Denmark Vesey
Insurrection and Hope
Donald Scazafave
Montclair State University
December 7, 2012
Throughout the South both upper and lower slavery was a common practice and a huge source of what drove the economy. Slaves where the building blocks of many Southern states and had a direct correlation between slave production and state production. They where intermingled at such a high level that many people even if they felt slavery was immoral knew it was necessary in order to make their states run properly. Owners of slaves needed these African Americans in order to work their fields and work in their homes because that is the way things where run in the U.S. during the Antebellum era. Slaves where seen as inhuman, not fit to share the same lifestyle as their white masters. They did not belong in the same light as a white person. Many people in the South believed that these African Americans where put on this earth to be slaves and nothing more. They should not be able to live freely with their families because to white southerners they where nothing but a second-class citizen if that.
Slaves where treated with little respect in most cases and would be punished sometimes severely other times minimally depending on the offense. Many slaves were content with what they had been given that their lives were going to be as slaves and nothing more. While this was the case their was many slaves that knew what was being done to them was extremely wrong and that they should not stand by idle, while these immoralities continued. Many slaves wanted to be freed and they thought through rebellions and insurrections this could be achieved. This idea of a rebellion was a good one. America was build through the revolution a rebellion of sorts so it could be done. America got its freedom from England, so in turn slaves should be able to rise up and earn their freedom. Throughout slavery in the U.S. rebellions did occur but none as famous or infamous as the ones of Nat Turner and Denmark
Donald Scazafave
Montclair State University
December 7, 2012
Throughout the South both upper and lower slavery was a common practice and a huge source of what drove the economy. Slaves where the building blocks of many Southern states and had a direct correlation between slave production and state production. They where intermingled at such a high level that many people even if they felt slavery was immoral knew it was necessary in order to make their states run properly. Owners of slaves needed these African Americans in order to work their fields and work in their homes because that is the way things where run in the U.S. during the Antebellum era. Slaves where seen as inhuman, not fit to share the same lifestyle as their white masters. They did not belong in the same light as a white person. Many people in the South believed that these African Americans where put on this earth to be slaves and nothing more. They should not be able to live freely with their families because to white southerners they where nothing but a second-class citizen if that.
Slaves where treated with little respect in most cases and would be punished sometimes severely other times minimally depending on the offense. Many slaves were content with what they had been given that their lives were going to be as slaves and nothing more. While this was the case their was many slaves that knew what was being done to them was extremely wrong and that they should not stand by idle, while these immoralities continued. Many slaves wanted to be freed and they thought through rebellions and insurrections this could be achieved. This idea of a rebellion was a good one. America was build through the revolution a rebellion of sorts so it could be done. America got its freedom from England, so in turn slaves should be able to rise up and earn their freedom. Throughout slavery in the U.S. rebellions did occur but none as famous or infamous as the ones of Nat Turner and Denmark
Bibliography: Crowell, John W. “The Aftermath of Nat Turner’s Insurrection.” The Journal of Negro History, Vol. 5, No. 2 (Apr., 1920), pp. 208-234 Ford, Lacy Hamilton, James. “Negro Plot: An Account of the Late Intended Insurrection among a Portion of the Blacks of the City of Charleston, South Carolina.” 2nd Edition, 1822.1-50. Higginson, Thomas W Johnson, Michael P. “Denmark Vesey and His Co-Conspirators.” The William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, Vol. 58, No. 4 (Oct., 2001), pp. 915-976 Lofton, John M “Slave Insurrections in the US.” Western Reserve Chronicle. December 14, 1859. http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov “Virginia Opinion Twenty- Eight Years Since.” Fremont Journal Worden, O.N. “Southampton Massacre.” Union County Star and Lewisburg Chronicle, November 4, 1859. http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov. [ 4 ]. Ford, Lacy. Deliver Us from Evil: The Slavery Question in the Old South. NY: Oxford University Press Inc., 2011. [ 5 ]. Hamilton, James. “Negro Plot: An Account of the Late Intended Insurrection among a Portion of the Blacks of the City of Charleston, South Carolina.” 2nd Edition, 1822.1-50. [ 16 ]. Worden, O.N. “Southampton Massacre.” Union County Star and Lewisburg Chronicle, November 4, 1859. http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov [ 17 ]