +is no exaggeration, if the Virginia newspapers may be taken as evidence.) +"It was there but a short time. He had no trial. They never do. In Nat's +time, the patrols would tie up the free colored people, flog 'em, and try +to make 'em lie against one another, and often killed them before anybody +could interfere. Mr. James Cole, high sheriff, said, if any of the +patrols came on his plantation, he would lose his life in defence of his +people. One day he heard a patroller boasting how many niggers he had +killed. Mr. Cole said, 'If you don't pack up, as quick as God Almighty +will let you, and get out of this town, and never be seen in it again, +I'll put you where dogs won't bark at you.' He went off, and wasn't seen +in them parts again." + +These outrages were not limited to the colored population; but other +instances occurred which strikingly remind one of more recent times. An +Englishman, named Robinson, was engaged in selling books at Petersburg. +An alarm being given, one night, that five hundred blacks were marching +towards the town, he stood guard, with others, on the bridge. After the +panic had a little subsided, he happened to remark, that "the blacks, as +men, were entitled to their freedom, and ought to be emancipated." This +led to great excitement, and he was warned to leave town. He took passage +in the stage, but the stage was intercepted. He then fled to a friend's +house; the house was broken open, and he was dragged forth. The civil +authorities, being applied to, refused to interfere. The mob stripped +him, gave him a great number of lashes, and sent him on foot, naked, +under a hot sun, to Richmond, whence he with difficulty found a passage +to New York. + +Of the capture or escape of most of that small band who met with Nat +Turner in the woods upon the Travis plantation, little can now be known. +All appear among the list of convicted, except Henry and Will. Gen. +Moore, who occasionally figures as second in command, in the newspaper +narratives of that day, was probably the Hark or Hercules before +mentioned; as no other of the confederates had belonged to Mrs. Travis, +or would have been likely to bear her previous name of Moore. As usual, +the newspapers state that most, if not all the slaves, were "the property +of kind and indulgent masters." + +The subordinate insurgents sought safety as they could. A free colored +man, named Will Artist, shot himself in the woods, where his hat was +found on a stake and his pistol lying by him; another was found drowned; +others were traced to the Dismal Swamp; others returned to their homes, +and tried to conceal their share in the insurrection, assuring their +masters that they had been forced, against their will, to join,--the +usual defence in such cases. The number shot down at random must, by all +accounts, have amounted to many hundreds, but it is past all human +registration now. The number who had a formal trial, such as it was, is +officially stated at fifty-five; of these, seventeen were convicted and +hanged, twelve convicted and transported, twenty acquitted, and four free +colored men sent on for further trial and finally acquitted. "Not one of +those known to be concerned escaped." Of those executed, one only was a +woman, "Lucy, slave of John T. Barrow." + +There is one touching story, in connection with these terrible +retaliations, which rests on good authority, that of the Rev. M. B. Cox, +a Liberian missionary, then in Virginia. In the hunt which followed the +massacre, a slaveholder went into the woods, accompanied by a faithful +slave, who had been the means of saving his life during the insurrection. +When they had reached a retired place in the forest, the man handed his +gun to his master, informing him that he could not live a slave any +longer, and requesting him either to free him or shoot him on the spot. +The master took the gun, in some trepidation, levelled it at the faithful +negro, and shot him through the heart. It is probable that this +slaveholder was a Dr. Blunt,--his being the only plantation where the +slaves were reported as thus defending their masters. "If this be true," +said the Richmond _Enquirer_, when it first narrated this instance of +loyalty, "great will be the desert of these noble-minded Africans." + +Meanwhile the panic of the whites continued; for, though all others might +be disposed of, Nat Turner was still at large. We have positive evidence +of the extent of the alarm, although great efforts were afterwards made +to represent it as a trifling affair. A