what value do statues have in educating about the past?
Poll - Total Votes: 1
More statues showing the real past
just confederate general statues
You can only vote on one answer.
Any states to Gabriel’s Conspiracy, 1800?
Born prophetically in 1776 on the Prosser plantation, just six miles north of Richmond, Va., and home (to use the term loosely) to 53 slaves, a slave named Gabriel would hatch a plot, with freedom as its goal, that was emblematic of the era in which he lived.
A skilled blacksmith who stood more than six feet tall and dressed in fine clothes when he was away from the forge, Gabriel cut an imposing figure. But what distinguished him more than his physical bearing was his ability to read and write: Only 5 percent of Southern slaves were literate.
Other slaves looked up to men like Gabriel, and Gabriel himself found inspiration in the French and Saint-Domingue revolutions of 1789. He imbibed the political fervor of the era and concluded, albeit erroneously, that Jeffersonian democratic ideology encompassed the interests of black slaves and white workingmen alike, who, united, could oppose the oppressive Federalist merchant class.
Spurred on by two liberty-minded French soldiers he met in a tavern, Gabriel began to formulate a plan, enlisting his brother Solomon and another servant on the Prosser plantation in his fight for freedom. Word quickly spread to Richmond, other nearby towns and plantations and well beyond to Petersburg and Norfolk, via free and enslaved blacks who worked the waterways. Gabriel took a tremendous risk in letting so many black people learn of his plans: It was necessary as a means of attracting supporters, but it also exposed him to the possibility of betrayal.
Regardless, Gabriel persevered, aiming to rally at least 1,000 slaves to his banner of “Death or Liberty,” an inversion of the famed cry of the slaveholding revolutionary Patrick Henry. With incredible daring — and naïveté — Gabriel determined to march to Richmond, take the armory and hold Gov. James Monroe hostage until the merchant class bent to the rebels’ demands of equal rights for all. He planned his uprising for August 30 and publicized it well.
But on that day, one of the worst thunderstorms in recent memory pummeled Virginia, washing away roads and making travel all but impossible. Undeterred, Gabriel believed that only a small band was necessary to carry out the plan. But many of his followers lost faith, and he was betrayed by a slave named Pharoah, who feared retribution if the plot failed.
The rebellion was barely under way when the state captured Gabriel and several co-conspirators. Twenty-five African Americans, worth about $9,000 or so — money that cash-strapped Virginia surely thought it could ill afford — were hanged together before Gabriel went to the gallows and was executed, alone.
Born prophetically in 1776 on the Prosser plantation, just six miles north of Richmond, Va., and home (to use the term loosely) to 53 slaves, a slave named Gabriel would hatch a plot, with freedom as its goal, that was emblematic of the era in which he lived.
A skilled blacksmith who stood more than six feet tall and dressed in fine clothes when he was away from the forge, Gabriel cut an imposing figure. But what distinguished him more than his physical bearing was his ability to read and write: Only 5 percent of Southern slaves were literate.
Other slaves looked up to men like Gabriel, and Gabriel himself found inspiration in the French and Saint-Domingue revolutions of 1789. He imbibed the political fervor of the era and concluded, albeit erroneously, that Jeffersonian democratic ideology encompassed the interests of black slaves and white workingmen alike, who, united, could oppose the oppressive Federalist merchant class.
Spurred on by two liberty-minded French soldiers he met in a tavern, Gabriel began to formulate a plan, enlisting his brother Solomon and another servant on the Prosser plantation in his fight for freedom. Word quickly spread to Richmond, other nearby towns and plantations and well beyond to Petersburg and Norfolk, via free and enslaved blacks who worked the waterways. Gabriel took a tremendous risk in letting so many black people learn of his plans: It was necessary as a means of attracting supporters, but it also exposed him to the possibility of betrayal.
Regardless, Gabriel persevered, aiming to rally at least 1,000 slaves to his banner of “Death or Liberty,” an inversion of the famed cry of the slaveholding revolutionary Patrick Henry. With incredible daring — and naïveté — Gabriel determined to march to Richmond, take the armory and hold Gov. James Monroe hostage until the merchant class bent to the rebels’ demands of equal rights for all. He planned his uprising for August 30 and publicized it well.
But on that day, one of the worst thunderstorms in recent memory pummeled Virginia, washing away roads and making travel all but impossible. Undeterred, Gabriel believed that only a small band was necessary to carry out the plan. But many of his followers lost faith, and he was betrayed by a slave named Pharoah, who feared retribution if the plot failed.
The rebellion was barely under way when the state captured Gabriel and several co-conspirators. Twenty-five African Americans, worth about $9,000 or so — money that cash-strapped Virginia surely thought it could ill afford — were hanged together before Gabriel went to the gallows and was executed, alone.
61-69, M
