The Resurrection of Nat Turner, Part 2: The Testimonial

by Sharon Ewell Foster

  “The law you created as men gives you what you want. But if you judge by the law of God, then you are guilty of the worst crimes. You are liars, thieves, and murderers. You are manstealers and God Almighty finds you guilty. His is the highest law on earth!”

  Nat Turner looked around the room at the heavy draperies, the carpets on the floors, the polished silverware in the cupboards. He looked at the fine clothes the men wore and the shoes with buckles. They surrounded themselves with nice things and told themselves that their wealth was proof of their righteousness. “We came to you in the past, begging for help. Like Pharaoh, you were cruel to those who complained. You choked the life from us just as you have choked others who got in your way.

  “There is no respite or refuge in the courts. There is no sheriff or army to take back what has been stolen from us. What did you expect us to do?”

  “You and the other slaves had plenty to eat, warm clothes, and roofs over your heads. Why?”

  “We starve. We freeze. We bleed. We die. And you do not know why? You truly do not know why? You have not heard your brothers’ cries of despair or our blood crying from the ground? You have not heard our stolen wages howling in the land?” Nat Turner was not afraid. Death was already promised to him. “If you do not know what you have done to thousands, millions, if you cannot see our suffering, then God help you: You are reprobate!”

  Chapter 73

  The midafternoon sun changed the shadows in the room. His mouth was dry. Trezvant had been questioning him for what felt like hours. But Peter Edwards could not offer him refreshments in front of Trezvant. Even the slightest courtesy would make Peter Edwards look like a sympathizer, a nigger-lover, and wealthy Edwards could not afford that.

  Trezvant and Nat Turner seemed to be the only two people in the room. Parker and Peter Edwards had faded into the background. Even Benjamin Phipps seemed to have disappeared. But Nat Turner knew there were others watching. Normally stationed in the kitchen, at the front door as butler, or standing by as a boy to do the masters’ bidding, the captives were watching and listening. They were silent and invisible, hoping not to be noticed, but listening to each word. He imagined, because he had felt the same himself, that they were uncertain how to feel.

  Were they silently cheering for him and praying for him as their hero? Were they angry because the revolt had caused them more trouble? Were they afraid to hope for freedom? Were they afraid to hope?

  They were captive witnesses and no matter how they felt about him now, they would remember. They were captives, and he must do all he could to defend and deliver them. There was a family debt he owed.

  Nat Turner looked at Trezvant. This was the trial that mattered. The play to come in the Jerusalem courtroom would be of little importance. The verdict there was already certain: Nat Turner would hang. But the fate of the captors was still uncertain. Today, the captors faced judgment. Trezvant held the fate of the nation in his hands—mercy and peace, or judgment and war. Trezvant did not seem to understand, and his questioning always came back to the same thing.

  The congressman shook his head. “You niggers bite the hand that feeds you. We did you people a favor bringing you here from your dark continent to teach you about Jesus Christ.”

  “How can you teach what you do not know?

  “You do not believe. You do not love. How can you teach Christ when you think you are gods?”

  Like earthly kings, they expected those they forced into slavery to serve gladly. Like evil gods, they felt it was their right to sacrifice the lives and dreams of others simply for their own profit and pleasure. God Himself does not force any man to be His slave. He is the Creator, but He gives each of us free will to choose if we will serve Him—as His friends and children. Those who choose to serve, serve with joy. God proves His greatness by giving all mankind freedom.

  “But you force others to follow you at gunpoint. Whips and dogs and armies enforce your rule.

  “So which of us is heathen and which is Christian, sir? The one who keeps men in chains, or the one who is kept? It is hard to know until harvesttime. God has judged.”

  Trezvant’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Don’t press me, boy. You speak too boldly. I have been patient with you. Always a smart, crafty answer. No doubt that is why you wear that scar on your head.”

  Nat Turner touched the scar on his temple while Trezvant shuffled his papers.

  “Why? You still have not explained, to my satisfaction, why, Nat.”

  “It will never be to your satisfaction; you do not want to understand. We are peaceful men forced to fight for our lives, our liberty, our birthright.”

  “Men?” Trezvant laughed.

  Nat Turner thought of Will, Hark, Sam, Dred, and the others, even young Davy. They had fought knowing the odds were against them. They had defended their families armed with little more than courage. “Yes, men. It is our solemn duty to defend our families, our women, and to obey God—both when He tells us to bow down and when He tells us to rise up!

  “We are men—God’s men, God’s warriors, God’s sons!” This was the reason that he was here. He could not back down now; he had to speak the whole truth. It was no accident that they were in this place just beyond Bethlehem on the way that leads to Jerusalem.

  God had spoken to Nat Turner in the Great Dismal Swamp. He did not want to return to Cross Keys. He did not want judgment to begin with the house of God, the house his father built, Turner’s Meeting Place. If he could have chosen where to begin war, it would have been with Giles Reese, who stole his family away.

