Nat Turner by Jaxon Grey Did you know there were 4 million slaves leading up to the Civil WarNat Turner had a rough childhood. Nat Turner was born a slave because his mom was a slave. Nat Turner's dad left right after he was born so he had a rough childhood with only his mom. Nat Turner had to work around the house and cook dinner because his mom was a slave 13 miles away. Nat Turner had to start doing slave work when he learned how to walk and communicate.
In Document C, it states, “The patriotic Nathaniel Turner was driven to desperation by the wrong and injustice of slavery.” Turner rebelled against slavery with violence because he believed that it was the only
Furthermore, his confession may not tell the whole truth. Nat was interviewed by attorney Thomas Ruffin Gray on November 1st, 1831 and continued his conversation throughout the next two days. When the interview was finally over, it took Gray 5 days to officially print the manuscript. The credibility of these transcripts is questionable due to the difficulty and longevity to officially print copies of what this “monster” apparently confessed. “But like all documents generated in the course of master-class investigations of slave revolts, alleged or actual, The Confessions of Nat Turner raises obvious evidentiary quandaries: credibility, reliability, authenticity”(Tomlins, 3).
The Fires of Nat Turner In the book The fires of Jubilee, we notice and go through a lot of Nat Turners violent “rebellion” as a former slave in order to get back at what they have gone through. Nat turner takes a complete different approach than what we saw with our letter from Hammond. Nat Turner with the help of a few other former slaves, have created the highest fatalities during his “rebel” from any slave up rise ever recorded. The book was written from a man who has caught his first ever taste of what freedom was like, which is what initially fueled his need for the rebellion.
Nat Turner and a group of armed slaves led an uprising against white slave owners in Southampton County, Virginia. He and his group killed 55 white men, women, and children. Nat Turner hid for 70 days, he was captured and jailed. At trial, he was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. He was eventually hung.
“The Confessions of Nat Turner” was written by William Styron in 1967. It recounts the events that lead up to Nat Turner’s failed slave rebellion in 1831. The book technically is not considered non-fiction. Since Nat Turner was a slave, a good amount of his life went undocumented. Because of this, William Styron has to fill in some of the holes in Nat’s confession.
The banned book that I chose to read for this quarter was “The Confessions of Nat Turner” by William Styron. The book is loosely based upon the slave rebellion that Nat Turner led in Southampton County, Virginia from August 21-23, 1831. The book starts with Nat Turner waiting for his trial for the rebellion, and then proceeds to look back on his life and then tell the novels through a series of flashbacks. The flashbacks start with his first slave master, Samuel Turner, and end with him leading the slave rebellion. The book has also come under quite a bit of criticism however.
Turner's corpse was flayed, beheaded, and quartered. Antebellum slave-holding whites were shocked by the murders and had their fears of rebellions heightened; Turner's name became “a symbol of terrorism and violent
Despite the positive connotation of Turner and his spanatic decision making in the beginning, Gladwell gradually uses a change of diction to change his connotation to be a negative one. Gladwell changes his description of Turner from, “ He was Captain Courageous, the man with nerves of steel…” (Gladwell 16) to, “It’s because Turner is a cold blooded- bargainer who could find a million dollars in someone’s back pocket that the person didn’t even know he had.’ (Gladwell 63-4)
By force, his name has been recorded on the list of dishonor, but future generations will remember him among the noble and brave.” In Garnet's speech, he passionately urges enslaved individuals to choose death over continued enslavement, emphasizing the necessity of sacrificing for freedom. Garnet's words resonate with the sentiments of desperation felt by many enslaved people, including Nat Turner, who took extreme measures to resist the injustices of slavery. Turner's violent rebellion can also be interpreted as a heroic act of defiance against a dehumanizing system. While his actions resulted in bloodshed, they were driven by a desire for justice and a message to others.
Nat Turner was born unto slavery and raised on the Turner family plantation on October 2nd, 1800. Growing up, Turner practiced great manners and was well educated for his times. He was raised by two very religious parents who later believed that he was sent from heaven to do work for God on the land. His parents believed he was a prophet from God due to him having distinct markings on his head and chest, along with the fact that had visions. In 1821 Turner ran away from his plantation but only remained a fugitive for a brief period, he once returned due to having another vision.
This primary source is a text that came into fruition after Nat Turner was captured in 1831 in the Southampton county jail. This was where he was interviewed by a physician named Thomas R. Gray. Nat Turner led the only effective sustained slave rebellion in U.S History, setting terror throughout the white south Gray, in his foreword to Turner's Confessions, even states that "never did a band of savages do their work of death more sparingly," leading his revelation that such, in his opinion, mentally embryonic people could devise such a plot. In addition, description of the slaves as savages" further connects Native Americans and slaves. Secondary source: abolition.nypl.org
In said narrative he spoke deeply about the horrors he faced as a black slave, unfolded & told numerous accounts of what he lived. He described being equal or being categorized as a farm animal, cleaving apart any humanity left in them in a sacrilege way, being treated with execration & imprudence. Furthermore, Frederick
Mr. Shelby’s definition of "humane" in his treatment of slaves is completely different from Haley’s. " Lor bless ye, yes! These critters ain't like white folks, you know; they gets over things, only manage right." (Stowe 5).
Twain portrays Nat, a slave at the Phelps house, as most southerners believed all slaves to be; plain-spoken, superstitious, and ignorant. If Twain was as progressive as he claimed to be, he would portray slaves in a different light, one where they aren't superstitious or completely uneducated. There were many slaves that would secretly learn to read and write, or in rare cases, their masters would teach them. It isn’t only one slave that Twain writes this way.