distinguished citizen of Virginia +wrote, three months later, to the Hon. W. B. Seabrook of South Carolina, +"From all that has come to my knowledge during and since that affair, I +am convinced most fully that every black preacher in the country east of +the Blue Ridge was in the secret." "There is much reason to believe," +says the Governor's Message on Dec. 6, "that the spirit of insurrection +was not confined to Southampton. Many convictions have taken place +elsewhere, and some few in distant counties." The withdrawal of the +United States troops, after some ten days' service, was a signal for +fresh excitement; and an address, numerously signed, was presented to the +United States Government, imploring their continued stay. More than three +weeks after the first alarm, the governor sent a supply of arms into +Prince William, Fauquier, and Orange Counties. "From examinations which +have taken place in other counties," says one of the best newspaper +historians of the affair (in the Richmond _Enquirer_ of Sept. 6), "I fear +that the scheme embraced a wider sphere than I at first supposed." Nat +Turner himself, intentionally or otherwise, increased the confusion by +denying all knowledge of the North Carolina outbreak, and declaring that +he had communicated his plans to his four confederates within six months; +while, on the other hand, a slave-girl, sixteen or seventeen years old, +belonging to Solomon Parker, testified that she had heard the subject +discussed for eighteen months, and that at a meeting held during the +previous May some eight or ten had joined the plot. + +It is astonishing to discover, by laborious comparison of newspaper +files, how vast was the immediate range of these insurrectionary alarms. +Every Southern State seems to have borne its harvest of terror. On the +eastern shore of Maryland, great alarm was at once manifested, especially +in the neighborhood of Easton and Snowhill; and the houses of colored men +were searched for arms even in Baltimore. In Delaware, there were similar +rumors through Sussex and Dover Counties; there were arrests and +executions; and in Somerset County great public meetings were held, to +demand additional safeguards. On election-day in Seaford, Del., some +young men, going out to hunt rabbits, discharged their guns in sport; the +men being absent, all the women in the vicinity took to flight; the alarm +spread like the "Ipswich Fright"; soon Seaford was thronged with armed +men; and when the boys returned from hunting, they found cannon drawn out +to receive them. + +In North Carolina, Raleigh and Fayetteville were put under military +defence, and women and children concealed themselves in the swamps for +many days. The rebel organization was supposed to include two thousand. +Forty-six slaves were imprisoned in Union County, twenty-five in Sampson +County, and twenty-three at least in Duplin County, some of whom were +executed. The panic also extended into Wayne, New Hanover, and Lenoir +Counties. Four men were shot without trial in Wilmington,--Nimrod, +Abraham, Prince, and "Dan the Drayman," the latter a man of seventy,--and +their heads placed on poles at the four corners of the town. Nearly two +months afterwards the trials were still continuing; and at a still later +day, the governor in his proclamation recommended the formation of +companies of volunteers in every county. + +In South Carolina, Gen. Hayne issued a proclamation "to prove the +groundlessness of the existing alarms,"--thus implying that serious +alarms existed. In Macon, Ga., the whole population were roused from +their beds at midnight by a report of a large force of armed negroes five +miles off. In an hour, every woman and child was deposited in the largest +building of the town, and a military force hastily collected in front. +The editor of the Macon _Messenger_ excused the poor condition of his +paper, a few days afterwards, by the absorption of his workmen in patrol +duties and describes "dismay and terror" as the condition of the people +of "all ages and sexes." In Jones, Twiggs, and Monroe Counties, the same +alarms were reported; and in one place "several slaves were tied to a +tree, while a militia captain hacked at them with his sword." + +In Alabama, at Columbus and Fort Mitchell, a rumor was spread of a joint +conspiracy of Indians and negroes. At Claiborne the panic was still +greater: the slaves were said to be thoroughly organized through that +part of the State, and multitudes were imprisoned; the whole alarm being +apparently founded on