Nat Turner was born on October 2, 1800 into slavery in Southampton, Virginia, about twenty miles from the North Carolina border. (9.1 Nat Turner's Rebellion. (n.d.). His mother name was Nancy, but nothing is known about his father except that his father escaped slavery and returned back to Liberia. After Nat Turner experienced separation from his father at a young age, he was raised by his mother and paternal grandmother and took the last name of his owner, which was common during those times when owners had slaves as property. Nat Turner was a very intelligent child who learned to read and write at an early age and he had a strong faith in Christianity, which was, install in him by his grandmother.( 9.1 Nat Turner's Rebellion. (n.d.). …show more content…
Turner’s experience was typical of slaves on southern plantations. (9.1 Nat Turner's Rebellion. (n.d.). He had little freedom; he could not legally marry, travel without his master’s permission, own property, or earn money. . (9.1 Nat Turner's Rebellion. (n.d.). He was forced to work long, hard hours in the fields for meager rations of food and clothing, and if he refused, he faced the whip or other punishment. . (9.1 Nat Turner's Rebellion. (n.d.). Like slaves during that time, Turner was sold several times to different masters. . (9.1 Nat Turner's Rebellion. (n.d.). Each time, he was forced to leave family and friends and move to a different plantation. It was this brutal, demeaning, system of slavery that Nat Turner sought to overthrow. He sought not only his own freedom, but to dismantle the entire system of slavery and liberate African Americans from white tyranny. . (9.1 Nat Turner's …show more content…
They planned a total annihilation of all slave owners and their families. Nat Turner’s revolt involved at least 70 slaves. The attack started with only a half dozen slaves, however within 24 hrs it had grown to a full-scale slave rebellion. He murdered Travis and his family then set forth on a bloody march toward Jerusalem. . In two days and nights about 60 white people were ruthlessly slain.( Nat Turner | American slave and bondsman. (n.d.). Doomed from the start, Turner’s insurrection was handicapped by lack of discipline among his followers and by the fact that only 75 blacks rallied to his cause. Armed resistance from the local whites and the arrival of the state militia a total force of 3,000 men provided the final crushing blow. Only a few miles from the county seat the insurgents were dispersed and either killed or captured, and many innocent slaves were massacred in the hysteria that followed. (9.1 Nat Turner's Rebellion.