1831 — Aug 21-23, Nat Turner Slave Revolt/Massacre of Whites, Southampton Co., VA-55-65
See Aug 23 (post-Revolt) entry for White Massacre of non-revolting Black Slaves
— ~65 Berry. Black Resistance White Law…Constitutional Racism in America. 1995, p. 22.
— 61 Baker. John Marshall: A Life In Law. 1974, p. 721.
— <60 Breen. Nat Turner’s Revolt: Rebellion and Response…PhD dissertation, 2005. p. 1.[1]
— >57 Aptheker. American Negro Slave Revolts. 1970, p. 298.
— 55 Childs. A History of the United States In Chronological Order. 1886, p. 95.
— 55 Gray. The Confessions of Nat Turner. 1831, p. 22.[2]
–31 children noted on page 22.
— 55 U. S. Central Publishing Co. Important Events of the Century: 1776-1876, p. 69.
— 55 White and Walbert. Nat Turner’s Rebellion. Learn NC. 2009; accessed 1-22-2018.
Narrative Information
Aptheker (American Negro Slave Revolts): “Southampton is a tidewater county, located in the southeastern part of Virginia, bordering the state of North Carolina. Covering six hundred square miles, it was in important economic unity in the tidewater area….Its population trend was that of…a more rapid growth of the Negro than of the white element. Thus, one finds that while, in 1820, there were 6127 whites and 8043 Negroes in Southampton County, in 1830 the figures read 6574 whites and 9501 Negroes.[3] In 1830 out of a total of thirty-nine tidewater counties only three surpassed Southampton in the number of free Negroes, and only four in the number of slaves, and in the number of whites.
“In its economic decline Southampton is also typical of the condition in eastern Virginia during the period. Thus, for example, it ranked fifth in the State in 1810 in the amount of taxes it paid on the assessed valuation of its land and lots, but dropped to forty-fourth in 1820 and to forty-sixth in 1830.
“The situation, then, in the decade prior to the Southampton revolt is one of extraordinary malaise in the slaveholding area. It is marked by a considerable expansion and development of anti-slavery feeling, nationally and internationally (as part of an all-embracing upsurge of progressive and radical thought and action throughout the western world), by great and serious unrest among the slave populations, in the West Indies as well as on the Continent, by severe economic depression, and by the more rapid growth of the Negro population than the white throughout the old South. Testifying to the uneasiness of the master class there appear numerous precautionary measures for the purpose of overawing, or further restricting the activities of the slave population (which, in turn, very likely stimulated discontent), and, as a last resort, on order to assure the speedy suppression of all evidences of slave insubordination.
“It was into such a situation (one is tempted to assert, though proof is, of course, not at hand, that it was because of such a situation) that the upraised dark arms of vengeance of Turner and his followers crashed in the summer of 1831….” (pp. 293-294)
“…mere personal vengeance was not Nat Turner’s motive. He had learned how to read…and, when his labors permitted, he had immersed himself in the stories of the Bible. He was a keen, mechanically gifted man whose religion offered him a rationalization for his opposition to the status quo….” (p. 295)
“Turner became convinced that he ‘was ordained for some great purpose in the hands of the Almighty.’ In the spring of 1828, while working in the fields, he ‘heard a loud noise in the heavens, and the Spirit instantly appeared to me and said the Serpent was loosened, and Christ had laid down the yoke he had borne for the sins of men, and that I should take it on and fight
against the Serpent, for the time was fast approaching when the first should be last and the last should be first.’”[4] (p. 296)
“According to Drewry, Turner the next day [Aug 14] exhorted at a religious meeting of Negroes in the southern part of Southampton County (not in North Carolina, as has been said)[5] where some of the slaves ‘signified their willingness to co-operate with him by wearing around their necks red bandanna handkerchiefs.” There was, certainly, a meeting of plotters in the afternoon of Sunday, August 21, and it was then decided to start the revolt that evening….” (p. 297)
“These six slaves, then, started out, in the evening of August 21, 1831, on their crusade against bondage. Their first blow — delivered by Turner himself — struck against person and family of Turner’s master, Joseph Travis, who were killed. Some arms and horses were taken, the rebels pushed on, and everywhere slaves flocked to their standard….Within twenty-four hours approximately seventy slaves were actively aiding in the rebellion.[6] By the morning of August 23rd, at least fifty-seven whites — men, women, and children — had been killed, and the rebels had covered about twenty miles.[7]
“Turner declared that ‘indiscriminate slaughter was not their intention after they obtained a foothold, and was resorted to in the first instance to strike terror and alarm…’ ….
