Description
Book SynopsisOn July 2, 1822, Denmark Vesey was hanged in Charleston, S.C., for his role in planning one of the largest slave uprisings in the United States. During his long, extraordinary life Vesey played many rolesCaribbean field hand, cabin boy, chandler''s man, house servant, proud freeman, carpenter, husband, father, church leader, abolitionist, revolutionary. Yet until his execution transformed him into a symbol of liberty, Vesey made it his life''s work to avoid the attention of white authorities. Because he preferred to dwell in the hidden alleys of Charleston''s slave community, Vesey remains as elusive as he is today celebrated, and his legend is often mistaken for fact. In this biography of the great rebel leader, Douglas R. Egerton employs a variety of historical sourceschurch records, court documents, travel accounts, and newspapers from America and Saint Domingueto recreate the lost world of the mysterious Vesey. The revised and updated edition reflects the most recent scholarship on
Trade ReviewEgerton seeks Vesey in the few records that remain, ranging from newspaper stories to hastily scribbled court transcripts, in uncommon sources from the Carolinas to Haiti. He finds that Vesey was a complicated man whose freed status and eloquence in several languages did not seem to matter, whose frustration with white society, white religion, and white power led him to organize a revolt that consisted of slaves simply walking away from it all. Egerton includes very useful essays on his sources and on Vesey's treatment by historians. * Reference and Research Book News *
Table of ContentsChapter 1: The Book of Telemaque, 1767–1782 Chapter 2: Stranger in a Strange Land, 1783–1793 Chapter 3: Nor a Lender Be, 1794–1799 Chapter 4: Freedom, 1800–1817 Chapter 5: Building the House of the Lord, 1817–1821 Chapter 6: Exodus, 1821–1822 Chapter 7: Lamentations, May–June 1822 Chapter 8: Judges, June–August 1822 Chapter 9: The Temple Finished, 1822–1865 Appendix 1: The Charleston Hanged Appendix 2: Denmark Vesey and the Historians Essay on Sources
