The (bloody) birth of a nation
Who, exactly, was the mysterious man who organized the deadliest slave uprising in American history?
The following is an extract from The Land Shall Be Deluged in Blood: A New History of the Nat Turner Revolt , and explores the people involved in the infamous rebellion against slaveholders.
On a winter sunday in February 1831, four men gathered in the woods of Southampton County, Virginia. Each made his way from a nearby plantation. Hark came from the house of Joseph Travis, a household that included at least seven other slaves. Joseph Travis’s neighbor Nathaniel Francis owned at least ten slaves, including Sam, who joined Hark in the woods. Nelson and Henry also came to the meeting, although it is unclear where they lived. Nelson may have belonged to Peter Edwards, who lived immediately next to Nathaniel Francis, close to the Travis place. If so, thirty-three-year-old Nelson was, according to one person, “uncommonly skilled and worth at least $400, and had he been mine I would not have taken $500 for him.” Where Henry lived is a mystery. Although not much is known about Henry, he was a man who had the ability to get liquor, and he may have provided the others drinks to stave off the cold.
If Nat Turner arrived as he did at later meetings, he appeared after the four other slaves had gathered. No one will ever know what Henry, Hark, Sam, and Nelson discussed as they waited for Nat Turner, but it would not be surprising if they were talking about a solar eclipse that had occurred on Saturday, February 12, 1831. The line of maximum eclipse traveled from northeast to southwest, from east of Boston to west of New Orleans. Before the solar event, one newspaper reminded its readers that an eclipse was merely “caused by the regular operation of natural laws.” Despite this newspaper’s assurances to the contrary, one suspects that many Americans saw eclipses as meaningful, perhaps as “signs or forerunners of great calamities.” The line tracing the moon’s maximum shadow passed directly over Virginia between Norfolk and Richmond, and Virginians were as captivated as other Americans. The Richmond Enquirer reported that “every person in the city was star gazing, from bleary-eyed old age to the most bright-eyed infancy.” Slaves, who were told what to do and often what to think, had the chance to look and decide for themselves exactly what it meant. Perhaps as the men waited for Nat Turner they discussed the eclipse. If they had their own ideas, Nat Turner was going to suggest that the eclipse meant that God wanted him to launch a slave rebellion, one that became the most important slave revolt in American history.
The rebellion itself faced incredible odds. If they all agreed to join, the conspiracy would consist of five unarmed slaves. How could they stand up to Southampton’s whites, let alone the state’s militia or the nation’s regular army? If any of the men had not seen the risks associated with joining the revolt, practical considerations made clear the odds they faced. Each man understood that Turner was asking him to join a suicidal mission. Nevertheless, perhaps even before the end of the meeting, everyone had agreed to join the revolt. Hark and Sam survived the revolt and faced trial for their actions. At their trials, the prosecution proved that the men participated in the revolt, which was an easy task, given the unsympathetic court and the men’s long involvement in the revolt. But no one recorded why these men decided to follow Nat Turner to their deaths. Some whites assumed that Turner’s followers were simply deluded pawns who “acted under the influence of their leader.” Yet it remains possible that Henry, Hark, Sam, and Nelson decided to join because of the attractiveness of Nat Turner’s proposal, not his personality. If the revolt succeeded, they would live as free men. If it failed, they would die fighting for their freedom. Either outcome was acceptable to these men, who otherwise faced life and death in slavery.
Despite the men’s failure to settle upon a plan, they agreed on a date to begin the revolt: the Fourth of July, 1831. Turner’s Confessions do not say why the rebels settled on this date or even whose idea it was, but the date was clearly not arbitrary. Practically, Independence Day created opportunities for mobilizing slaves who were given the holiday off. At the same time, the conspirators may have thought it would be a day when the whites were especially vulnerable, either because most whites would be congregated in a few places or because the whites’ celebrations might leave them less prepared to respond to the news that the slaves had risen. For the next five weeks, the five conspirators worked to devise a plan that made sense.
The rebels also understood the ideological significance of the date. The prophet may have seen this revolt as part of a religious war that would lead to the second coming, but the other rebels understood that this struggle coincided with the principles laid out by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence. Two decades after the revolt, Frederick Douglass lambasted the failure of Americans to extend to African Americans the principles celebrated on the Fourth of July. He called Independence Day “a sham” and reminded his audience that “the blessings in which you this day rejoice are not enjoyed in common.”
Although the rebels were denied the podium available to [Frederick] Douglass, by selecting the Fourth of July to begin their revolt they implied that the revolt was not simply an event within Nat Turner’s eschatology.
They also wanted America to remember that “all men are created equal.” As the Fourth of July approached, however, Turner’s unease grew. According to the Confessions, the rebels’ inability to settle on a plan “affected my mind to such a degree, that I feel sick.” Recounting the story months later, Turner recognized that his worries led to the illness that kept him from participating in an Independence Day revolt. Without a plan and lacking a fit leader, the other rebels allowed the Fourth of July to pass quietly.