“In the morning of the twenty-third Turner and his followers set out for the county seat, Jerusalem, where there was a considerable store of arms. When about three miles from this town several of the slaves, notwithstanding Turner’s objections, insisted upon trying to recruit the slaves of a wealthy planter named Parker. Turner, with a handful of followers, remained at the Parker gate while the rest went to the home itself, about half a mile away. Once at the Parker home many of the slaves appear to have slacked their thirst from its well-stocked cellar and to have rested. Turner became impatient and set out to get his tardy companions. The eight or nine slaves remaining at the gate were then attacked by a volunteer corps of whites of about twice their number. The slaves retreated, but upon being reinforced by the returning Turner and his men, the rebels pressed on and forced the whites to give ground. The latter, however, were in turn reinforced by a company of militia and the Negroes, whose guns, according to the Richmond Compiler of August 29, were not ‘fit for use,’ fled.
“Though Turner later tried to round up sufficient followers to continue the struggle, his efforts were futile and this battle at Parker’s field was the crucial one. Late in the day of this encounter the commander at Fort Monroe, Colonel Eustis, was requested by the Mayor or Norfolk to send aid. By the morning of the 24th, three companies of artillery with a field piece and one hundred stands of spare arms, together with detachments of men from the warships Warren and Natchez were on their way to the scene of the trouble. They made the sixty miles in one day, and met hundreds of other soldiers from volunteer and militia companies of the counties, in Virginia and in North Carolina, surrounding Southampton.
Aptheker on Insurrections, Rebellions and Revolts: “It is almost always referred to as an insurrection. The aim of an insurrection is not revolutionary; the aim of a rebellion is. A revolt is of less magnitude than a rebellion.”[8] (p. 1)
Aptheker on “New Repressive Legislation” “On April 7, 1831, the Virginia legislature passed a law which considerably, and adversely affected the Negro population. Free Negroes remaining contrary to law were to be sold into slavery, and ‘all meetings of free negroes or mulattoes, at any school-house, church, meeting house or other place for teaching them reading or writing, either in the day or night, under whatsoever pretext, shall be deemed and considered as an unlawful assembly;” punishable by not more than 20 lashes for the Negroes and a fine of $50 for the whites present, whom the court might also send to jail for two months. It was further provided that any white person who, for pay, assembled with slaves in order to instruct them in reading and writing was to be fined not more than $100 and not less than $10. This act took effect on June 1, 1831.”[9] (p. 27)
Baker: “On August 23, 1831, Governor John Floyd of Virginia wrote: ‘This will be a very noted day in Virginia. At daylight this morning the Mayor of the City put into my hands a notice to the public, written by James Trezevant of Southampton County, stating that an insurrection of the slaves in the county had taken place, that several families had been massacred and that it would take a considerable military force to put them down.’ This was the revolt led by the slave Nat Turner that resulted in the deaths of sixty-one whites in Southampton County. Men, women, and children were slaughtered. The whites coming to the rescue were equally ferocious. They raced into Southampton County and no black was safe, however innocent he was of complicity in the revolt.[10]
“The uprising exacerbated the most dreaded fear of all Virginians and most southerners, that of the blacks rising up and murdering them in their beds….
But the revolt failed to produce in even the more thoughtful Virginians any understanding of the evil of slavery. That, for them, had not been the cause of the revolt. Rather, there had been a conspiracy, one that had made dupes out of otherwise decent Virginians. Governor Floyd in a letter explained what he considered the origin of the revolt. Because he was a respected citizen, elected to his post by the state legislature, it is reasonable to assume his thoughts were universal ones in Virginia. He wrote:
I am fully persuaded the spirit of insubordination which has, and still manifests itself in Virginia, had its origin among, and eminated from the Yankee population, upon their first arrival amongst us, but most especially the Yankee pedlars and traders.
The course has been by no means a direct one. They began first by making them religious; their conversations were of that character, telling the blacks, God was no respecter of persons; the black man was as good as the white; that all men were born free and equal that they can not serve two masters; that the white people rebelled against England to obtain freedom; so have the blacks a right to do so.
