American Negro Slave Revolts

by Herbert Aptheker

This is the first fully documented study of Negro slave revolts in The United States. Dr. Aptheker provides proof, obtained by painstaking research, that this content and rebelliousness were not only exceedingly common, but we're characteristic of American Negro slaves. Special attention is paid to the famous slave rebellion of Nat Turner, into the revolts led by Denmark Vesey and Gabriel. This pioneering study remains a major contribution to the destruction of the myth of Afro – American docility.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Race, American History, United States, Anti Racist, Research

428 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1974

About the author

Herbert Aptheker was an American Marxist historian and political activist. He wrote more than 50 books, mostly in the fields of African American history and general U.S. history, most notably, American Negro Slave Revolts (1943), a classic in the field, and the 7-volume Documentary History of the Negro People (1951-1994). He compiled a wide variety of primary documents supporting study of African-American history.

From the 1940s, Aptheker was a prominent figure in U.S. scholarly discourse. David Horowitz described Aptheker as "the Communist Party’s most prominent Cold War intellectual".[1] He was blacklisted in academia during the 1950s because of his Communist Party membership.

Aptheker's master's thesis, a study of the 1831 Nat Turner slave revolt in Virginia, laid the groundwork for his future work on the history of American slave revolts. Aptheker revealed Turner's heroism, demonstrating how his rebellion was rooted in resistance to the exploitative conditions of the Southern slave system. His NEGRO SLAVE REVOLTS IN THE UNITED STATES 1526-1860 (1939), includes a table of documented slave revolts by year and state. His doctoral dissertation, American Negro Slave Revolts, was published in 1943. Doing research in Southern libraries and archives, he uncovered 250 similar episodes. It remains a landmark and a classic work in the study of Southern history and slavery.

Aptheker challenged racist writings, most notably those of Georgia-born historian Ulrich Bonnell Phillips. The latter had characterized enslaved African Americans as child-like, inferior, and uncivilized; argued that slavery was a benign institution; and defended the preservation of the Southern plantation system. Such works had been common in the field before Aptheker's scholarship revealed a much more nuanced society, in which African Americans acted from agency.

Considering himself a protégé of W. E. B. Du Bois, Aptheker long emphasized his mentor's social science scholarship and life-long struggle for African Americans to achieve equality. In his work as a historian, he compiled a documentary history of African Americans in the United States, a monumental collection which he started publishing in 1951. It eventually resulted in seven volumes of primary documents, a tremendous resource for African-American studies.

Reviews

[JRT · Rating 5 out of 5]

Discontent and rebelliousness among enslaved African Americans was the standard, not the exception. This is the basic thesis of this tremendously important work. This book explodes the racist, pro-slavery myth of the “docile slave.” It firmly and prominently centers the direct and violent resistance to slavery that generations of African Americans engaged in.

As Aptheker makes clear from the outset, the white planter class was paralyzed with the fear of African revolt. The author brilliantly described how notions of “Black docility” are rooted in pervasive anti-Black racism, as they posit that only the ignorant, stupid, and child-like Blacks could be so thoroughly pacified in their response to enslavement.

So much of American history was rooted in fear of African revolt. Out of that fear came a highly complex system of control and repression. Nevertheless, not only does Aptheker dismiss the “docile slave” narrative, he dispenses with the idea that revolting Africans were “influenced” or directed by white Northerners. This paternalistic and racist notion removes agency from the enslaved and effectively infantilizes them.

Aptheker notes that on an individual level, enslaved Africans resisted their condition in a multitude of ways. However, he defines “insurrection” very specifically—characterizing it as an organized revolt consisting of 10 or more people, wherein liberation from enslavement is the explicit purpose. With this definition, Apetheker identifies approximately 250 revolts and conspiracies of this flavor. Aptheker would go on to methodically list and detail revolt after revolt, from the very first European settlement containing African slaves in 1526, all the way through the Civil War.