For the next five weeks, the five conspirators worked to devise a plan that made sense. Every time one of the rebels proposed a new plan, the others found reason to reject it. Despite his confidence in these four men, Nat Turner’s vision was essentially prophetic. He wanted another sign from God to confirm what the Holy Spirit had already shown him. Exactly forty days after the Fourth of July, the sign appeared. On August 13, 1831, the midday sun appeared “silvery,” as if it were “shining through a vanishing fog.” Its light also cast a peculiar hue, giving people “an unusually ghastly appearance.” By late afternoon, the sun’s appearance had changed: “it assumed a greenish blue appearance.” The sun also shone less brightly, and a sunspot appeared, visible to the naked eye. This phenomenon was observed from New York to Georgia, where the Georgia Courier reported that the sun appeared “shorn of its beams.” It could be looked at directly “and shed a grayish-blue light on the earth.” Near Richmond, one woman described the late afternoon appearance more dramatically: at “about 4 o’clock on looking up at the sun to our amazement, it was as blue as any cloud you ever saw.” Perhaps there was a natural explanation for “the very unusual if not unexampled appearance of the sun,” but Nat Turner saw this as the sign that he was waiting for. The odd appearance of the sun was confirmation that God wanted the revolt to begin. According to a newspaper account, Turner interpreted the black sunspot, which appeared over the silvery sun, as “positive proof, that he would succeed in his undertaking.” The hour to strike had arrived.
On the morning of Sunday, August 21, Henry, Hark, Nelson, Sam, Will, and Jack met as planned at Cabin Pond. While they prepared a pig that Hark had brought and drank the apple brandy that Henry contributed, the four charter members of the revolt began explaining to the new recruits their plans to “rise and kill all the white people.” At about three o’clock in the afternoon Nat Turner joined the small band. As he approached the group, he noticed the two new recruits. He recognized Jack and guessed how he had gotten there: Hark had brought him. Based upon his experiences as a scorned prophet, Nat Turner understood that most of the people in the black community would not spontaneously rise to rebel upon hearing that Turner had declared war on the slaveholders, even following the recent remarkable appearance of the sun. So he had to be prepared to welcome rebels who joined his force for reasons other than loyalty to him. One of the most important sources of recruiting would be when those who had already committed to the revolt persuaded their friends and family to join the army. Nat Turner knew both Hark and Jack and understood the influence that Hark had upon his brother-in-law. Even though Jack was never fully convinced of the wisdom of the revolt, Turner accepted him without question as “only a tool in the hands of Hark.”
In contrast, Turner questioned Will, asking “how he came to be there.” Will did not respond by explaining how he had come to learn about the small, secretive plot; instead he told Turner the reasons he wanted to join Turner’s army. This answer, preserved in the Confessions, is a remarkable piece of evidence. As Turner remembered it, Will responded that “his life was worth no more than others, and his liberty as dear to him.” In this response, Will appeared different from the clichés that contemporary whites told themselves about Turner’s followers. One contemporary newspaper described how whites understood the rebels: the followers were a “few ignorant wretches” whose minds Nat Turner “deceive[d], delude[d] and overawe[d].” Another account described how Turner “had acquired the character of a prophet” who had “acquired an immense influence, over such persons as he took into his confidence.” A correspondent at the time wrote to his brother that Turner “lied” to the blacks he was able to get to join him. A letter written about the revolt to North Carolina’s governor explained how the rebels had been deluded: “Religion has been brought to their aid.” According to this letter, these rebels had even come to believe that their martyrdom would be rewarded with eternal salvation: “Many have said so when about to be put to death.”Will, too, was ready to die, but his reason was different from the ones whites focused upon. Will wanted to fight for his freedom, and he indicated that he was ready to “lose his life” if the revolt failed. As revealing as what he said is what he did not say. He gave no hint that he was impressed by Turner’s religion, expressed no confidence in Nat Turner as a prophet, and provided no reason to think that Turner had acquired “an ascendancy over [his] mind.” In fact, if one considers the antagonism suggested by Turner’s pointed questions directed only to Will, Will seems to have joined the revolt in spite of Turner, not because of him. Whatever tension that existed between Turner and Will eased once Will explained that he was ready to die fighting alongside Turner. According to Turner, Will’s answers were “enough to put him in full confidence.”
The feast at Cabin Pond lasted until about nine or ten o’clock. The small band then made its way to the Travis farm. The first person they encountered at the Travises’ was Austin, another one of the eight slaves who lived on the farm. Since Austin lived and worked on a small farm with two of the revolt’s leaders, they must have known him well. Yet Turner had not invited Austin to join the conspirators in February, nor had he joined the other rebels earlier in the day at Cabin Pond. Austin’s distance from the rebels during the plotting stages is one of the strongest pieces of evidence that Turner initially kept the conspiracy small. The record leaves no evidence that Austin felt any slight at the rebels’ decision not to include him earlier. Instead, he and six other rebels headed over to the Travises’ cider press.
Jack, the most reluctant rebel, soon slipped away from the others. In the quiet of the night, sitting with his head held in his hands between knees, he tried to decide what to do. He could have easily awakened the Travis family and warned them about the imminent revolt. Just as easily, he could have fled, avoiding any involvement with the rebellion itself. But he did neither of these things. When Moses, a young slave on the farm, approached the unhappy man, Jack explained to him that he was “sick and wanted to go home.” He had little confidence in the rebels’ plan, even after Hark explained it to him, and he was not sure that he was ready to die in this revolt. As when Nat Turner noted that his worries “affected my mind to such a degree, that I feel sick,” Jack soon felt ill. By the middle of the night, several hours after he complained about feeling poorly to Moses, Moses saw Jack again “in the yard sick.” While the others drank and Jack worried, Nat Turner remained by himself, alone, a position he would often find himself in during a revolt that he had begun and which would eventually best be known by his name.
Patrick H. Breen is the author of The Land Shall Be Deluged in Blood: A New History of the Nat Turner Revolt. He is Associate Professor of History at Providence College.
