We’re going to take a look at two of them – one written by Thomas Gray in 1831, and one written by Nathan Alan Davis in 2016.Ĭore Company Actor and Nat Turner in Jerusalem director Gavin Lawrence explored Gray’s document, titled “The Confessions of Nat Turner,” saying “Reading the document helped me understand the conflict in the play, and what each person wanted. While those are the very basic facts, perspective is a different story. And after his capture, before he was executed, Nat Turner told his story to a white lawyer, Thomas Gray, who published that confession. At the time, the event was seized upon as a rallying point for both slaveholders and abolitionists. As you may know, in 1831, Nat Turner led a slave rebellion during which more than 50 people were killed, most of them white. After all, the perceived “winner” can vary greatly depending on the perspective. But to split that hair, history is truly written by those who hold the power. It’s often said that history is written by the winners. We recently talked with Director and APT Core Company Actor Gavin Lawrence about what it was like diving into the different facets of Nat's story, and producing this play for APT. Equity & Anti-Racism Vision & Action PlanĪPT's latest series of "Out of the Woods" play readings continues this Friday with Nathan Alan Davis' Nat Turner in Jerusalem.Other slave states followed suit, restricting the rights of free and enslaved blacks to gather in groups, travel, preach, and learn to read and write. The Virginia legislature actually debated ending slavery, but chose instead to impose additional restrictions and harsher penalties on the activities of both enslaved and free African Americans. Nat Turner’s rebellion led to the passage of a series of new laws. The rest, along with 300 free blacks from Southampton County, agreed to be exiled to Liberia in Africa. Nineteen of the thirty who had been arrested were convicted and executed. "The insurrection of the blacks have made greate disturbance here every man is armd with a gun by his bed nights and in the field at work a greate many of the blacks have been shot there heads taken of stuck on poles at the forkes of rodes some been hung, some awaiting there trial in several countys, 6 in this county I expect to see them strecht ther trial nex week there is no danger of their rising again here." In a letter written a month later from North Carolina, Nelson Allyn described the retaliation against African Americans: In the days following the attack, 3000 soldiers, militia men, and vigilantes killed more than one hundred suspected rebels. They captured or killed most of the insurgents, although Turner himself managed to avoid capture for sixty days.Įven though Turner and his followers had been stopped, panic spread across the region. The local authorities stopped the uprising by dawn the next day. In the early hours of August 22, 1831, a slave named Nat Turner led more than fifty followers in a bloody revolt in Southampton, Virginia, killing nearly 60 white people, mostly women and children.
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