AFTERMATH |
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As it was published: The Confessions was a hit with the public and had to be reprinted because of demand for its gory details. Nat Turner's lawyer published it, claiming it was his full testimony
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Contemporary depiction: This was how a woodcut of the time depicted the Turner rebellion, saying that it portrayed (left) a mother pleading for her children's lives, a Mr. Travis being murdered (center) and (right) Mr. Harrow, who defended himself while his wife escaped
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Nat Turner preaches religion. Image Credit: The Granger Collection, New York
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AFTERMATHAftermath
The rebellion was quashed within two days. In the aftermath of the revolt, officials tried forty-eight black men and women on charges of conspiracy, insurrection, and treason. In total, the state executed 56 people, banished many more, and acquitted. The state reimbursed the slaveholders for their slaves. But in the hysterical climate that followed the rebellion, close to 200 black people were killed by white militias and mobs. Turner eluded capture for two months but remained in Southampton County. On October 30, a white farmer named Benjamin Phipps discovered him in a hole covered with fence rails. A trial was quickly arranged; On November 5, 1831, Nat Turner was tried for "conspiring to rebel and making insurrection", convicted, and sentenced to death. When asked if he regretted what he had done, Turner responded, "Was Christ not crucified?" He was hanged on November 11 in Jerusalem, Virginia. Turner's corpse was flayed, beheaded and quartered. After Turner's capture, a local lawyer, Thomas Ruffin Gray, wrote and published The Confessions of Nat Turner: The Leader of the Late Insurrection in Southampton, Virginia. The book was the result both of Gray's research while Turner was in hiding and of his conversations with Turner before the trial. This document remains the primary window into Turner's mind. Because of the author's obvious conflict of interest as the attorney for other accused participants, historians disagree on how to assess it as insight into Turner. In 1967, William Styron drew from Gray's work in writing his novel, The Confessions of Nat Turner, for which he won the Pulitzer Prize. The Legal Response In the aftermath of the Nat Turner Slave Rebellion, dozens of suspected rebels were tried in courts called specifically for the purposes of hearing the cases against the slaves. Most of the trials took place in Southampton, but some were held in neighboring Sussex County, as well as a few in other counties. Most slaves were found guilty, many were then executed. Some of those found guilty were transported outside the state but not executed. Fifteen of the slaves tried in Southampton were acquitted. Moreover, some owners of slaves who were killed during the rebellion or its immediate aftermath sought compensation from the legislature; all their petitions were rejected. The following spring in Richmond, the Virginia General Assembly debated the future of slavery in the state. While some urged gradual emancipation, the pro-slavery side prevailed. The General Assembly passed legislation making it unlawful to teach slaves, free blacks, or mulattoes to read or write, and restricting all blacks from holding religious meetings without the presence of a licensed white minister. Other slave-holding states across the South enacted similar laws restricting activities of slaves and free blacks. Some free blacks chose to move their families north to obtain educations for their children. Some white people, such as teachers Thomas J. Jackson (later known as "Stonewall Jackson") and Mary Smith Peake, violated the laws and taught slaves to read. Overall, the laws enacted in the aftermath of the Turner Rebellion enforced widespread illiteracy among slaves. As a result, most newly freed slaves and many free blacks in the South were illiterate at the time of the end of the American Civil War. Freedmen and Northerners considered the issue of education and helping former slaves gain literacy as one of the most critical in the postwar South. Consequently, many northern religious organizations, former Union Army officers and soldiers, and wealthy philanthropists were inspired to create and fund educational efforts specifically for the betterment of African Americans in the South. Although Reconstruction legislatures passed authorization to establish public education for the first time in the South, a system of legal racial segregation was later imposed under Jim Crow Laws, and black schools were historically underfunded by southern states. |