Gabriel’s Rebellion:  The Virginia Slave Conspiracies of 1800 and 1802.  By Douglas R. Egerton.  Chapel Hill:  University of North Carolina Press, 1993.

In Gabriel’s Rebellion, Egerton tells of two separate slave rebellion attempts. The white slave masters found out about the plots from turncoat slaves who betrayed the rebels. The author details the attempt to revolt in 1800 by Gabriel, a literate slave blacksmith of Henrico County, and the 1802 plot led by a slave ferryman of Amelia County named Sancho. 

On August 30, 1800, Gabriel led several hundred other slaves on a march in Richmond. The plan hinged on the idea of capturing James Monroe, the Governor of Virginia, and obtaining their freedom. The rebellion was foiled on the day of the planned revolt by two reluctant slaves who reported it to the white authorities. On the day of the planned rebellion, bad weather disrupted coordination of the slaves, foiling the insurrection and leading to their capture.  The subsequent trial ended with the execution of twenty-seven rebelling slaves. One year later, Sancho devised his own plan to rise up against the slave masters.  In this later conspiracy, Sancho attempted to coordinate the slaves in several counties, which led to stirrings in the slave community and subsequently alerted the white authorities.

Egerton puts forth the idea that these slave insurrections are actually revolutions, which never came to fruition.  As he writes argues, the main characters involved wanted not only revenge against their owners and crooked merchants, but also wanted to be treated as equals.  With the advent of refugee owners and slaves from Haiti, and with the encouragement of Republican rhetoric, many blacks thought that the opportunity to gain their freedom lay within their grasp.  The author writes that both Gabriel and Sancho believed that when the slaves revolted, whites would come to their assistance.  Gabriel thought his rebellion would “spark a class struggle that had a recognized purpose and might force specific concessions from the state authorities” (p. 49). 

The author provides an in-depth analysis of how the two rebel leaders planned and equipped themselves for the revolt.  He also debunks the myth surrounding Gabriel as a religious fanatic. Egerton reveals to the reader how the American Revolution helped sow the seeds for the rebellion by exposing the slave/owner culture to Republican ideals.  He also notes that both rebellions ended dismally; they nearly led to the total emancipation of the slaves but instead led to the reinstatement of strict control over them. 

Douglas Egerton gives an extensively researched scholarly work on how the two different slave revolts developed and how the culture of Virginia reacted.  His efforts, however, fail to provide any evidence for the motivation he relates for the main characters.

Despite these detractions, the author does give an excellent overview of eighteenth-century Virginia and how the revolts led to slave owners’ worst nightmare coming true.  He also gives a reasonable argument for the Marxist line of thought in regards to how the merchant and upper class focused on money, while the “working-class subculture” viewed the skilled slaves as equals.  This scholarly work thus provides to the reader an excellent understanding of how and why the slave rebellions of 1800 and 1802 developed.

Thomas Walker

Egerton offers a revisionist interpretation of Gabriel’s Rebellion, which he considers unique in southern history. Within the context of this revolt, and the Easter Plot of 1802, he presents a powerful synthesis of what he calls “artisan republicanism” and black revolutionary activity in Virginia that suggests a union between the political hopes of white and black skilled labor during the early period of the Republic.

This “artisan republicanism” rose from the ashes of black insurrections during the American Revolution in Virginia. Black responses to Lord Dunmore’s proclamation of 1776 revealed deepening demands for liberty. Although slavery survived postwar abolitionism, its existence was insecure. Economic change mixed with post-war egalitarianism, flavored by evangelical religion, prompted slave owners to award emancipation to over ten thousand black Virginians after 1782. When a fearful Virginia quickly tabled St. George Tucker’s 1796 plan for gradual abolition, and moved to curtail the number of free blacks, literate black artisans like Gabriel turned to their only alternative–a radical attempt to change the system through violence.

