Dr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
On August 21, 194 years ago in less than a month, Nat Turner led a revolt. Dozens died. But what haunted white Southerners wasn’t the blood—it was the intention. The reading. The prophecy. The belief that enslaved people could think, lead, and judge.
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Image: Emancipation and Freedom monument at Brown’s Island, Richmond, Virginia.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
Some names didn’t fade—they silenced rooms.
Gabriel Prosser. Denmark Vesey. Toussaint.
Men whose rebellions—or plans—traveled farther than they ever did. What they represented terrified the slaveholding South: Black men not just rising, but imagining freedom.
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Image: A posthumous portrait of François-Dominique Toussaint Louverture, Oil on Canvas, Alexandre-François-Louis, comte de Girardin, ca. 1813.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
By the 1830s, the fear had settled into the culture like humidity. Everyone knew the names.
No need for explanation.
Until August 1831—when the fear took on a new name. Turner. Nat Turner.
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Image: “Cruelties of slavery.” The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1835-05.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
In Southampton County, Virginia, Turner led a small band of enslaved men.
They moved deliberately—farm to farm, cabin to cabin—killing over 50 white people.
Men. Women. Children. Infants.
It wasn’t random. It was judgment.
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Image: This woodcut, published in 1831 with, a story about the Southampton Rebellion, titled "Horrific Massacre.”
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
There had been others:
—Gabriel, in Richmond, 1800.
—Vesey, in Charleston, 1822.
—Toussaint, in Haiti, whose uprising shattered colonial pride.
Turner was not the first.
But he was the first to speak prophecy aloud.
5/19
Image: Denmark Vesey Monument in Hampton Park, Charleston, South Carolina.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
After his capture, Turner told the lawyer Thomas Gray:
“I do not recall learning the alphabet, but I acquired the art of reading with the most perfect ease.”
He had read the Bible.
He had read prophecy.
And he had acted on it.
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Image: Discovery of Nat Turner: wood engraving illustrating Benjamin Phipps's 1882 capture of Nat Turner on October 30, 1831.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
That, to white slaveholders, was the true terror:
Not that slaves might act violently—
But that they might act intentionally.
That they might read. Interpret. Lead.
Ordained by no master but God.
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Image: Account of the rebellion in the Washington Daily Intelligencer,
November 7, 1831.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
The retaliation was swift—and brutal.
In one town, a man named Albert Waller was shot and hanged. He’d never met Turner.
In another, 15 Black men’s heads were mounted on poles and left to rot.
This was not justice. It was message-sending.
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Images: Front cover of the first person account of the rebellion given by Nat Turner, taken down by attorney Thomas Gray (pictured below).
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
White mobs moved from town to town.
They didn’t ask questions. They didn’t seek Turner. They killed. Men. Women. Children. Over 200 Black people died—many who had never heard Turner’s name.
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Image: Memorial plaques commemorating Gabriel Prosser’s planned rebellion in 1800.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
The courts followed fast. Trials were held. Sentences passed. But law was not the point.
The system was. And the system had been challenged. The arithmetic was clear:
60 whites dead in the uprising.
Over 200 Black lives taken in response.
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Image: Title page William Sidney Drewry, The Southampton Insurrection: Nat Turner’s Rebellion, 1900.
Source: https://dn720101.ca.archive.org/0/items/southamptoninsur00drew/southamptoninsur00drew.pdf
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth Glassco
This was Southern law’s true formula:
For every act of resistance, a punishment—not equal, but overwhelming. Terror was not the consequence. Terror was the policy.
11/19
Image: Historical Marker U-115 (Buckhorn Quarters) was made into a highway marker in 1930, while U-122 (Nat Turner's Rebellion) was made into a highway marker in 1991. Both portray the rebellion as tragic rather than as an act of self-liberation.
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Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
Even after the killings ended, fear remained.
Not because Turner lived. But because his name did. It lingered—in silence, in sermons, in the laws that followed: Laws against reading. Preaching.
Gathering. Laws written in fear.
12/19
Video: The Birth of a Nation trailer, film, defection of Nat Turner’s rebellion, 2015, search Searchlight Pictures.
https://youtu.be/ezWiUTXB11A
THE BIRTH OF A NATION: Official HD Teaser Trailer | Watch it Now on Digital HD | FOX Searchlight