one stray copy of the Boston _Liberator_. + +In Tennessee, the Shelbyville _Freeman_ announced that an insurrectionary +plot had just been discovered, barely in time for its defeat, through the +treachery of a female slave. In Louisville, Ky., a similar organization +was discovered or imagined, and arrests were made in consequence. "The +papers, from motives of policy, do not notice the disturbance," wrote one +correspondent to the Portland _Courier_. "Pity us!" he added. + +But the greatest bubble burst in Louisiana. Capt. Alexander, an English +tourist, arriving in New Orleans at the beginning of September, found the +whole city in tumult. Handbills had been issued, appealing to the slaves +to rise against their masters, saying that all men were born equal, +declaring that Hannibal was a black man, and that they also might have +great leaders among them. Twelve hundred stand of weapons were said to +have been found in a black man's house; five hundred citizens were under +arms, and four companies of regulars were ordered to the city, whose +barracks Alexander himself visited. + +If such was the alarm in New Orleans, the story, of course, lost nothing +by transmission to other slave States. A rumor reached Frankfort, Ky., +that the slaves already had possession of the coast, both above and below +New Orleans. But the most remarkable circumstance is, that all this seems +to have been a mere revival of an old terror once before excited and +exploded. The following paragraph had appeared in the Jacksonville, Ga., +_Observer_, during the spring previous:-- + + "FEARFUL DISCOVERY.--We were favored, by yesterday's mail, with a + letter from New Orleans, of May 1, in which we find that an + important discovery had been made a few days previous in that + city. The following is an extract: 'Four days ago, as some + planters were digging under ground, they found a square room + containing eleven thousand stand of arms and fifteen thousand + cartridges, each of the cartridges containing a bullet.' It is + said the negroes intended to rise as soon as the sickly season + began, and obtain possession of the city by massacring the white + population. The same letter states that the mayor had prohibited + the opening of Sunday schools for the instruction of blacks, + under a penalty of five hundred dollars for the first offence, + and, for the second, death." + +Such were the terrors that came back from nine other slave States, as the +echo of the voice of Nat Turner. And when it is also known that the +subject was at once taken up by the legislatures of other States, where +there was no public panic, as in Missouri and Tennessee; and when, +finally, it is added that reports of insurrection had been arriving all +that year from Rio Janeiro, Martinique, St. Jago, Antigua, Caraccas, and +Tortola,--it is easy to see with what prolonged distress the accumulated +terror must have weighed down upon Virginia during the two months that +Nat Turner lay hid. + +True, there were a thousand men in arms in Southampton County, to inspire +security. But the blow had been struck by only seven men before; and +unless there were an armed guard in every house, who could tell but any +house might at any moment be the scene of new horrors? They might kill or +imprison negroes by day, but could they resist their avengers by night? +"The half cannot be told," wrote a lady from another part of Virginia, at +this time, "of the distresses of the people. In Southampton County, the +scene of the insurrection, the distress beggars description. A gentleman +who has been there says that even here, where there has been great alarm, +we have no idea of the situation of those in that county.... I do not +hesitate to believe that many negroes around us would join in a massacre +as horrible as that which has taken place, if an opportunity should +offer." + +Meanwhile the cause of all this terror was made the object of desperate +search. On Sept. 17 the governor offered a reward of five hundred dollars +for his capture; and there were other rewards, swelling the amount to +eleven hundred dollars,--but in vain. No one could track or trap him. On +Sept. 30 a minute account of his capture appeared in the newspapers, but +it was wholly false. On Oct. 7 there was another, and on Oct. 18 another; +yet all without foundation. Worn out by confinement in his little cave, +Nat Turner grew more adventurous, and began to move about stealthily by +night, afraid to speak to any human being, but hoping to obtain some +information that might aid