The New York Conspiracy Trials of 1741: Daniel Horsmanden's Journal of the Proceedings, with Related Documents

by Serena R. Zabin

When in 1741 a rash of fires followed a theft in pre-revolutionary New York City, British colonial authorities came to suspect an elaborate conspiracy led by slaves and poor whites who intended to burn the city and hand it over to Britain’s Catholic foes. Within seven months, roughly 200 people were arrested, 17 were hanged, and 70 others were expelled from New York. This book abridges the transcript Justice Daniel Horsmanden kept of the trials. His record of the testimony of slaves and working-class whites provides extraordinary clues to the nature of race, class, and gender relationships in colonial New York City and raises questions about the nature and extent of the alleged conspiracy. Serena Zabin’s introduction provides context by describing slavery, tavern culture, and the legal system as well as explaining British tensions with France and Spain. Additional documents include newspaper accounts of the Antigua and Stono Rebellions and letters concerning the 1741 trials to help students make connections among these uprisings and the atmosphere of fear and suspicion they created. Document headnotes and glosses, lists of trial participants, a chronology of events, questions for consideration, a selected bibliography, and an index provide strong pedagogical support.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

193 pages, Paperback

First published February 4, 2004

Reviews

[Marion Granigan · Rating 4 out of 5]

When slave populations in New York City soared to 20% of the city’s population in the early 1700’s, a series of arsons and burglaries quickly exaggerated fears and became the basis for allegations of a conspiracy involving Blacks and Whites. Most of the accounts of the trial itself come from Daniel Horsmanden, a British attorney who recorded the testimony in his own hand, but who had his own agenda and biases throughout the conspiracy trial. Should we consider Horsemanden’s testimony as trustworthy or discard it as that of an hysterical partisan. His account reads as an attempt to justify the actions of the court, of which he was a leading member, by proving that some White people in conjunction with some Negroes and other slaves planned to burn the city of New York and murder its inhabitants, but, as the book demonstrates, conflicting testimony and crucial questions were ignored or unanswered, and pleas of innocence were dismissed. A difficult book to read.