Egerton divides his book into two general sections. “Part One: Richmond 1800” consists of seven chapters. In the first three, Egerton includes information of the post-revolutionary era. He gives a brief account of Virginia’s slave system at the end of the eighteenth century to introduce Gabriel, a skilled blacksmith who worked both on and off the plantation. In the next four chapters, he recounts the development of the plot, its collapse, the arrests and trials of its leaders and the executions of twenty-seven of their number. The remaining chapters, entitled “Part Two: Halifax 1802,” deal with the Easter Plot of 1802 and the immediate and long-term effects of the two conspiracies.

The author considers Gabriel’s rebellion in an urban context. Gabriel was influenced by the ideology of the skilled craftsmen of the city, and saw an opportunity for blacks to gain their freedom in the politics of class and the divisive nature of the election of 1800. Completely misunderstanding the mentality of whites, Gabriel assumed that his rebellion would unite skilled workers regardless of color. Equally, he was unable to gain the support of slaves in rural areas. In the second part of his book, Egerton ties Gabriel’s conspiracy with another two years later. Sancho, a slave involved in Gabriel’s conspiracy, escaped capture and execution. In 1802 he led the Easter Plot that failed and was also brutally suppressed. One of the most fascinating aspects of Egerton’s analysis of this event is the involvement of the “watermen” of the Chesapeake. These men lived in a mobile maritime world populated by both slaves and free blacks who monopolized maritime operations in the Virginia-Maryland area.

Egerton’s minutely detailed reconstruction of both plots brings clearly to focus how little we know about slave plots in the early nineteenth century. He concludes that “Gabriel’s conspiracy was completely urban, the only plot of its kind in southern history.” (59) Gabriel “dreamed of overturning the central class relationship in his society, but not the society itself.” (30) Egerton asserts that the goal of the conspirators was “to destroy the hegemony of the ‘merchants’,” who he insists were the only group of whites that Gabriel considered his enemies. (x)

Egerton’s research is most impressive. His use of Virginia court records is exhaustive, and his exceptional narrative style makes this an excellent book for general consumption as well as scholarship.

Ed Townes

Gabriel’s Rebellion:  The Virginia Slave Conspiracies of 1800 and 1802.  By Douglas R. Egerton.  (Chapel Hill, NC:  University of North Carolina Press.  c.1993.  Pp. ix,262.  ISBN 0-8078-2113-6)

 In Gabriel’s Rebellion: The Virginia Slave Conspiracies of 1800 and 1802, Douglas Egerton recounts two tentatively joined slave revolution plots. The authorities discovered and crushed both plots before they produced any violence. The author divided the work into two parts. The first part tells of the Gabriel rebellion and its aftermath. The second part tells of the Sancho or Easter rebellion and includes less about the plot and more about the debate these two thwarted rebellions initiated in the Virginia legislature. The author derived his primary sources from newspapers and from the court records of the subsequent trials of the conspirators. The author utilized extensive endnotes and provided three appendices concerning some historiographical questions.

 The initial chapter describes the historical context of tidewater Virginia as it left the 18th century and entered the 19th century.  Egerton notes several socio-ideological concepts, which the author claims influenced slaves and black men in the area.  First, the rhetoric of the American War for Independence seeped into the consciousness of slaves and freedmen alike.  The flocking of many slaves to the British flag also caused concern for slaveholders. The Great Awakening produced long term affects by creating several different churches and their continued growth after the American War for Independence included a growth in anti-slavery rhetoric. The end of the 18th century also brought, according to the author, an increasing need to assuage the guilt of the slave owner. This guilt over slavery caused a loosening of the strict social controls on slaves and freedmen. The author notes that the increased egalitarian rhetoric and limited reforms fell short of emancipation and forced slaves to “take matters into their own hands.” (15)

 As with most slaves, little is known of the slave Gabriel and his youth. Someone taught him to read and he supposedly learned the skill of his father, blacksmithy. He was tall and strong and had a wife. His artisan skill allowed him to be hired-out to other whites or to seek his own work on a limited scale. As long as he obeyed the law, gave some of his profits to his master and did not stray too far, he acquired a quasi-freedom similar to other artisan slaves.  Because black skilled craftsmen were cheaper than white skilled craftsmen were, employers chose black artisans and white artisans were forced to find work elsewhere, thus increasing urban demand for such labor.  Gabriel eventually made his way to Richmond where he did most of his work. In Richmond, these quasi-free slaves interacted with the rich merchants and with other middle and low-income classes of urban society.