One of the most striking aspects of this historical account is just how many planned revolts were betrayed by Africans themselves. What could have been…This is a must read for anybody who wants to learn about the revolutionary history of Black Americans.

[RK Byers · Rating 5 out of 5]

the fact that there were at least 250 revolts involving 10 or more slaves just makes you wonder how many times two or three dudes got together and said, "You know what? Let's kill some m____f_____s!"

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is an absolute MUST READ for anyone interested in the development of slavery in the United States and the lead-up to the Civil War.

One reason is that it’s amazing how many revolts there were starting at the very beginning of slavery in the South. Another is that, reading about these, and the terror they caused, is that it’s amazing that Southern slaveholders didn’t just give up on slavery. Yes, it was economically “necessary,” but as this author points out, there were more economic depressions and hard times during the years from establishment to the Civil War than there were boom times and during those hard times, slaves had to be maintained with money taken out of their owners’s pockets.

A third reason is that you’ll learn so much about US history that you never knew before. For instance, probably the main reason for taking over Florida was not just territorial expansion and to drive out the Spanish but to keep slaves from fleeing there and finding freedom (which many did). Also, behind the reasoning for prohibiting further slave importation into the states was NOT, as in Britain, a desire to slowly cause emancipation (as we well know) but to decrease the concentration of slaves in small areas and allow the white population to increase in proportion. This was probably also the main reason for the push to expand slavery into new states as they were admitted.

Slave states, as Aptheker shows, always carried on a very quiet discussion on whether slavery should be abandoned, but after the Nat Turner revolt, the voice of liberation became silent and those who believed in emancipation, mostly Quakers and Methodists, moved from the South and helped create a vibrant Abolitionist movement in the North. And while fears concerning revolts were limited to blacks up until the Turner revolt, an increasing number of whites, even the “po’ whites” that would become the most virulent upholders of segregation after the War, were included in or helped lead revolts from 1831 on.

An amazing realization I had was how obvious it is that the use of death as a deterrent doesn’t work (as we should know from the lack of decrease in capital crimes nowadays). Slavers continually hanged, burned, whipped to death, broke on the wheel and nearly every other type of death you can imagine, slaves that lead or were involved in revolts. It never stopped the next revolt. Even the mass hanging of conspirators didn’t help – as a result of Denmark Vesey’s revolt, 39 slaves and freedmen were hanged, 17 of them in public and at the same time.

As well as describing the fear that the major revolts – those of Gabriel in 1800, Denmark Vesey in 1822, and Nat Turner in 1831 - Aptheker outlines thousands of other, smaller revolts. He divides his work into periods of time: plots before and immediately after the Revolution, 1791-1809, etc. – so that it’s possible to put them against the rest of the history of the time. He also supports his findings with extensive primary sources, mostly letters, newspaper article, journal entries, of contemporaries. He admits when there is no followup and also allows for the exaggeration, both positive and negative, that always exists. He keeps the notes separate but places them at the bottom of the page on which they’re cited, in the old-fashioned way, which allows you to immediately access them, if you want, or ignore them, like I did.

His style is amazing for a scholar. It is extremely easy to read and flows from one idea to the next so that you feel like you are reading a work written for interested amateurs instead of scholars. The edition I read was the 50th anniversary edition, published in 1993, so that shows you the success of this as a resource for scholarly work.

