Nat Turner

In the late summer of 1831, in a remote section of southeastern Virginia, there took place the only effective, sustained revolt in the annals of American Negro slavery ... The revolt was led by a remarkable preacher named Nat Turner, an educated slave who felt himself divinely ordained to carry out the deed that haunts our conscience and flashes across our present like a blaze of summer lightning.

"A companion to the PBS documentary Nat Turner: A Troublesome Property"--Cover.

Originally published as William Styron's Nat Turner. These essays address the misrepresentation of Turner's life and activities by white writers. The contributors include Lerone Bennett Jr., John O. Killens, Alvin Poussaint, and John A. Williams

Nathaniel “Nat” Turner was a black slave who led a rebellion in the American South in the summer of 1831. A charismatic leader, Turner gathered about 75 slaves to his cause. By the time the insurrection was suppressed, more than 100 were dead, and Turner was hanged. In the aftermath, laws were passed to prevent the education of slaves and a deeper schism opened between abolitionists and slaveholders. The rebellion was truly a harbinger of the bloody events to come. This significant story of pre-Civil War America is the focus of this comprehensive volume, a valuable support for social studies curricula.

Nat Turner, an enslaved black man, believed he was chosen by God to battle against the evils of slavery. Driven by visions, Turner banded with six others, and on August 22, 1831, his rebellion began with attacks at plantations in Southampton, Virginia. As he and his group moved from plantation to plantation, dozens of enslaved men joined them. Finally, the local militia put an end to their movement, arresting and hanging many of the men involved. Nat Turner's rebellion deepened the divide between Americans who wanted to abolish slavery and those who wanted to protect it, setting the groundwork for the American Civil War.

First full-length study of the bloodiest slave uprising in U.S. history explores the nature of Southern society in the early 19th century and the conditions that led to the rebellion. The inspiration for the acclaimed 2016 movie Birth of a Nation.

In graphic novel format, this book tells the true story of the 1831 Virginia slave rebellion led by slave Nat Turner, who believed he was a prophet.

A bold new interpretation of Nat Turner and the slave rebellion that stunned the American South In 1831 Virginia, Nat Turner led a band of Southampton County slaves in a rebellion that killed fifty-five whites, mostly women and children. After more than two months in hiding, Turner was captured, and quickly convicted and executed. In the Matter of Nat Turner penetrates the historical caricature of Turner as befuddled mystic and self-styled Baptist preacher to recover the haunting persona of this legendary American slave rebel, telling of his self-discovery and the dawning of his Christian faith, of an impossible task given to him by God, and of redemptive violence and profane retribution. Much about Turner remains unknown. His extraordinary account of his life and rebellion, given in chains as he awaited trial in jail, was written down by an opportunistic white attorney and sold as a pamphlet to cash in on Turner’s notoriety. But the enigmatic rebel leader had an immediate and broad impact on the American South, and his rebellion remains one of the most momentous episodes in American history. Christopher Tomlins provides a luminous account of Turner's intellectual development, religious cosmology, and motivations, and offers an original and incisive analysis of the Turner Rebellion itself and its impact on Virginia politics. Tomlins also undertakes a deeply critical examination of William Styron’s 1967 novel, The Confessions of Nat Turner, which restored Turner to the American consciousness in the era of civil rights, black power, and urban riots. A speculative history that recovers Turner from the few shards of evidence we have about his life, In the Matter of Nat Turner is also a unique speculation about the meaning and uses of history itself.