After setting the stage, the author then dives into the Marxist pool. His description of urban Richmond in 1800 centers on the working class and the rich merchant class, which greatly irritated Gabriel.  If not Marxist, Egerton focuses on the idea of a class struggle and continually uses Marxist-inspired terminology, like “working-class subculture, laboring brotherhood,” and “interracial nautical proletariat.” The author assumes that because Gabriel had a modicum of literacy and was what could be termed working class that he assumed the identity of a class-struggle hero. Egerton also proscribes heavy political theory to the interpretation of Gabriel.  The author includes Gabriel in discussions of complicated partisan politics swirling around the election of 1800.

 Gabriel’s timing of his revolt revolved around two factors.  His disgust with the merchant elite of Richmond and the possibility of civil war following the election of 1800.  Certainly the election and the changing of political power in 1800 brought with it some uncertainty, but civil war?  The possible political knowledge of a barely literate blacksmith may account for his disgust with his perceived new masters (Richmond’s merchants), but involving Gabriel within the complicated political debates of 1800 seems ludicrous.  Gabriel’s revolt centered on the taking of Richmond and holding the city hostage until all men were freed socially and economically.  The author imposes a complex series of partisan political debates over the fairly simple slave revolt.

 Egerton notes other occurrences that may have more directly influenced the plot.  The French revolution and the pro-French leanings of Jefferson’s party weigh heavily on the author’s analysis of Gabriel.  The successful slave revolt on Haiti also influenced Gabriel.  These influences seem less preposterous than the complicated political leanings of quasi-free blacksmiths.  The urban environment influenced Gabriel not only in what information he processed, but also who he recruited into the plot.  The urban nature of the plot proved unique in the history of slavery and included similar conspiratorial plots in neighboring urban areas.  The urbaness of the plot may explain the author’s obsession with the idea of a class struggle.

 The actual plot proved workable and many believed in its success had it not been for a freak thunderstorm the night of the uprising.  Gabriel had planned to march on armory and capitol building after setting a diversionary fire in the city’s warehouse area.  On the night of the revolution a severe thunderstorm hit, complicating the congregation of conspirators and postponing the revolt.  The very next day, several rural fieldhands who have gotten wind of the plot exposed the revolt and the rounding up of conspirators began.  White authorities only learned of the extent of the revolt after several slaves divulged information in hopes of reward and freedom.  White authorities eventually identified Gabriel as the mastermind and captured him four weeks later.  The revolt supposedly contained some 500-600 enlistees.  The subsequent trials led to the execution of 27 black men.
 In part two of the book the author drops much of his class-struggle rhetoric and focuses on the riverine plot of a slave named Sancho who fomented a rebellion which was supposed to occur Easter day 1802.  Sancho participated in the Gabriel rebellion but escaped detection.  His plot involved black men that worked up and down the James River.  His revolt was much more secret and much smaller than Gabriel’s was.  As rumors and innuendo spread about another slave revolt the conspiracy became unraveled.  In the end another 25 black men were executed.

 In the aftermath of both waves of trials and executions the governor James Madison and various other groups, anti-slavery, liberals, religious dissenters, etc. grew weary of the executions and debate began on the idea of exiling problems slaves from Virginia and even the United States.  Egerton spends more time on the debates than on the Easter rebellion in part two of the work.  After debating, experimenting and examining colonization, the idea was shelved and the only option left to slave-owning Virginia became the increased oppression and repression of its black population.

 Egerton makes huge leaps and assertions with very little evidence.  The book suffers from a lack of continuity and several divergent discussions.  For instance, the expense of the militia, trial and executions receives too much text and wreaks of filler material.  The author also notes, conspicuously, the interracial sexual paranoia of the Richmond elite, which lends little to the discussion of the revolts.  The evaluation of especially Gabriel’s rebellion in the context of a class struggle limits the credibility of the author’s solid conclusions of the increased repression and oppression of the black population following these two revolts and the slavery debate they raised.

Ed Townes