[Jerry Peace · Rating 4 out of 5]

Required reading for everyone who believes or has been taught that slavery was beneficial for the slaves and that slaves loved, honored and wildly appreciated the beneficence of their masters. Aptheker, to a torturous degree, laboriously documents slave uprisings, and much more often, plots, from the sixteenth century in North America through the Civil War. The most intricate plot was Denmark Vesey's, a free man (he purchased his freedom from lottery winnings) who recruited up to nine thousand slaves. The plan, to subdue Charleston, S.C., killing all whites, and then sailing to Haiti and Africa, was betrayed by a domestic slave. Vesey had forbidden recruiting house slaves; their better treatment rendered them unreliable revolt participants. This leads me to wonder how many of the plots were actually serious and how many were a group of men speculating. Most often the plots were betrayed by slaves, many of whom were subsequently freed and given lifetime stipends. But the sheer number that Aptheker documents argues that far from being subhumans incapable of initiative, southern slavery boiled with resentment, disobedience and sometimes violence. There were particular laws against slaves poisoning their masters; and "sabotage, shamming illness, 'stealing,' suicide and self-mutilation, and strikes" were other methods of disruption performed by slaves. Arson was particularly popular; slaves had no guns but they always had access to fire. Another argument dispelling the happily subservient slave image is the constant fear of slave insurrection exhibited in newspapers and letters and which resulted in, as recorded by Frederick Law Olmstead, "police machinery such as you would never find in towns under free government: citadels, sentries, passports, grapeshotted cannon, and daily public whippings of the subjects for accidental infractions of police ceremonies. I happened myself to see more direct expression of tyranny in a single day and night in Charleston, than at Naples in a week." According to one Virginian-"In a word, if we will keep a ferocious monster in our country, we must keep him in chains." Curiously, a strong tendency arose to blame plots and uprisings on abolitionist interlopers and even Methodist preachers and Quakers. Kind of like we hear now about BLM protests-"Must be outside agitators, antifa, since our blacks would never do that." Another interesting point Aptheker makes is the dueling reactions to plots and revolts. On one hand, much of the reporting is exaggerated, distorted, and simply fabricated. Conversely, some insurrections or plots were never reported or relegated to an isolated and buried paragraph of benign language. Last, I wonder at the irony between Denmark Vesey's plot and Nat Turner's uprising. Vesey had meticulous plans, a core of lieutenants, weapons, including a barrel of gunpowder, and a large and willing army, only to be betrayed by a house slave. Nat Turner, though having somewhat of a plot, began with six men and killed at least fifty-seven whites-men, women and children- before his group was subdued. But the result for Vesey and his men and Turner and his was the same. For me, the lesson becomes people will not be subjugated forever. People will sabotage or burn, will kill or run away, will poison or go on strike, will steal or starve themselves. And no army, no militia, no force can keep the chains bound forever.

[Douglas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like to occasionally reread a book and so I picked up this classic history after 45 years - and it was old then. This book is about how the enslaved fought back against their oppressors. I mean seriously you don't go for that 'happy darkie' crap do you? Heavily footnoted for those that like to drill down and fact check.

There are other books that detail the inhumanity of the institution but this book is worth the read for addressing how the slavers were afraid of Black Freedom Fighters and how they set up systems to keep America a slave state.

A good read and a worthy addition to any library.

[William West · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this right after Edward Baptist's The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism. Starting this book, I was worried it would be too repetitive of the former reading. Both books, after all, seek to detail the historical reality of American slavery in a way that implicates capitalism itself. Interestingly, beyond their very similar subjects, the two works could not be more different from one another.

Baptist is what might be described as a post-Marxist- a leftist with a critical view of capitalism as inherently exploitative, but one who rejects any notion of dialectical materialism or Marxist “solutions.” His historical analysis seeks to deflate accepted notions of both the right and the left. Aptheker, by contrast, was an orthodox Communist Party USA member his entire adult life. This book is an account of slavery that supports the Party line on the nature of class struggle, and what the Party would have held to be its inevitable and universal characteristics: Basically, enslaved African-Americans were the equivalent of feudal serfs, and like any subordinated class they took to violence to try to shake off the yokes of oppression. Ultimately, insurrection was the result of economic factors. During periods of depression, scarcity trickled down to the most oppressed, who had nothing and were thus forced to risk their lives to free themselves. Revolutionary crisis was inevitable, and sooner or later one came about that brought about a revolution that freed the oppressed and ushered in a more egalitarian social order (the American Civil War).

