The significance of the Nat Turner Slave Revolt lies in the reason it may have failed because of the prominent role played by the Bible and Christianity in the Nat Turner Slave Revolt compared to the Haitian Revolution which was based on Voodoo a Pre-Colonial African Form of Spirituality.
The Nat Turner Slave Revolt
The significance of the Nat Turner Slave Revolt can be traced to the story of Nat Turner who was a Slave Preacher from Virginia who led one of the most recognized failed Slave Rebellions in History.
Before he led the Nat Turner Slave Rebellion, in October 1800, Nat Turner had arrived as a Slave on the Benjamin Turner family plantation in Southampton County, Virginia where Nat Turner learnt how to read at an early age and Nat Turner would turn to the Bible as a means of understanding the world around him, particularly his situation as a Slave.
Nat Turner quickly became a Preacher amongst the Slaves on the Turner Plantation at first preaching that the Bible required Slaves to be obedient to their Masters.
Nevertheless, after a mystical experience captured in the‘ Confessions Of Nat Turner’ in which Nat Turner reported to have seen drops of blood on corn like they were heavenly dew, he was sure that the Bible required him to unite oppressed Slaves to overthrow their Masters in order that they could secure their freedom.
On August 21, Nat Turner initiated his Rebellion with fellow Slaves beginning with the killing of the Turner family, the Masters of his own Plantation.
The Nat Turner Rebellion spread throughout the Plantations and a minimum of fifty Plantation Owners were killed.
Nevertheless, by August 23, Plantation Owners had controlled the revolt, and nearly all his followers had been captured.
Nat Turner escaped however, hiding in the woods for two weeks until he was discovered and arrested after his voluntary surrender.
After his arrest, Nat Turner was tried and sentenced to death for “conspiring to rebel and make insurrection.”
On November 11 Nat Turner was hanged.
The Significance Of The Nat Turner Slave Revolt
The significance of the Nat Turner Slave Revolt lies in the fact that the Nat Turner Slave Revolt can be interpreted as a story of Black Resistance to Slavery on the foundation of an ideology built on the Culture, idiom and metaphors of American Slave Owners represented by Christianity and the Bible, rather than an Afrocentric Spirituality like Voodoo which led to the successful Haitian Revolution.
In essence, the Nat Turner Slave Revolt is significant because it reflects how Slaves in America by the time of the Nat Turner Slave Rebellion become more assimilated into American Culture compared to the Slaves in the earlier Rebellion in Haiti in which the Slaves were able to organise around the memory of their own African Religion like Voudon.
