The Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner's Fierce Rebellion

by Stephen B. Oates

Overview

“A penetrating reconstruction of the most disturbing and crucial slave uprising in America’s history.” —New York Times

The definitive account of the most infamous slave rebellion in history and the aftermath that brought America one step closer to civil war—newly reissued to include the text of the original 1831 court document "The Confessions of Nat Turner"

The fierce slave rebellion led by Nat Turner in Virginia in 1831 and the savage reprisals that followed shattered beyond repair the myth of the contented slave and the benign master, and intensified the forces of change that would plunge America into the bloodbath of the Civil War. Stephen B. Oates, the celebrated biographer of Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr., presents a gripping and insightful narrative of the rebellion—the complex, gifted, and driven man who led it, the social conditions that produced it, and the legacy it left. 

A classic, here is the dramatic re-creation of the turbulent period that marked a crucial turning point in America's history.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062656551
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	09/06/2016
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	224
Sales rank:	507,879
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Stephen B. Oates (1936-2021) was a professor emeritus of history at the University of Massachusetts–Amherst. His books include Let the Trumpet Sound: A Life of Martin Luther King, Jr. and With Malice Toward None: A Life of Abraham Lincoln. Oates has been awarded numerous honors, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and Nevins-Freeman Award of the Civil War Round Table of Chicago for lifetime achievement in the field of Civil War studies.

Table of Contents

Foreword to the Perennial Library Edition ix

Prologue: Southampton County, 1831 1

Part 1 This Infernal Spirit of Slavery 5

Part 2 Go Sound the Jubilee 33

Part 3 Judgment Day 59

Part 4 Legacy 127

Epilogue: Southampton County, 1973 147

Reference Notes 155

Index 181

Maps

Southeastern Virginia, 1831 72

Nat Turner Country 73

Editorial Reviews

A vivid and excellent narrative account.” — New York Times

“Oates writes in a vivid...fashion constructing a meaningful historical context.” — Library Journal

“A vivid and convincing re-creation of the rebellion’s black and white violence, breathing life into chilling scenes of mayhem, against a background of slave reality and slave-holding mentality.” — Publishers Weekly

“A much needed correction to historical fantasies. . . . Grounded in the facts and excellently documented, this volume is essential for students of slavery and of the history of violence in America.” — FAWN BRODIE, author of Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History

“A penetrating, moving, gripping, eminently successful and readable account of an important event in American history!” — Fort Worth Star-Telegram

From the Publisher

A penetrating, moving, gripping, eminently successful and readable account of an important event in American history!

Fort Worth Star-Telegram

A much needed correction to historical fantasies. . . . Grounded in the facts and excellently documented, this volume is essential for students of slavery and of the history of violence in America.

FAWN BRODIE

A vivid and excellent narrative account.

New York Times

A much needed correction to historical fantasies. . . Grounded in the facts and excellently documented, this volume is essential for student of slavery and the history of violence in America.

Fawn Brodie

Nat Turner is an American enigma. Was he a saint? A visionary? Were those visions authentic? How could he have come from the mild Virginia Tidewater society of 1831? Oates answers these questions and more in his vivid portrait of Turner, the slave society that nurtured him and the changes wrought in that society because of him. Reader John McDonough adopts a scholarly, but highly engaged, tone that is patient, thorough and deliberate. At the same time, his voice is resonant with the mystery he’s exploring. Its burry roughness holds the listener and creates an intimacy that matches the author’s own familiar tone and takes all the difficulty out of doing history. P.E.F. ©AudioFile, Portland, Maine

OCT/NOV 98 - AudioFile