his escape. Returning regularly to his retreat +before daybreak, he might possibly have continued this mode of life until +pursuit had ceased, had not a dog succeeded where men had failed. The +creature accidentally smelt out the provisions hid in the cave, and +finally led thither his masters, two negroes, one of whom was named +Nelson. On discovering the formidable fugitive, they fled precipitately, +when he hastened to retreat in an opposite direction. This was on Oct. +15; and from this moment the neighborhood was all alive with excitement, +and five or six hundred men undertook the pursuit. + +It shows a more than Indian adroitness in Nat Turner to have escaped +capture any longer. The cave, the arms, the provisions, were found; and, +lying among them, the notched stick of this miserable Robinson Crusoe, +marked with five weary weeks and six days. But the man was gone. For ten +days more he concealed himself among the wheat-stacks on Mr. Francis's +plantation, and during this time was reduced almost to despair. Once he +decided to surrender himself, and walked by night within two miles of +Jerusalem before his purpose failed him. Three times he tried to get out +of that neighborhood, but in vain: travelling by day was of course out of +the question, and by night he found it impossible to elude the patrol. +Again and again, therefore, he returned to his hiding-place; and, during +his whole two months' liberty, never went five miles from the Cross Keys. +On the 25th of October, he was at last discovered by Mr. Francis as he +was emerging from a stack. A load of buckshot was instantly discharged at +him, twelve of which passed through his hat as he fell to the ground. He +escaped even then; but his pursuers were rapidly concentrating upon him, +and it is perfectly astonishing that he could have eluded them for five +days more. + +On Sunday, Oct. 30, a man named Benjamin Phipps, going out for the first +time on patrol duty, was passing at noon a clearing in the woods where a +number of pine-trees had long since been felled. There was a motion among +their boughs; he stopped to watch it; and through a gap in the branches +he saw, emerging from a hole in the earth beneath, the face of Nat +Turner. Aiming his gun instantly, Phipps called on him to surrender. The +fugitive, exhausted with watching and privation, entangled in the +branches, armed only with a sword, had nothing to do but to +yield,--sagaciously reflecting, also, as he afterwards explained, that +the woods were full of armed men, and that he had better trust fortune +for some later chance of escape, instead of desperately attempting it +then. He was correct in the first impression, since there were fifty +armed scouts within a circuit of two miles. His insurrection ended where +it began; for this spot was only a mile and a half from the house of +Joseph Travis. + +Tom, emaciated, ragged, "a mere scarecrow," still wearing the hat +perforated with buckshot, with his arms bound to his sides, he was driven +before the levelled gun to the nearest house, that of a Mr. Edwards. He +was confined there that night; but the news had spread so rapidly that +within an hour after his arrival a hundred persons had collected, and the +excitement became so intense "that it was with difficulty he could be +conveyed alive to Jerusalem." The enthusiasm spread instantly through +Virginia; M. Trezvant, the Jerusalem postmaster, sent notices of it far +and near; and Gov. Floyd himself wrote a letter to the Richmond +_Enquirer_ to give official announcement of the momentous capture. + +When Nat Turner was asked by Mr. T. R. Gray, the counsel assigned him, +whether, although defeated, he still believed in his own Providential +mission, he answered, as simply as one who came thirty years after him, +"Was not Christ crucified?" In the same spirit, when arraigned before the +court, "he answered, 'Not guilty,' saying to his counsel that he did not +feel so." But apparently no argument was made in his favor by his +counsel, nor were any witnesses called,--he being convicted on the +testimony of Levi Waller, and upon his own confession, which was put in +by Mr. Gray, and acknowledged by the prisoner before the six justices +composing the court, as being "full, free, and voluntary." He was +therefore placed in the paradoxical position of conviction by his own +confession, under a plea of "Not guilty." The arrest took place on the +30th of October, 1831, the confession on the 1st of November, the trial +and conviction on the 5th, and the execution on the