Although Baptist is writing with a much less rigid historical outlook, and many of his economic arguments seem much more convincing to today's reader than do Aptheker's, his seems the more naïve depiction of the enslaved. My deepest criticism of his generally very powerful book was that it portrayed enslaved African-Americans as utterly helpless victims of a perfect system of domination. In Baptist's account the slaves were creative and possessed great inner strength to persevere in the face of the myriad horrors committed against them, but they seemingly posed little threat to their fanatically greedy and cruel overlords.

Aptheker's book more than amply off-sets Baptist's rather idyllic portrayal of the enslaved. Aptheker's south was a place that was often on the verge of open race-war and in the best of times was characterized by a kind of cold-race-war. It was a world in which the rulers lived in almost as much fear as the ruled. The Old Lefty historian delights in the letters of terrified white wives and editorials in southern newspapers that openly communicated to their readers that they would not inform them about slave unrest because it was too terrifying a subject to dwell on. Entire towns, according to Aptheker, were not infrequently set ablaze by rebelling slaves. For Aptheker, the oppressor is an animal that is doomed by the gyrations of history and on some level it understands this.

While this book seems a bit dated now, it is important to remember that when it was first published in 1942 white supremacist ideology had so reasserted its cultural hegemony since the days of reconstruction that most mainstream histories of slavery then described it as a benign institution that in many respects suited and benefited Black people. Aptheker's research demolished such claims. For that, if nothing else, it is of great importance.

[Larry Lamar Yates · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book, which is still widely seen as the definitive starting point on its subject, was reprinted in 1993, and is available from booksellers and libraries. Aptheker closed the book with these sentences, which seem obvious now, but were extremely radical when he wrote them:

“The data herein printed make necessary the revision of the generally accepted notion that [the American Negro’]s response was one of passivity and docility. The evidence, on the contrary, points to the conclusion that discontent and rebelliousness were not only exceedingly common, but indeed characteristic of American Negro slaves.”

[Eddie S. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very thorough book about slave insurrections that have happened in American history. Many laws and power struggles were at play, and white supremacy had to be protected by any means. Other than John Brown, there were many aides of Caucasian descent that assisted slaves. The most interesting historical account of slavery I've read.

[Pat Carson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding piece of scholarship. This anniversary edition has two updates from the author that add more detail. Recommended to anyone who wants to learn more about slavery in the United States.

[David the Ñoldo · Rating 4 out of 5]

“This study has attempted to meet the need, which has become increasingly evident in recent years, of depicting in realistic terms the response of the American Negro to his bondage. The data herein presented make, necessary the revision of the generally accepted notion that his response was one of passivity and docility. The evidence, on the contrary, points to the conclusion that discontent and rebelliousness were not only exceedingly common, but, indeed, characteristic of American Negro slaves.” (P.368).

Herbert Aptheker seems to have brilliantly made his case for the goal of this book. Citing and referencing numerous primary sources and documents while also evaluating and weeding through the exaggerated claims and the hushed or understated events.

[A.J. Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Groundbreaking, necessary, this book changed my life. The deep research unveils the intentionally hidden fact that Black people NEVER submitted peacefully to slavery. Through tireless research, Aptheker found the truth and weaves a tale of unrelenting resistance and uprising against some of the most unhuman acts in human history. The struggle continues. Power to the people.

[Z · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the formative books in my life; highly recommended.

[ػᶈᶏϾӗ]

Indispensable. The history of slavery IS a history of revolt and resistance, and a desperate attempt to keep people from seeing the extent of that oppressive mode's perpetual instability.

[Jacklyn Belcher · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book - it had thorough, insightful analyses of different revolts. The lessons are useful.

[Todd Thompson · Rating 5 out of 5]

May cause a vital shift in thinking about who was really responsible for emancipation.

[Izetta Autumn]

I would have been trouble in 1848 reading and stuff...