  But it was God’s command, God’s judgment. Here they were, and Nat Turner had to be obedient; he had to speak the whole truth. “You brought us here. You pay for your education, for your homes, for your wealth, by stealing our lives. We cut your roads through forests; we erect your buildings; we tend your children. In return for what we do, you give nothing. In return for our work, you steal our memories, our families, and you shame us, you humiliate us. You doom us to lives where our only worth is breeding more children for you to destroy.”

  What would happen to the generations born of the people, God’s children, used for breeding, the generations forbidden to marry? Who would heal them, who would make them whole?

  Trezvant’s face was flushed with fury. He put down his pen and crossed his arms. Parker looked troubled.

  “When you are done with us—if we live to be old and you have no more use for us—then you abandon us and tell yourselves you owe nothing, it is over. You reassure yourselves that you are good men.”

  No good fruit could grow from the seeds the captors planted. What would chained and beaten men, men forbidden to love, teach their children and their children’s children? How could sweet milk flow from women treated as animals?

  The captors left behind a debt too great for their children to bear, an evil inheritance like the firstborn sons of Egypt. Cursing them, they left their children to defend their forefathers’ wrongs. “You poison us, you poison your own children, you poison the land. You poison the nation. You are Old Testament men, men without grace. How will you pay the debt for the trespasses you commit against the children, against the generations yet unborn?”

  Trezvant’s mouth set in a line. “I don’t care how crazy you are, don’t think that I’m going to sit here and allow you to malign this great nation!” His face tightened. “We are the sons of liberty, and I will not tolerate your blasphemy.”

  “It is a great nation. But it is also our nation. We are also sons of this nation we built together.” Every acre, every field, every sip of liquor was purchased with captive blood. “Ours is a great country—how much greater would it be if its bricks were not ground from broken hearts, if they were not patched with the mortar of broken dreams?

  “You don’t want to share what God has given to all with your brothers. How much greater would our country be if you did not ask our Father to deny us?”

  Trezvant’s fists, resting on the table, were taut, his kn
uckles white. “Don’t you dare presume to preach to me. I’m not one of you nigger field hands. What I want to know from you is why you did it. Why did you murder all those good white people?”

  “We did not make war against all white people. You are the proof: You two gentlemen are white and alive. We did not murder; we executed God’s judgment.”

  Trezvant leaned against the table. “The judgment of God? Over fifty white people are dead!”

  “Judgment begins at the house of the Lord, but many more will die. You have judged others, now judgment comes to you.

  “Millions of African men, women, and children are dead. Who will answer for the lives taken? Who will answer for the generations stolen—fathers, mothers, teachers, sons, daughters, farmers?”

  The captors stole and murdered millions but claimed innocence and righteousness.

  There were families left without fathers. There were villages left with no young men to farm and no men to protect them. Teachers and mothers, babies were stolen, mothers left with empty arms.

  “If you demand justice, first you must pay the debt you owe. Who will pay Africa for her children? If you do not pay, you leave the debt at your children’s and your children’s children’s feet.”

  Panting and blotched with rage, though Parker tried to restrain him, Trezvant blustered. “Fiend! Liar!”

  Nat Turner was bound to the truth. All that had happened—his mother’s theft from Africa, Cherry’s beating, Hark’s death, even the death of his captor and friend Sallie—was for nothing if he did not speak the truth. “What happened the night of the sickle moon was not murder. It was revolt. First harvest. God’s judgment. Not against all white men, but against those who lie and say they are God’s people while rebelling against His will, against His love. They are evil, wolves in sheep’s clothing.

  “God’s judgment began at the house of God—at Turner’s Meeting Place. My father bequeathed me trusteeship there—”

  “A trustee?” Trezvant slapped the table then, wide-eyed and grinning ear to ear. He gaped as if, finally, the prize for which he had been waiting had come. “You are a clown! At last, comic relief! You? A trustee?” Trezvant looked at the other white men present and laughed. “A nigger trustee?”

  Nat Turner felt his face warming, like that of a smaller boy begging his taller brother for what was his, jumping for what was just out of reach. “I am a free man forced into slavery. My property, my rights were stolen. Then they stole my wife and son from me.”

  Trezvant was still laughing. “You are a high-minded fellow, aren’t you? Everyone’s stealing from you.”

  “I am a trustee and have the right to set forth judgment. It is against God’s law to make your brother your slave, and the penalty for this disobedience, for centuries of arrogant disobedience, is death.” No mercy could be given to those who gave no mercy. “‘For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.’” There was no life or mercy for those who chose to live with cold, dead hearts.

  The smile left Trezvant’s face. “You are a murderous wretch! You killed children!”

  Nat Turner’s head and shoulders slumped. He heard Levi Waller’s family screaming. He saw their faces. If they had gotten to the still earlier, Waller’s family might still be alive. A tear stung his cheek. “I thank God that I feel this sorrow,” he whispered to himself.

  Then their faces and screams were replaced by those of the captives he’d known. He saw his mother’s tears and her shame. He saw and heard the witnesses, and he saw Misha and her baby floating away on the water. He felt their heartbreak, their humiliation, their shame. Nat Turner lifted his head, righted his shoulders. “How many children have you killed?”