following Friday, the +11th of November, precisely at noon. He met his death with perfect +composure, declined addressing the multitude assembled, and told the +sheriff in a firm voice that he was ready. Another account says that he +"betrayed no emotion, and even hurried the executioner in the performance +of his duty." "Not a limb nor a muscle was observed to move. His body, +after his death, was given over to the surgeons for dissection." + +The confession of the captive was published under authority of Mr. Gray, +in a pamphlet, at Baltimore. Fifty thousand copies of it are said to have +been printed; and it was "embellished with an accurate likeness of the +brigand, taken by Mr. John Crawley, portrait-painter, and lithographed by +Endicott & Swett, at Baltimore." The newly established _Liberator_ said +of it, at the time, that it would "only serve to rouse up other leaders, +and hasten other insurrections," and advised grand juries to indict Mr. +Gray. I have never seen a copy of the original pamphlet; it is not easily +to be found in any of our public libraries; and I have heard of but one +as still existing, although the Confession itself has been repeatedly +reprinted. Another small pamphlet, containing the main features of the +outbreak, was published at New York during the same year, and this is in +my possession. But the greater part of the facts which I have given were +gleaned from the contemporary newspapers. + +Who now shall go back thirty years, and read the heart of this +extraordinary man, who, by the admission of his captors, "never was known +to swear an oath, or drink a drop of spirits"; who, on the same +authority, "for natural intelligence and quickness of apprehension was +surpassed by few men," "with a mind capable of attaining any thing"; who +knew no book but his Bible, and that by heart; who devoted himself soul +and body to the cause of his race, without a trace of personal hope or +fear; who laid his plans so shrewdly that they came at last with less +warning than any earthquake on the doomed community around; and who, when +that time arrived, took the life of man, woman, and child, without a +throb of compunction, a word of exultation, or an act of superfluous +outrage? Mrs. Stowe's "Dred" seems dim and melodramatic beside the actual +Nat Turner, and De Quincey's "Avenger" is his only parallel in +imaginative literature. Mr. Gray, his counsel, rises into a sort of +bewildered enthusiasm with the prisoner before him. "I shall not attempt +to describe the effect of his narrative, as told and commented on by +himself, in the condemned-hole of the prison. The calm, deliberate +composure with which he spoke of his late deeds and intentions, the +expression of his fiend-like face when excited by enthusiasm, still +bearing the stains of the blood of helpless innocence about him, clothed +with rags and covered with chains, yet daring to raise his manacled hands +to heaven, with a spirit soaring above the attributes of man,--I looked +on him, and the blood curdled in my veins." + +But, the more remarkable the personal character of Nat Turner, the +greater the amazement felt that he should not have appreciated the +extreme felicity of his position as a slave. In all insurrections, the +standing wonder seems to be that the slaves most trusted and best used +should be most deeply involved. So in this case, as usual, men resorted +to the most astonishing theories of the origin of the affair. One +attributed it to Free-Masonry, and another to free whiskey,--liberty +appearing dangerous, even in these forms. The poor whites charged it upon +the free colored people, and urged their expulsion; forgetting that in +North Carolina the plot was betrayed by one of this class, and that in +Virginia there were but two engaged, both of whom had slave wives. The +slaveholding clergymen traced it to want of knowledge of the Bible, +forgetting that Nat Turner knew scarcely any thing else. On the other +hand, "a distinguished citizen of Virginia" combined in one sweeping +denunciation "Northern incendiaries, tracts, Sunday schools, religion, +reading, and writing." + +But whether the theories of its origin were wise or foolish, the +insurrection made its mark; and the famous band of Virginia +emancipationists, who all that winter made the House of Delegates ring +with unavailing eloquence,--till the rise of slave-exportation to new +cotton regions stopped their voices,--were but the unconscious +mouthpieces of Nat Turner. In January, 1832, in reply to a member who had +called the