Details

Details of Nat Turner’s Life

• ·         Born in Southampton County, Virginia(property of slave owner Benjamin Turner)
• ·         He was five and a half feet tall, dark complexion, erect and strong in appearance.
• ·         He didn’t smoke or drink. Slaves looked on him with pride
• ·         A slave didn’t have a surname. Usually referred to as their first name by their owners.
• ·         He learned to read quickly, was also deeply religious, and was a powerful preacher.
• ·         Nat knew things that had happened before he was born without being told by the adults.
• ·         People started to say that he would be a prophet when he grew to be an adult. Slaves also believed that he had mysterious powers.
• ·         Nat grew to believe God had placed him on earth for an extraordinary reason.
• ·         Nat then came to believe his purpose was to free the slaves. He started hearing voices and seeing visions.
• ·         He said that warring would happen between races and in late August 1831 it did.
• ·         In his rebellion, he murdered men, women and children.
• ·         They recruited slaves to their cause and carried off guns and ammunition.
• ·         This rebellion went on unchecked for forty-eight hours.
• ·         The group stopped for reinforcements at a nearby plantation which was a grave mistake, because a patrol was waiting for them.
• ·         Turner escaped and waited for his men but they never showed. He headed for the Great Dismal Swamp which extended from near Norfolk, Virginia, into North Carolina and was home to a large colony of fugitives.
• ·         He hid there for weeks, going out only at night to get food and water.
• ·         Meanwhile, whites went out murdering and killing 120 blacks in one day. These were innocent victims who had nothing to do with the revolt.
• ·         The slave owners tried to stop the slaughter of the innocent but nothing could stop the patrol. Slaves were tortured and burned alive.
• ·         Nat Turner hid in several places before he was captured on October 30."The men who tried and hanged him, and then dissected his body, may have done their job of obliteration so well that it will never be possible to put the pieces back together again- neither the pieces of his body nor the pieces of his character and identity."

       - Nat Turner: A Slave Rebellion in History and Memory.