He Shall Go Out Free: The Lives of Denmark Vesey / Edition 1

by Douglas R. Egerton

Overview

On 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 roles—Caribbean 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 sources—church records, court documents, travel accounts, and newspapers from America and Saint Domingue—to recreate the lost world of the mysterious Vesey. The revised and updated edition reflects the most recent scholarship on Vesey, and a new afterword by the author explores the current debate about the existence of the 1822 conspiracy. If Vesey's plot was unique in the annals of slave rebellions in North America, it was because he was unique; his goals, as well as the methods he chose to achieve them, were the product of a hard life's experience.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780742542235
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	12/10/2004
Series:	American Profiles
Edition description:	Revised and Updated Edition
Pages:	296
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.96(h) x 0.65(d)

About the Author

Douglas R. Egerton is the author of the critically acclaimed Gabriel's Rebellion: The Virginia Slave Conspiracies of 1800 and 1802 and Charles Fenton Mercer and the Trial of National Conservatism. He is professor of history at Le Moyne College in Syracuse, New York.

Table of Contents

Chapter 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

What People are Saying About This

Peter Kolchin

A fine biography that sheds light on an important but often misunderstood conspiracy. Together with Gabriel's Rebellion, this book establishes Douglas R. Egerton as a leading student of American slave revolts.
—(Peter Kolchin, author of American Slavery: 1619 to 1877)

Leslie H. Fishel

It is an extraordinary work, the product of probing research and fluent writing. Despite the sparse written record, Vesey's "lives" as emigrant, slave, and free man are sketched with vitality and understanding. The twenty-first century needs this readable reminder of an inspiring man and a significant event.
—(Leslie H. Fishel, Jr., author of Black America: A Documentary History)

David Roediger

This riveting story of Denmark Vesey and his comrades allows Egerton to explore expertly both the brutality and the limits of white planters rule. This study is a rich reminder of the centrality of movement and revolt in the history of the emancipation of U.S. slaves.
—(David Roediger, author of The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class and Towards the Abolition of Whiteness: Essays on Race, Politics, and Working Class History)

Peter H. Wood

Douglas Egerton uses archival evidence and the rich shelf of modern scholarship to build an informed and compelling portrait of a Herculean figure in Southern history. In He Shall Go Out Free Egerton combines careful sleuthing and a biographer's intuition to bring a key American life out of the shadows and place it in a complicated Atlantic setting.
—(Peter H. Wood, author of Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion)

Editorial Reviews

Egerton 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

From the Publisher

Egerton 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

Egerton greatly enriches our understanding of Vesey's strategy and aspirations by placing him and his fellow conspirators in the context of Charleston society, and Charleston society in the context of the larger Atlantic world. An extraordinarily assiduous researcher, Egerton also expands our knowledge of Vesey.
— New York Times Book Review

Ira Berlin

Egerton (history, Le Moyne College) presents a biography of Denmark Vesey, most famous for his doomed 1822 slave rebellion in Charleston, South Carolina. The work goes beyond the planning of the rebellion to look at the entire life of Vesey and, by extension, the social world that shaped him. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

The riveting story of Denmark Vesey and his comrades allows Egerton to explore expertly both the brutality and the limits of white planters' rule. This study is a rich reminder of the centrality of movement and revolt in the history of the emancipation of U.S. slaves.

David Roediger

An informed and compelling portrait of a Herculean figure in Southern history. Egerton combines careful sleuthing and a biographer's intuition to bring a key American life out of the shadows and place it in a complicated Atlantic setting.

Peter H. Wood

A fine biography that sheds light on an important but often misunderstood conspiracy. Together with Gabriel's Rebellion, this book establishes Douglas R. Egerton as a leading student of American slave revolts.

Peter Kolchin

Egerton writes in a clear, engaging style; his work is fully documented and reflects a solid grasp of scholarship on slavery and slave revolts.

Choice Reviews

This is an extraordinary work, the product of probing research and fluent writing. Despite the sparse written record, Vesey's 'lives' as emigrant, slave, and freeman are sketched with vitality and understanding. The twenty-first century needs this readable reminder of an inspiring man and a significant event.

Leslie H. Fishel

Egerton writes in a clear, engaging style; his work is fully documented and reflects a solid grasp of scholarship on slavery and slave revolts.

Choice

Egerton writes in a clear, engaging style; his work is fully documented and reflects a solid grasp of scholarship on slavery and slave revolts.

CHOICE