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SLAVE REBELLIONS
UNIT I
COLONIAL LAWS AND REVOLTS
Laws controlling the lives of slaves varied from
region to region. Every colony passed its own
slave laws, and colonies revised these laws over
time. Settlers in Georgia, for example, barred
slavery from the colony in 1735 but lifted the ban
in 1750. Virginia enacted its first slave code in
1661. South Carolina passed fairly weak regulations in 1690 and then revised its laws in 1696,
1712, and 1740, each time strengthening the restrictions placed on slaves.
Generally, slaves could not go aboard ships or
ferries or leave the town limits without a written
pass. Crimes for slaves ranged from owning hogs
and carrying canes to disturbing the peace and
striking a white person. Punishments included
whipping, banishment to the West Indies, and
death. Many of these laws also applied to free African Americans and to Native Americans.
Laws restricting the movement of slaves made
organizing slave rebellions extremely difficult.
Because slaves could not travel or meet freely,
they had only limited contact with slaves in other
areas. A few early documented cases of slave revolts do stand out. In 1739, several dozen slaves
near Charleston, South Carolina, killed more than
twenty whites in what is known as the Stono Rebellion. The slaves burned an armory and began to
march toward Spanish Florida, where a small colony of runaway slaves lived. Armed planters captured and killed the rebels. In New York City, brutal laws passed to control African Americans led to
rebellions in 1708, 1712, and 1741. After the 1741
revolt, thirteen African Americans were burned
alive in punishment. African Americans undertook
almost fifty documented revolts between 1740 and
1800.
More commonly, African Americans resisted
slavery through a series of silent acts, such as pretending to misunderstand orders or faking illness.
While these actions could not give them freedom,
they did grant the slaves a small degree of control
over their own lives.
19TH CENTURY SLAVE REVOLTS
Only a small percentage of slaves ever managed to
escape their captivity or to win their freedom. Rebellion, especially on a large scale, stood little
chance of success. While historians have documented scores of slave rebellions, most were small,
spontaneous responses to cruel treatment and
ended in tragic failure.
Vesey’s Plan In 1800, the year of Gabriel
Prosser’s revolt, a young slave named Denmark
Vesey bought his freedom with $600 he won in a
street lottery. He worked as a carpenter and became a preacher at the local African Methodist
Episcopal Church. Vesey was self-educated and
read anti-slavery literature. He grew increasingly
angry at the sufferings of his fellow African
Americans.
Vesey preached against slavery, quoting the
Declaration of Independence and the Bible. He
criticized African Americans who would not stand
up to whites.
In 1822 Vesey’s anger turned to action. He
laid plans for the most ambitious slave revolt in
American history. In a conspiracy that reportedly
involved hundreds or even thousands of rebels,
Vesey plotted to seize the city of Charleston in
July 1822. Later accounts said that he intended to
raid the arsenal, kill all the white residents, free the
slaves, and burn the city to the ground.
Like Gabriel Prosser, Vesey was betrayed by
some of his followers. In June, South Carolina
troops smashed the rebellion before it could get
started.
Thirty-five African Americans were
hanged, including Vesey. Another 32 were expelled from South Carolina. Four white men received fines and prison terms for aiding the rebels.
Nat Turner, a 31-year-old
African American preacher, planned and carried
out a violent uprising in August 1831 known as
Turner’s Rebellion. Acting under what he believed
was divine inspiration, he led up to 70 slaves in
raids on white families in southeastern Virginia. In
attacks on four plantations, the rebels killed 57
white people.
Eventually, local militia captured most of the
rebels. The state of Virginia hanged about 20 of
the slaves, including Turner. Crowds of frightened
and angry whites rioted, slaughtering about a hun-
Turner’s Rebellion
A SHORT HISTORY OF THE CIVIL WAR
dred African Americans who had had no part in the
revolt.
White Southerners Alarmed Slave revolts were a
white southerner’s nightmare, since in many communities African Americans out-numbered the
white population. Virginia, which was not a cotton
state, briefly considered ending slavery in order to
ease this threat. But instead, it joined other southern states in tightening restrictions on slaves following the Vesey and Turner rebellions. Virginia
and North Carolina passed laws against teaching
enslaved people to read. Some states prevented
African Americans from moving freely or meeting.
THE AMISTAD INCIDENT
Although no significant revolt occurred after
Turner’s death, his passion and success escalated
the conflict between the states over slavery. One
more revolt, however, would seriously change the
entire issue of slavery and slave revolts: the Amistad incident. In general, Amistad is overlooked by
historians in favor of the more lurid and more deliberate revolts in Haiti and in the southern United
States. The Amistad incident, however, dramatically changed the European-American idea of
SLAVE REBELLIONS
2
slave revolt and the moral constitution of slave
revolts.
The year is 1839. Slave traffic is officially illegal in every country in the world. Despite this, a
Cuban boat, the Amistad, is still trading in human
lives kidnapped from Western Africa. On this trip,
however, a powerful African, who speaks no
European language, named Cinque, leads a revolt
against the crew and kills everyone except the captain and first mate. He demands that the Africans
be returned to Africa, but instead the captain sails
to New York. Claiming that the Africans are Cuban slaves rather than Africans, the United States
put them on trial for murder and revolt. The result,
however, was a stunning reversal in European
ideas of slave revolts. Defended by no less than
John Quincy Adams, the court declares the African
revolutionaries to be justified in their murder of the
crew. For the first time, Americans applied to
slaves the same right to revolt as they believed
they had. The southern revolts, from Haiti to
Turner, suddenly shifted in the minds of many
Americans as representing what they really were:
freedom wars. To many Americans, it was becoming increasingly evident that the answer to slavery
in the south had to be violent.