In the meantime, I am sure without any purpose of this kind, the preachers, especially Northern, were very assiduous in operating upon our population. Day and night they were at work and religion became, and is, the fashion of the times. Finally our females and of the most respectable were persuaded that it was piety to teach negroes to read and write, to the end that they might read the Scriptures. Many of them became tutoresses in Sunday schools and pious distributors of tracts from the New York Society.
At this point more active operations commenced; our magistrates and laws became more inactive; large assemblies of negroes were suffered to take place for religious purposes. Then commenced the efforts of the black preachers. Often from the pulpits these pamphlets and papers were read, followed by the incendiary publications of Walker,[11] Garrison,[12] and Knapp of Boston; these too with songs and hymns of a similar character were circulated, read and commented upon, we resting in apathetic security until the Southampton affair.
From all that has come to my knowledge during and since this affair, I am fully convinced that every black preacher, in the whole country east of the Blue Ridge, was in the secret, that the plans as published by those northern prints were adopted and acted upon by them, that their congregations, as they were called, knew nothing of this intended rebellion, except a few leading, and intelligent men, who may have been head men in the church. The mass were prepared by making them aspire to an equal station by such conversations as I have related as the first step.
I am informed that they had settled the form of government to be that of the white people, whom they intended to cut off to a man, with this difference that the preachers were to be their governors, generals, and judges. I feel fully justified to myself, in believing the northern incendiaries, tracts, Sunday Schools, religion and reading and writing has accomplished this end.
I shall in my annual message recommend that laws be passed to confine the slaves to the estates of their master, prohibit negroes from preaching, absolutely to drive from this state all free negroes, and to substitute the surplus revenue in our treasury annually for slaves, to work for a time upon our railroads, etc., and then sent out of the country, preparatory, or rather as the first step to emancipation. This last point will of course be tenderly and cautiously managed, and will be urged or delayed as your state and Georgia may be disposed to cooperate…[13]
“This last was a reference to a proposal to come before the state legislature calling for the gradual emancipation of the state’s slaves…
“By this time, however, the exportation of slaves to the states further south had become too profitable an industry for Virginia to end it: at least too profitable an industry for Virginia to have the courage to end it. Estimates are that between eight thousand and nine thousand slaves were sold south every year, an that a healthy black male could bring about $1,000 on the slave market. By the 1830s the state’s income from the sale of slavers would be more than $20 million. This all came out in the 1832 debates….” (Baker. John Marshall, pp. 721-724.)
Berry: “In 1831, ‘unusual uneasiness’ again prevailed in the South. Rumors of revolts and insurrections were rampant. Military units were increasingly wary and kept the black population under careful surveillance. In Louisiana, officials informed the War Department that a major revolt threatened and requested that additional troops be sent to the area; troops in the vicinity were put on alert. Along the eastern seaboard, army units were moved from northern states into the South to prevent suspected insurrection.[14] The rumors were partly fulfilled in Southampton, Virginia in August 1831, when Nat Turner instigated a revolt with approximately seventy slaves. State military volunteers, with the aid of federal troops, moved in to suppress the rebellion….The commander of the naval yard at Norfolk issued seven hundred stands of arms and twelve thousand rounds ammunition to local white citizens. Approximately sixty-five white persons were killed. The rebels, with the exception of their leader, were all killed or captured within ten days after the outbreak of the disturbance….” (Berry. Black Resistance White Law… Constitutional Racism in America. 1995, pp. 22-23).
Childs: “A negro insurrection broke out in Virginia, near the North Carolina border. It started with a party of three white men[15] and four slaves, who commenced killing several families, and impressing into their service all slaves on their route,[16] until a force of nearly two hundred accumulated,[17] spreading desolation everywhere in their path. Fifty-five white persons were murdered before the insurrection was quelled. Troops were called out by the authorities of Virginia and North Carolina, who succeeded in killing or capturing all the insurgents. Fearing that this outbreak was but a part of a grand conspiracy of the negroes generally, martial law was proclaimed in many places, and every negro who could not give a satisfactory account of himself was arrested. In South Carolina the “Vigilance Association of Columbia” offered a reward of one thousand dollars for the apprehension and conviction of any person who should be detected in distributing or circulating in that State the abolition paper called the Liberator, published in Boston, or the pamphlet called “Walker s Pamphlet,” or any other publication of a seditious tendency.” (Childs 1886, p. 95.)