In August 1831, in Southampton County, Virginia, Nat Turner led a bloody uprising that took the lives of some fifty-five white people—men, women, and children—shocking the South. Nearly as many black people, all told, perished in the rebellion and its aftermath. Nat Turner and the Rising in Southampton County presents important new evidence about the violence and the community in which it took place, shedding light on the insurgents and victims and reinterpreting the most important account of that event, The Confessions of Nat Turner. Drawing upon largely untapped sources, David F. Allmendinger Jr. reconstructs the lives of key individuals who were drawn into the uprising and shows how the history of certain white families and their slaves—reaching back into the eighteenth century—shaped the course of the rebellion. Never before has anyone so patiently examined the extensive private and public sources relating to Southampton as does Allmendinger in this remarkable work. He argues that the plan of rebellion originated in the mind of a single individual, Nat Turner, who concluded between 1822 and 1826 that his own masters intended to continue holding slaves into the next generation. Turner specifically chose to attack households to which he and his followers had connections. The book also offers a close analysis of his Confessions and the influence of Thomas R. Gray, who wrote down the original text in November 1831. Allmendinger draws new conclusions about Turner and Gray, their different motives, the authenticity of the confession, and the introduction of terror as a tactic, both in the rebellion and in its most revealing document. Students of slavery, the Old South, and African American history will find in Nat Turner and the Rising in Southampton County an outstanding example of painstaking research and imaginative family and community history. "The exhaustive research Allmendinger presents greatly enriches our historical understanding of the Southampton Rebellion through the eyes of its key victims. Nat Turner and the Rising in Southampton County reveals important dimensions of the rebellion's local history and contextualizes the event, as Nat Turner did, within the context of slavery in Southampton County."—Reviews in History "Allmendinger’s great achievement is that he made full use of ‘new’ primary sources related to the uprising of 1831—new sources hitherto hidden in plain sight. Most importantly, he understood the significance of this material and knew exactly how to mine it for valuable new insights into virtually every aspect of Nat Turner’s rebellion."—Reviews in American History "No one has done more to corroborate and sync the details, nor to illuminate Turner’s inspirations and goals. Nat Turner and the Rising in Southampton County is a model of historical methodology, and goes further than any other previous work in helping readers understand Turner’s motives and meaning."—African American Intellectual History Society "We are all in David Allmendinger's debt for the labor of research that has given The Rising in Southampton County its absent material context."—Law and History Review "Though the subject of countless histories, novels, videos, and websites, Nat Turner, the leader of the largest slave insurrection in U.S. history, remains an enigma; yet, in this new and challenging study, the life and times of the legendary revolutionary come into much better focus. A must-read for historians of slave resistance and all others interested in the history of antebellum Virginia and in particular Southampton County."—Register of the Kentucky Historical Society "Allmendinger approaches a well-trodden historical event from a distinctive perspective. [He] provides the most complete historical context surrounding the rebellion. Ultimately, Allmendinger succeeds in providing a more complete understanding of the community of Southampton, Virginia, and offers a better explanation for the motivations that led Turner and his followers down such a bloody path in 1831."—Choice David F. Allmendinger Jr. is professor emeritus of history at the University of Delaware. He is the author of Paupers and Scholars: The Transformation of Student Life in Nineteenth-Century New England and Ruffin: Family and Reform in the Old South.

Presents a biography of the slave and preacher who, believing that God wanted him to free the slaves, led a major revolt in 1831.

Biography of the slave and preacher who, believing that God wanted him to free the slaves, led a major revolt in 1831.

In this first single-authored history of Virginia since the 1970s, Peter Wallenstein traces major themes across four centuries in a brisk narrative that recalls the people and events that have shaped the Old Dominion.

The “magnificent” Pulitzer Prize–winning and #1 New York Times–bestselling novel about the preacher who led America’s bloodiest slave revolt (The New York Times). The Confessions of Nat Turner is William Styron’s complex and richly drawn imagining of Nat Turner, the leader of the 1831 slave rebellion in Virginia that led to the deaths of almost sixty men, women, and children. Published at the height of the civil rights movement, the novel draws upon the historical Nat Turner’s confession to his attorney, made as he awaited execution in a Virginia jail. This powerful narrative, steeped in the brutal and tragic history of American slavery, reveals a Turner who is neither a hero nor a demon, but rather a man driven to exact vengeance for the centuries of injustice inflicted upon his people. Nat Turner is a galvanizing portrayal of the crushing institution of slavery, and Styron’s deeply layered characterization is a stunning rendering of one man’s violent struggle against oppression. This ebook features a new illustrated biography of William Styron, including original letters, rare photos, and never-before-seen documents from the Styron family and the Duke University Archives.

DigiCat Publishing presents to you this special edition of "The Confessions of Nat Turner" by Nat Turner. DigiCat Publishing considers every written word to be a legacy of humankind. Every DigiCat book has been carefully reproduced for republishing in a new modern format. The books are available in print, as well as ebooks. DigiCat hopes you will treat this work with the acknowledgment and passion it deserves as a classic of world literature.