outbreak a "petty affair," the eloquent James McDowell thus +described the impression it left behind:-- + + "Now, sir, I ask you, I ask gentlemen in conscience to say, was + that a 'petty affair' which startled the feelings of your whole + population; which threw a portion of it into alarm, a portion of + it into panic; which wrung out from an affrighted people the + thrilling cry, day after day, conveyed to your executive, '_We + are in peril of our lives; send us an army for defence_'? Was + that a 'petty affair' which drove families from their + homes,--which assembled women and children in crowds, without + shelter, at places of common refuge, in every condition of + weakness and infirmity, under every suffering which want and + terror could inflict, yet willing to endure all, willing to meet + death from famine, death from climate, death from hardships, + preferring any thing rather than the horrors of meeting it from a + domestic assassin? Was that a 'petty affair' which erected a + peaceful and confiding portion of the State into a military camp; + which outlawed from pity the unfortunate beings whose brothers + had offended; which barred every door, penetrated every bosom + with fear or suspicion; which so banished every sense of security + from every man's dwelling, that, let but a hoof or horn break + upon the silence of the night, and an aching throb would be + driven to the heart, the husband would look to his weapon, and + the mother would shudder and weep upon her cradle? Was it the + fear of Nat Turner, and his deluded, drunken handful of + followers, which produced such effects? Was it this that induced + distant counties, where the very name of Southampton was strange, + to arm and equip for a struggle? No, sir: it was the suspicion + eternally attached to the slave himself,--the suspicion that a + Nat Turner might be in every family; that the same bloody deed + might be acted over at any time and in any place; that the + materials for it were spread through the land, and were always + ready for a like explosion. Nothing but the force of this + withering apprehension,--nothing but the paralyzing and deadening + weight with which it falls upon and prostrates the heart of every + man who has helpless dependants to protect,--nothing but this + could have thrown a brave people into consternation, or could + have made any portion of this powerful Commonwealth, for a single + instant, to have quailed and trembled." + +While these things were going on, the enthusiasm for the Polish +Revolution was rising to its height. The nation was ringing with a peal +of joy, on hearing that at Frankfort the Poles had killed fourteen +thousand Russians. The _Southern Religious Telegraph_ was publishing an +impassioned address to Kosciuszko; standards were being consecrated for +Poland in the larger cities; heroes like Skrzynecki, Czartoryski, +Rozyski, Raminski, were choking the trump of Fame with their complicated +patronymics. These are all forgotten now; and this poor negro, who did +not even possess a name, beyond one abrupt monosyllable,--for even the +name of Turner was the master's property,--still lives, a memory of +terror, and a symbol of wild retribution. + + + + +APPENDIX OF AUTHORITIES + + +THE MAROONS OF JAMAICA + +1. Dallas, R. C. "The History of the Maroons, from their origin to the +establishment of their chief tribe at Sierra Leone: including the +expedition to Cuba, for the purpose of procuring Spanish chasseurs; and +the state of the Island of Jamaica for the last ten years, with a +succinct history of the island previous to that period." In two volumes. +London, 1803. [8vo.] + +2. Edwards, Bryan. "The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British +Colonies in the West Indies. To which is added a general description of +the Bahama Islands, by Daniel M'Kinnen, Esq." In four volumes. +Philadelphia, 1806. [8vo.] + +3. Edwards, Bryan. "Proceedings of the Governor and Associates of Jamaica +in regard to the Maroon Negroes, with an account of the Maroons." London, +1796. 8vo. + +4. Edwards, Bryan. "Historical Survey of St. Domingo, with an account of +the Maroon Negroes, a history of the war in the West Indies, 1793-94" +[etc.]. London, 1801. 