Gray: “….No cry for mercy penetrated…No acts of remembered kindness made the least impression upon these remorseless murderers. Men, women and children, from hoary age to helpless infancy were involved in the same cruel fate….” (T. R. Gray, member of the Court, statement of Nat Turner taken at Jerusalem, Southampton, VA, 11-5-1831, p. 4.)
Turner in Gray: “….Since the commencement of 1830, I had been living with Mr. Joseph Travis, who was to me a kind master, and placed the greatest confidence in me; in fact I had no cause to complain of his treatment to me.
“On Saturday evening, the 20th of August, it was agreed between Henry, Hark and myself, to prepare a dinner the next day for the men we expected, and then to concert a plan, as we had not yet determined on any. Hark, on the following morning, brought a pig, and Henry brandy, and being joined by Sam, Nelson, [end of p. 11] Will and Jack….
“…it was quickly agreed we should commence at home (Mr. J. Travis’) on that night, and until we had armed and equipped ourselves, and gathered sufficient force, neither age nor sex was to be spared, (which was invariably adhered to.) We remained at the feast until about two hours in the night, when we went to the house and found Austin; they all went to the cider press and drank, except myself. On returning to the house, Hark went to the door with an axe, for the purpose of breaking it open, as we knew we were strong enough to murder the family, if they were awaked by the noise; but reflecting that it might create an alarm in the neighborhood, we determined to enter the house secretly, and murder them whilst sleeping. Hark got a ladder and set it against the chimney, on which I ascended, and hoisting a window, entered and came down stairs, unbarred the door, and removed the guns from their places. It was then observed that I must spill the first blood. On which, armed with a hatchet, and accompanied by Will, I entered my master’s chamber, it being dark, I could not give a death blow, the hatchet glanced from his head, he sprang from the bed and called his wife, it was his last word, Will laid him dead, with a blow of his axe, and Mrs. Travis shared the same fate, as she lay in bed. The murder of this family, five in number, was the work of a moment, not one of them awoke; there was a little infant sleeping in a cradle, that was forgotten, until we had left the house and gone some distance, when Henry and Will returned and killed it; we got here, four guns that would shoot, and several old muskets, with a pound or two of powder.
“We remained some time at the barn, where we paraded; I formed them in a line as soldiers, and after carrying them through all the manoeuvres I was master of, marched them off to Mr. Salathul Francis’, about six hundred yards distant. Sam and Will went to the door and knocked. Mr. Francis asked who was there, Sam replied, it was him, and he had a [end of p. 12] letter for him, on which he got up and came to the door, they immediately seized him, and dragging him out a little from the door, he was dispatched by repeated blows on the head; there was no other white person in the family.
“We started from there for Mrs. Reese’s, maintaining the most perfect silence on our march, where finding the door unlocked, we entered, and murdered Mrs. Reese in her bed, while sleeping; her son awoke, but it was only to sleep the sleep of death, he had only time to say who is that, and he was no more.
“From Mrs. Reese’s we went to Mrs. Turner’s, a mile distant, which we reached about sunrise, on Monday morning. Henry, Austin, and Sam, went to the still, where, finding Mr. Peebles, Austin shot him, and the rest of us went to the house; as we approached, the family discovered us, and shut the door. Vain hope! Will, with one stroke of his axe, opened it, and we entered and found Mrs. Turner and Mrs. Newsome in the middle of a room, almost frightened to death. Will immediately killed Mrs. Turner, with one blow of his axe. I took Mrs. Newsome by the hand, and with the sword I had when I was apprehended, I struck her several blows over the head, but not being able to kill her, as the sword was dull. Will turning around and discovering it, despatched her also. A general destruction of property and search for money and ammunition, always succeeded the murders.
“By this time my company amounted to fifteen, and nine men mounted, who started for Mrs. Whitehead’s, (the other six were to go through a by way to Mr. Bryant’s and rejoin us at Mrs. Whitehead’s,) as we approached the house we discovered Mr. Richard Whitehead standing in the cotton patch, near the lane fence; we called him over into the lane, and Will, the executioner, was near at hand, with his fatal axe, to send him to an untimely grave. As we pushed on to the house, I discovered some one run round the garden, and thinking it was some of the white family, I pursued them, but finding it was a servant girl belonging to the house, I returned to commence the work of death, but they whom I left, had not been idle; all the family were already murdered, but Mrs. Whitehead and her daughter Margaret. As I came round to the door I saw Will pulling Mrs. Whitehead out of the house, and at the step he nearly severed her head from her body, with his broad axe. Miss Margaret, when I discovered her, had concealed herself in the corner, formed by the projection of the cellar cap from the house; on my approach she fled, but was soon overtaken, and after [end of p.13] repeated blows with a sword, I killed her by a blow on the head, with a fence rail.