YouTube
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
In the white Southern mind, the rebellion had proved a terrible thesis: That Black freedom would not build—it would destroy.
So slavery, however brutal, was declared necessary.
Safety required dominance. Order required blood.
13/19
Image: Cover of William Styron’s influential but fictional version of Turner’s story.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25
But others read the meaning differently.
It was not savagery—it was desperation.
Turner’s rebellion was proof not of Black violence, but of how far a people must be pushed…
to be heard. To imagine freedom—and fight for it.
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Image: It is thought that Nat Turner was holding this Bible when he was captured two months after the rebellion he led against slaveholders in Southampton County, Virginia. Michael R. Barnes, SI, Gift of Maurice A. Person and Noah and Brooke Porter.
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25

Primary Sources

Gray, Thomas R. The Confessions of Nat Turner, the Leader of the Late Insurrection in Southampton, VA. Baltimore: T. R. Gray, 1831. Reprinted in various editions; digital facsimile available at Documenting the American South. https://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/turner/menu.html.

Virginia General Assembly. Documents Relating to the Southampton Insurrection. Richmond: Virginia State Library, 1831–1832.
Source: https://www.loc.gov/item/00001930/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

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Nat Turner, 1800?-1831 The Confessions of Nat Turner, the Leader of the Late Insurrection in Southampton, Va.

The Confessions of Nat Turner, the Leader of the Late Insurrection in Southampton, Va. by Nat Turner, 1800?-1831

Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25

Primary Sources Cont.

“Rebellion in Southampton.” Richmond Enquirer, August–September 1831. See also Norfolk Herald and Petersburg Intelligencer for contemporary newspaper coverage.
Source: https://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?psid=357&smtID=3&utm_source=chatgpt.com

Secondary Sources

Aptheker, Herbert. Nat Turner’s Slave Rebellion: Together with the Full Text of the So-Called “Confessions” of Nat Turner. New York: International Publishers, 1937.
Source: https://archive.org/details/natturnersslaver0000herb?utm_source=chatgpt.com
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Digital History

Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25

More Secondary Sources

Breen, Patrick H. The Land Shall Be Deluged in Blood: A New History of the Nat Turner Revolt. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015.

French, Scot. The Rebellious Slave: Nat Turner in American Memory. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2004.
Source: https://archive.org/details/rebelliousslaven00fren_0?utm_source=chatgpt.com

Greenberg, Kenneth S., ed. Nat Turner: A Slave Rebellion in History and Memory. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Source: https://archive.org/details/natturnerslavere0000unse?utm_source=chatgpt.com
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The rebellious slave : Nat Turner in American memory : French, Scot : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

x, 379 p. ; 24 cm

Internet Archive
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25

Still More Secondary Sources

Greenberg, Kenneth, ed. The Confessions of Nat Turner and Related Documents. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1996. Source: https://archive.org/details/confessionsofnat00gree?utm_source=chatgpt.com

Oates, Stephen B. The Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner’s Fierce Rebellion. New York: Harper & Row, 1975. Source: https://archive.org/details/firesofjubileena0000oate?utm_source=chatgpt.com

Styron, William. The Confessions of Nat Turner: A Novel. New York: Random House, 1967.
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The confessions of Nat Turner and related documents : Greenberg, Kenneth S : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Includes bibliographical references and index

Internet Archive
Show threadDr. D. Elisabeth GlasscoJul 25

Final Secondary Sources

Clarke, John Henrik, ed. William Styron’s Nat Turner: Ten Black Writers Respond. New York: Random House, 1968. Source: https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.148990?utm_source=chatgpt.com

William Sidney Drewry, The Southampton Insurrection: Nat Turner’s Rebellion (Washington, DC: The Neale Company, 1900), PDF, Internet Archive, https://dn720101.ca.archive.org/0/items/southamptoninsur00drew/southamptoninsur00drew.pd

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The Confessions Of Nat Turner : Styron, William : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Book Source: Digital Library of India Item 2015.148990dc.contributor.author: Styron, Williamdc.date.accessioned: 2015-07-06T13:52:21Zdc.date.available:...

Internet Archive
Show threadLooking for explanations…Jul 26

@Deglassco

Would love some alt text. When I enlarged the photos, they weren’t clear enough to read.