4to. + +5. _Edinburgh Review_, ii. 376. [Review of Dallas and Edwards, by Henry +Lord Brougham.] + +Also Annual Register, Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, etc. + +[There appeared in _Once a Week_ (1865) a paper entitled "The Maroons of +Jamaica," and reprinted in _Every Saturday_ (i. 50, Jan. 31, 1866), in +which Gov. Eyre is quoted as having said, in the London _Times_, "To the +fidelity and loyalty of the Maroons it is due that the negroes did not +commit greater devastation" in the recent insurrection; thus curiously +repeating the encomium given by Lord Balcarres seventy years before.] + + * * * * * + +THE MAROONS OF SURINAM + +1. "Narrative of a Five Years' Expedition against the revolted negroes of +Surinam, in Guiana, on the wild coast of South America, from the year +1772 to 1777 ... by Capt. J. G. Stedman." London. Printed for J. Johnson, +St. Paul's Churchyard, and J. Edwards, Pall Mall. 1790. [2 vols. 4to.] + +2. "Transatlantic Sketches, comprising visits to the most interesting +scenes in North and South America and the West Indies. With notes on +negro slavery and Canadian emigration. By Capt. J. E. Alexander, 42 Royal +Highlanders." London: Richard Bentley, New Burlington St., 1833. [2 vols. +8vo.] + +Also Annual Register, etc. + +[The best account of the present condition of the Maroons, or, as they +are now called, bush-negroes, of Surinam, is to be found in a graphic +narrative of a visit to Dutch Guiana, by W. G. Palgrave, in the +_Fortnightly Review_, xxiv. 801; xxv. 194, 536. These papers are +reprinted in _Littell's Living Age_, cxxviii. 154, cxxix. 409. He +estimates the present numbers of these people as approaching thirty +thousand. The "Encyclopaedia Britannica" gives the names of several +publications relating to their peculiar dialect, popularly known as +Negro-English, but including many Dutch words.] + + * * * * * + +GABRIEL'S DEFEAT + +The materials for the history of Gabriel's revolt are still very +fragmentary, and must be sought in the contemporary newspapers. No +continuous file of Southern newspapers for the year 1800 was to be found, +when this narrative was written, in any Boston or New-York library, +though the Harvard-College Library contained a few numbers of the +Baltimore _Telegraphe_ and the Norfolk _Epitome of the Times_. My chief +reliance has therefore been the Southern correspondence of the Northern +newspapers, with the copious extracts there given from Virginian +journals. I am chiefly indebted to the Philadelphia _United-States +Gazette_, the Boston _Independent Chronicle_, the Salem _Gazette_ and +_Register_, the New-York _Daily Advertiser_, and the Connecticut +_Courant_. The best continuous narratives that I have found are in the +_Courant_ of Sept. 29, 1800, and the Salem _Gazette_ of Oct. 7, 1800; but +even these are very incomplete. Several important documents I have been +unable to discover,--the official proclamation of the governor, the +description of Gabriel's person, and the original confession of the +slaves as given to Mr. Sheppard. The discovery of these would no doubt +have enlarged, and very probably corrected, my narrative. + + * * * * * + +DENMARK VESEY + +1. "Negro Plot. An Account of the late intended insurrection among a +portion of the blacks of the city of Charleston, S.C. Published by the +Authority of the Corporation of Charleston." Second edition. Boston: +printed and published by Joseph W. Ingraham. 1822. 8vo, pp. 50. + +[A third edition was printed at Boston during the same year, a copy of +which is in the library of the Massachusetts Historical Society. The +first and fourth editions, which were printed at Charleston, S.C., I have +never seen.] + +2. "An Official Report of the trials of sundry negroes, charged with an +attempt to raise an insurrection in the State of South Carolina: preceded +by an introduction and narrative; and in an appendix, a report of the +trials of four white persons, on indictments for attempting to excite the +slaves to insurrection. Prepared and published at the request of the +court. By Lionel H. Kennedy and Thomas Parker, members of the Charleston +bar, and the presiding magistrates of the court." Charleston: printed by +James R. Schenck, 23 Broad St. 1822. 8vo, pp. 188x4. + +3. "Reflections occasioned by the late disturbances in Charleston, by +Achates." Charleston: printed and sold by A. E. Miller, No. 4 Broad St. +1822. 8vo, pp. 30. + +4. "A Refutation of the Calumnies circulated against the Southern and +Western States, respecting the institution and existence of slavery among +them. To which is added a minute and particular account of the actual +state and condition of their Negro Population, together with Historical +Notices of all the Insurrections that have taken place since the +settlement of the country.--Facts are stubborn things.