Book Syntesis of "fires of Jubilee" Nate Turners

Oates, Stephen B. The Fires of Jubilee, New York: Harper & Row, 1975

Stephen Oates, in a riveting storytelling fashion, captures the desires

and anxieties of the early to mid 19th century, with The Fires of Jubilee.

Oates has performed rigorous study to present an accurate portrayal of a

fascinating and mysterious man, who lived during an extraordinary period in

American history.

Oates begins the book with a thorough biography of Turner. He makes

a real effort to show what lead a man to commit the actions he did. Nat was

born on October 17, 1800 in Southampton County, Virginia. His mother

Nancy was brought to America in 1795. The man who purchased her was

Benjamin Turner, a wealthy tidewater planter. Nancy married a slave whose

name is not known, and gave birth to Nat. Interestingly she tried to kill Nat

rather then see him grow up to be a slave. By the time he was four or five

years old, people started to realize that there was something very special

about Nat. He could recall things that had happened before he was born.

Nat's parents were very proud of him and discovered strange marking on his

head and back. African legend held that a male with such markings would

grow up to be a leader. He intelligence earned the respect of other slaves as

well. One time he was given a book by another slave. Amazingly he knew

how to read it. No one knows who taught Nat to read, as an education was

very rare among slaves. His master, Benjamin Turner was extremely

impressed with Nat and often remarked to friends that, "he would never be of

service to anyone as a slave."

In 1809 Nat's life changed immensely. The first shock came when his

father escaped slavery to the north, never to be seen again. The second shock

was the death of Nat's master. In 1810 Nat became the official property of

Benjamin's oldest son, Samuel Turner. Samuel was a highly religious

bachelor in his mid twenties. Samuel worked his slaves hard and used

Christianity to scare slaves into obedience. I found this to be one of the most

fascinating situations in the book. The author takes several pages away from

Nat's story to describe some attitudes in the south. Most southerners,

including slave holders were deeply religious, devoted Christians. The basic

idea that whited tried to teach blacks was that God is supreme, and he allows

slavery because white people are superior to blacks. A good slave should not

question God's authority, but should accept his lot in life and carry out his

duties cheerfully. It was taught that slaves who were lazy or questioned the

morality of slavery would burn in hell for questioning God's supremacy.

Dreams of freedom or temptation to run away were the work of the devil and

punishable by eternity in hell.

Despite their attempts to use Christianity as justification, many

American slave holders at this time were somewhat uneasy about the entire

slave situation. In 1790 a full scale slave rebellion had rocked the island of

Santo Domingo. In 1799 two white guards were killed while transporting

slaves through Nat's hometown, Southampton county. The first attempted

large scale insurrection on American soil was the Gabriel Prosser conspiracy

in Richmond in 1800. Gabriel and