“By this time, the six who had gone by Mr. Bryant’s, rejoined us, and informed me they had done the work of death assigned them. We again divided, part going to Mr. Richard Porter’s, and from thence to Nathaniel Francis’, the others to Mr. Howell Harris’, and Mr. T. Doyles. On my reaching Mr. Porter’s, he had escaped with his family. I understood there, that the alarm had already spread, and I immediately returned to bring up those sent to Mr. Doyles, and Mr. Howell Harris’; the party I left going on to Mr. Francis’, having told them I would join them in that neighborhood.
“I met these sent to Mr. Doyles’ and Mr. Harris’ returning, having met Mr. Doyle on the road and killed him; and learning from some who joined them, that Mr. Harris was from home, I immediately pursued the course taken by the party gone on before; but knowing they would complete the work of death and pillage, at Mr. Francis’ before I could there, I went to Mr. Peter Edwards’, expecting to find them there, but they had been here also. I then went to Mr. John T. Barrow’s, they had been here and murdered him. I pursued on their track to Capt. Newit Harris’, where I found the greater part mounted, and ready to start; the men now amounting to about forty, shouted and hurraed as I rode up, some were in the yard, loading their guns, others drinking. They said Captain Harris and his family had escaped, the property in the house they destroyed, robbing him of money and other valuables.
“I ordered them to mount and march instantly, this was about nine or ten o’clock, Monday morning. I proceeded to Mr. Levi Waller’s, two or three miles distant. I took my station in the rear, and as it ’twas my object to carry terror and devastation wherever we went, I placed fifteen or twenty of the best armed and most to be relied on, in front, who generally approached the houses as fast as their horses could run; this was for two purposes, to prevent their escape and strike terror to the inhabitants–on this account I never got to the houses, after leaving Mrs. Whitehead’s, until the murders were committed, except in one case. I sometimes got in sight in time to see the work of death completed, viewed the mangled bodies as they lay, in silent satisfaction, and immediately started in quest of other victims–Having murdered Mrs. Waller and ten children,[18] we started for Mr. William Williams’ — having killed him and two little boys that were there; while engaged in this, Mrs. Williams fled and got some distance [end p.14] from the house, but she was pursued, overtaken, and compelled to get up behind one of the company, who brought her back, and after showing her the mangled body of her lifeless husband, she was told to get down and lay by his side, where she was shot dead.
“I then started for Mr. Jacob Williams, where the family were murdered–Here we found a young man named Drury, who had come on business with Mr. Williams–he was pursued, overtaken and shot. Mrs. Vaughan was the next place we visited–and after murdering the family here, I determined on starting for Jerusalem–Our number amounted now to fifty or sixty, all mounted and armed with guns, axes, swords and clubs–On reaching Mr. James W. Parkers’ gate, immediately on the road leading to Jerusalem, and about three miles distant, it was proposed to me to call there, but I objected, as I knew he was gone to Jerusalem, and my object was to reach there as soon as possible; but some of the men having relations at Mr. Parker’s it was agreed that they might call and get his people. I remained at the gate on the road, with seven or eight; the others going across the field to the house, about half a mile off. After waiting some time for them, I became impatient, and started to the house for them, and on our return we were met by a party of white men, who had pursued our blood-stained track, and who had fired on those at the gate, and dispersed them, which I new nothing of, not having been at that time rejoined by any of them–Immediately on discovering the whites, I ordered my men to halt and form, as they appeared to be alarmed–The white men, eighteen in number, approached us in about one hundred yards, when one of them fired, (this was against the positive orders of Captain Alexander P. Peete, who commanded, and who had directed the men to reserve their fire until within thirty paces)[19] And I discovered about half of them retreating, I then ordered my men to fire and rush on them; the few remaining stood their ground until we approached within fifty yards, when they fired and retreated. We pursued and overtook some of them who we thought we left dead; (they were not killed) after pursuing them about two hundred yards, and rising a little hill, I discovered they were met by another party, and had haulted, and were re-loading their guns, (this was a small party from Jerusalem who knew the negroes were in the field, and had just tied their horses to await their return to the road, knowing that Mr. Parker and family were in Jerusalem… [end of p.16] [Blanchard note: the story can be continued in Gray, in Sources section; there were no more Turner and company killings after this point.]