--_Shakspeare_. By +a South Carolinian." [Edwin C. Holland.] Charleston: printed by A. E. +Miller, No. 4 Broad St. 1822. 8vo, pp. 86. + +5. "Rev. Dr. Richard Furman's Exposition of the views of the Baptists +relative to the colored population in the United States, in a +communication to the Governor of South Carolina." Second edition. +Charleston: printed by A. E. Miller, No. 4 Broad St. 1833. 8vo, pp. 16. + +[The first edition appeared in 1823. It relates to a petition offered by +a Baptist Convention for a day of thanksgiving and humiliation, in +reference to the insurrection, and to a violent hurricane which had just +occurred.] + +6. "Practical Considerations, founded on the Scriptures, relative to the +Slave Population of South Carolina. Respectfully dedicated to the South +Carolina Association. By a South Carolinian." Charleston: printed and +sold by A. E. Miller, No. 4 Broad St. 1823. 8vo, pp. 38. + +7. [The letter of Gov. Bennett, dated Aug. 10, 1822, was evidently +printed originally as a pamphlet or circular, though I have not been able +to find it in that form. It may be found reprinted in the _Columbian +Centinel_ (Aug. 31, 1822), _Connecticut Courant_ (Sept. 3), and Worcester +_Spy_ (Sept. 18). It is also printed in Lundy's _Genius of Universal +Emancipation_ for September, 1822 (ii. 42), and reviewed in subsequent +numbers (pp. 81, 131, 142).] + +8. "The Liberty Bell, by Friends of Freedom. Boston: Anti-Slavery Bazaar. +1841. 12mo." [This contains an article on p. 158, entitled "Servile +Insurrections," by Edmund Jackson, including brief personal reminiscences +of the Charleston insurrection, during which he resided in that city.] + +[Of the above-named pamphlets, all now rare, Nos. 1 and 2 are in my own +possession. Nos. 3, 4, 5, 6, are in the Wendell Phillips collection of +pamphlets in the Boston Public Library.] + + * * * * * + +NAT TURNER'S INSURRECTION + +1. "The Confessions of Nat Turner, the leader of the late Insurrection in +Southampton, Va., as fully and voluntarily made to Thomas R. Gray, in the +prison where he was confined, and acknowledged by him to be such when +read before the Court of Southampton, with the certificate under seal of +the court convened at Jerusalem, Nov. 5, 1831, for this trial. Also an +authentic account of the whole insurrection, with lists of the whites who +were murdered, and of the negroes brought before the Court of +Southampton, and there sentenced, etc." New York: printed and published +by C. Brown, 211 Water Street, 1831. + +[This pamphlet was reprinted in the _Anglo-African Magazine_ (New York), +December, 1859. Whether it is identical with the work said by the +newspapers of the period to have been published at Baltimore, I have been +unable to ascertain. But if, as was alleged, forty thousand copies of the +Baltimore pamphlet were issued, it seems impossible that they should have +become so scarce. The first reprint of the Confession, so far as I know, +was a partial one in Abdy's "Journal in the United States." London. 1835. +3 vols. 8vo.] + +2. "Authentic and Impartial Narrative of the Tragical Scene which was +witnessed in Southhampton County (Va.), on Monday, the 22d of August +last, when Fifty-five of its inhabitants (mostly women and children) were +inhumanly massacred by the blacks! Communicated by those who were +eye-witnesses of the bloody scene, and confirmed by the confessions of +several of the Blacks, while under Sentence of Death." [By Samuel Warner, +New York.] Printed for Warner & West. 1831. 12mo, pp. 36 [or more, copy +incomplete. With a frontispiece]. Among the Wendell Phillips tracts in +the Boston Public Library. + +3. "Slave Insurrection in 1831, in Southampton County, Va., headed by Nat +Turner. Also a conspiracy of slaves in Charleston, S.C., in 1822." New +York: compiled and published by Henry Bibb, 9 Spruce St. 1849. 12mo, pp. +12. + +[The contemporary newspaper narratives may be found largely quoted in the +first volume of the _Liberator_ (1831), and in Lundy's _Genius of +Universal Emancipation_ (September, 1831). The files of the Richmond +_Enquirer_ have also much information on the subject.] + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Black Rebellion, by Thomas Wentworth Higginson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACK REBELLION *** + +***** This file should be named 8432-8.txt or 8432-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/8/4/3/8432/ + +Produced by Eric Eldred, Thomas Berger, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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