1. SLAVERY REVOLT
Created by Dakota Greenwell 21, Laura Pholsina,
Angelica Jetton
&
Lance Loper

2. THE GABRIEL
PROSSER
Probably the most fateful year in the history of American Negro slave revolts is that of 1800, for it was
then that Nat Turner and John Brown were born, that Denmark Vesey bought his freedom, and it was then
that the great conspiracy named after Gabriel, slave of Tomas H. Prosser of Henrico Country, Virginia,
occurred.
This Gabriel, the chosen leader of the rebellious slaves, was a twenty-four year old giant of six feet two inches,
"a fellow of courage and intellect above his rank in life, who had intended to purchase a piece of silk for a flag,
on which they would have written 'death or liberty.'." Another leader was Jack Bowler, four years older and three
inches taller than Gabriel, who felt that "we had as much right to fight for our liberty as any men." Gabriel's wife,
Nanny, was active, too, as were his brothers, Solomon and Martin. The former conducted the sword making, and
the latter bitterly opposed all suggestion of delaying the outbreak, declaring, "Before he would any longer bear
what he had borne, he would turn out and fight with his stick."
The conspiracy was well-formed by the spring of 1800, and there is a hint that wind of it early reached Governor
Monroe, for in a letter to Thomas Jefferson, dated April 22, he referred to "fears of a negro insurrection." Crude
swords and bayonets as well as about 500 bullets were made by the slaves through the spring, and each Sunday
Gabriel entered Richmond, impressing the city's features upon his mind and paying particular attention to the
location of arms and ammunition.

3. NAT TURNER “THE PROPHET”
OCTOBER 2, 1800 - NOVEMBER
11,1831
Black slave preacher Nat Turner felt that God had called on him to lead his people out of slavery. He was
born on a small plantation in Virginia to an African-born slave mother who taught him to hate slavery. His
master's son taught him to read, and over the years he became fanatically religious and served as preacher
for the slaves in the area. Some of his devoted flock began to call him "the Prophet." A solar eclipse in 1831
was God's sign to Nat Turner that the time had come to strike the blow for freedom.
The biggest slave uprising in U.S. history began on the night of August 21, 1831, when Turner and seven fellow
slaves murdered their master and his family while they slept, and then set out on a campaign of brutal murder
that terrorized the countryside and killed 55 white people. Picking up slave recruits as they traveled from
plantation to plantation, Turner and his followers moved through Southampton County toward the county seat of
Jerusalem, where they planned to capture the armory. Some of the slaves were mounted so that they could chase
down anyone trying to escape as they swept down on a plantation and bludgeoned to death all the white people
they could find- children and women, young and old indiscriminately. For 48 hours, Turner and his undisciplined
followers rampaged and killed until they, themselves, were killed, captured, or dispersed in a confrontation with
armed citizens and the state militia outside Jerusalem. Nat managed to escape and hide out for six weeks before
he was captured. He and 16 of his followers were hanged.

4. SLAVE REVOLT
For over two hundred years, Africans were brought against their will to Britain's American colonies
and to the new United States of America. One historian, Herbert Aptheker, calculated that over two
hundred separate slave revolts took place from the 1600's to the end of the U.S. Civil War in 1865.

5. RESOURCES
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