- S. Central Publishing Co.: “1831….Insurrection and massacre in Southampton county, Va. In August about sixty or seventy slaves rose upon the white inhabitants and massacred fifty-five men, women, and children.” (U. S. Central Publishing Co. Important Events of the Century: 1776-1876, p. 69.)
Wood and Walbert: “On August 22, 1831, Nat Turner and six fellow slaves began their attack. Their plan was to move systematically from plantation to plantation in Southampton and kill all white people connected to slavery, including men, women, and children. They started on their own plantation and murdered Turner’s owner and his family. During the next twenty-four hours, Turner and his fellow insurgents moved throughout the county to eleven different plantations, killing fifty-five people and inspiring fifty or sixty enslaved men to join their ranks. They then moved on to the town of Jerusalem with the intention of destroying the town and killing all the inhabitants. But before they could reach their destination, they were stopped by a heavily armed white militia. The Governor had called about three thousand militiamen to put down the rebellion. Seeing that they were greatly outnumbered, the insurgents disbanded, and many fled into the woods and swamps.
“The white militia hunted down and soon captured or killed the men who had participated in the rebellion, except for Nat Turner. For two months Turner hid in the woods of Southampton County. When he was finally captured, he was tried, convicted, and then hanged and his body skinned. Fifty-four other men were executed by the state.
Newspaper
Aug 23:[20] “An express reached the governor this morning informing him that an insurrection had broken out in Southampton, and that, by the last accounts, there were seventy whites massacred and the militia retreating. Another express to Petersburg says that the blacks were continuing their destruction; that three hundred militia were retreating in a body, before six or eight hundred blacks. A shower of rain coming up as the militia were making an attack, wet the powder so much that they were compelled to retreat, being armed only with shot-guns. The negroes are armed with muskets, scythes, axes, &c. &c….” (Annapolis Republican, MD. “Insurrection in Virginia. Extract of a letter from a gentleman to his friend in Baltimore, dated Richmond, August 23d.” 8-27-1831.)
Sources
Annapolis Republican, MD. “Insurrection in Virginia. Extract of a letter from a gentleman to his friend in Baltimore, dated Richmond, August 23d.” 8-27-1831. Accessed 1-24-2018 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/annapolis-maryland-republican-aug-27-1831-p-3/
Aptheker, Herbert. American Negro Slave Revolts. New York: International Publishers, 1970. Accessed 1-23-2018 at: https://www.scribd.com/document/204919722/American-Negro-Slave-Revolts-Herbert-Aptheker
Aptheker, Herbert. Nat Turner’s Slave Rebellion, Including the 1831 ‘Confessions.” Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, Inc., 1996, 2006. Google preview accessed 1-22-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=UsepDQzh0FkC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false
Baker, Leonard. John Marshall: A Life In Law. New York and London, Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc. 1974.
Berry, Mary Frances. Black Resistance White Law: A History of Constitutional Racism in America. New York: Penguin Books, 1995.
Breen, Patrick H. Nat Turner’s Revolt: Rebellion and Response in Southampton County, Virginia. Doctoral dissertation, University of Georgia, Athens, 2005. Accessed 1-24-2018 at: https://getd.libs.uga.edu/pdfs/breen_patrick_h_200505_phd.pdf
Childs, Emery E. A History of the United States In Chronological Order From the Discovery of America in 1492 to the Year 1885. NY: Baker & Taylor, 1886. Google digitized. Accessed 9-4-2017: http://books.google.com/books?id=XLYbAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false
Gray, Thomas R. The Confessions of Nat Turner, the Leader of the Late Insurrection in Southampton, VA, As fully and voluntarily made to Thomas R. Gray. Baltimore: Thomas R. Gray, Lucas & Deaver, print., 1831. Accessed 1-23-2018 at: http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/turner/turner.html
United States Central Publishing Co. Important Events of the Century: 1776-1876. NY: U.S. Central Pub. Co., 1876. Google preview accessed 1-22-2018 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=OGZt1HGsgmEC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false
Wood, L. Maren and David Walbert. Nat Turner’s Rebellion. Learn NC (North Carolina Digital History). 2009. Accessed 1-22-2018 at: http://www.learnnc.org/lp/editions/nchist-newnation/4574
[1] “By the middle of the day on Monday, 22 August, the rebels had killed nearly five dozen whites…”
[2] On this page Gray notes the names or relationships (i.e. “four daughters”) of fatalities “amounting to fifty-five.”
[3] Cites: Documents…of the Convention of 1850-51; Niles’ Weekly Register, Sept. 8, 1832, XLIII, p. 30; W. S. Drewry. The Southampton Insurrection, p. 208n.; The American Annual Register, 1830-32, p. 381.
[4] Cites The Confessions of Nat Turner, pp. 9 and 11. [See Gray in Sources below.]
[5] Cites: N. Stevens, “The 100th anniversary of the Nat Turner Revolt,” in The Communist, 1931, X, p. 739.
[6] Breen: “The rebels…failed to win much spontaneous support from among the slaves who had heard about the revolt. As a result, a rebel army that traveled throughout St. Luke’s Parish in Southampton County, home to nearly twenty-five hundred slaves over twelve [years of age], almost certainly never included as many as eighty men.” (p8)
[7] In footnote 21, Aptheker writes: “Neither contemporaries nor later commentators agree as to the number of casualties, or, and the discrepancies are especially great, the number of rebels. Detailed evidence for the estimates made above covers several pages of the present writer’s master’s thesis, “Nat Turner’s Revolt,” Columbia University, 1937.”
[8] Cites Senate Document No. 209, 57th Cong., 2d Sess. (Vol. 15) p. 258 note “Federal aid in domestic disturbances 1787-1903” prepared under direction of Maj.-Gen H. C. Corbin by F. T. Wilson — Washington, 1903. Government Printing Office.
[9] Cites: Acts passed at a General Assembly….of Virginia….One thousand eight hundred and thirty…., Richmond, 1831, pp. 107-108. Notes, additionally: “An act passed April 13, 1831, forbade trading with slaves without owner’s permission–Ibid., p. 130.”
[10] Baker footnote: “Ambler, Floyd, p. 155. See pp. 156-68 for excerpts from Gov. Floyd’s diary concerning the revolt. For the best modern account of the uprising, see Henry I. Tragle, “Slave Revolt,” American History Illustrated, Nov. 1971, p. 4 passim.
[11] David Walker. Walker’s Appeal. Boston, 1830. Made case, in Aptheker’s words “justifying and vindicating the use of force for abolition…” (p. 23)
[12] William Lloyd Garrison. Editor of abolitionist newspaper The Liberator, which he co-founded with Isaac Knapp in 1831. (Wikipedia. “William Lloyd Garrison.” 12-6-2017 edit. Accessed 1-22-2018.)
[13] Abler, pp. 89-91.
[14] Cites, in footnote 13, Aptheker. Slave Revolts, pp. 290–310; and Senate Documents, 209 (1903), p. 56.
[15] Not true, though there was at least one newspaper report we have seen that makes this statement. Historians and others we use as sources herein, state this is not accurate.
[16] It appears that at least one slave who was part of the party he was not willing to participate in the killings. As for the claim Childs makes that all slaves along the route were impressed into participating, this is not true.
[17] Not true. See, for example, Aptheker and Breen on number of participants — never exceeding eighty.
[18] Blanchard note: From this reading it might seem these were school children from the community. Gray writes on page 19 of “The escape of a little girl who went to school at Mr. Waller’s, and where the children were collecting for that purpose.” This girl “seeing the negroes approach, ran up on a dirt chimney (such as are common to log houses,) and remained there unnoticed during the massacre of the eleven that were killed at this place.” Breen, however, at p.125, writes that “John Hill Wheeler, A Murfreesboro resident who wrote a history of the Tarheel State twenty years after the revolt, recalled [Levi] Waller’s account of the events at his plantation: Waller described ‘with painful effort that his wife and ten children (one at the breast) were murdered, and that he only escaped to tell the dreadful tale.” [He had fled to Murfreesboro.]
[19] The note within parentheses is by Gray.
[20] This article is included here for the purpose of giving an example of the type of press reporting at the time. One should not take as facts the information portrayed.