  In one swift movement, Trezvant rose to his feet and struck him. Nat Turner tasted salty blood as he toppled from his stool to the floor. Trezvant’s boot moved in slow motion and Nat Turner felt bright, white pain across the bridge of his nose.

  Harriet

  Chapter 74

  Boston

  1856

  Harriet had thought she wanted to listen; she had thought she was ready. She had thought she had the courage to hear.

  But she felt accused. She felt angry. She had done nothing wrong.

  She had given her life and sacrificed her reputation working to abolish slavery. The guilt and anger she felt was not rational. She did not create slavery. She owned no slaves. She tried to help, had risked her life and reputation to help. But she felt guilt just the same, and Harriet wanted it to stop.

  “How could you know this?” The anger in her voice surprised her. She felt it, but she had not wanted William to know. “You were in the Great Dismal Swamp, were you not?” She was embarrassed by the cynicism that laced her voice but not embarrassed enough that she could control it. “You were not there! How could you know this?” She did not call William a liar, but she wanted to believe he was. It would have been easier than feeling what she felt. She had done nothing, but she felt convicted.

  William was calm. “There were others there. There are always those who go unnoticed—as long as they do not move too suddenly, as long as they are quiet. The truth is carried on whispers and birds’ wings.

  “There were even those in the courtroom who wanted the truth known.”

  Harriet thought of William Parker, the lawyer who acted as Nat Turner’s defense attorney, and she recalled the mysterious letter that had sent her on her most recent journey.

  Harriet’s hand shook when she lifted her teacup. Though she fought it, everything within her felt convicted. “I feel as though you are attacking me, Mr. Love.” She rested the jittering cup back on its saucer. “All white people are not responsible. I did not create slavery. All white people are not evil.”

  “I only speak the truth of what happened.”

  “But Nat Turner was a murderer!” Harriet was surprised at the bitterness in her tone. “You try to paint him as a hero.”

  William nodded. “Why is it so hard for you to allow us a hero?”

  “I hardly think ‘hero’ describes Nat Turner.”

  “Because he took up arms?” He shook his head.

  It was the same thing she had felt before, a kind of quiet antagonism, as though William were angry with everyone. His aggressiveness and senseless anger sparked hers; she had done nothing to him. She did not deserve to feel guilty.

  “You wanted to know the truth,” William said.

  Somehow she could not help feeling as if she and her family had played some part in forcing Nat Turner to be who and what he had become.

  Now William reached out and touched her hand. Harriet was stunned by what appeared to be kindness in his dark eyes. “We can stop.”

  She pulled her hand away and then wiped at the tears on her face.

  “It is not easy or pleasant for any of us. That is why we must work hard to end it.”

  “I didn’t do it!” Harriet wept.

  He nodded. “Still, all of us must work to clean up the mess. Part of ending it is facing the truth.”

  Harriet dabbed at her face. “Forgive me.”

  William shrugged and shook his head. “We may stop,” he repeated.

  “Continue,” she said, and then braced herself.

  Nat Turner

  Chapter 75

  Cross Keys

  1831

  What must it feel like to sail, sailing away,

  Watching the prow of a great ship cut through the water?

  What must it feel like to stand, standing as master of the ship,

  Riding the waves beneath you?

  What must it feel like to step, stepping on sandy shores,

  Dining on French pastries, drinking Turkish coffee?

  What must it feel like to ride, riding in a grand carriage,

  Bustling down the cobblestone streets of the capital,

  Having men and women wave the flag and call you hero?

  What would it be like to sit, sitting in a
cabin before a golden fire,

  Bouncing his son on his knee with his wife smiling at him across the table?

  What would it be like to see, seeing another spring,

  Hearing the first robins and seeing apple blossoms?

  What must it feel like to swim, swimming in the ocean,

  Swimming until he disappeared from shore?

  Nat Turner was choking now, water all around him. He bobbed in the ocean, great waves crashing around him, choking him. He was going to drown.

  “WAKE UP, YOU devil!” Trezvant’s voice reached him through the waves. “Wake up!” Then, “Douse him again!”

  Come to, his face, hair, and shirt wet, Nat Turner sputtered and gasped for air. Trezvant’s voice had a false pleasantness. “That’s a boy. You must remember your place so you don’t make me angry.”

  It was difficult to see; Nat Turner imagined that both his eyes must be swelling shut. Trezvant stared at him, seeming to admire the knot Nat Turner felt pressing the center of his face. “All right, Preacher man, let’s try this all again.”

  Pounding the table one time and smiling another, it seemed to Nat Turner that all Trezvant’s questions ran together. Outside, the leaves drifted and swirled softly, translucent against the late afternoon sun. His mind drifted away… he felt Cherry’s warm hand on his face.

  STANDING IN THE moonlight, he watched her walk the path that he had left for her. Still under the trees, she skirted in and out of the moonlight. “I am black, but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon.” In the darkness, secreted among the grass, the trail of stones glowed green and blue and pink. She collected them as she walked so that no one else could follow.

  For months Nat Turner had been planning and planting and had managed to keep this secret in the woods to himself. Instead of tattered rags, he imagined Cherry in a white gown and shawl. When she stepped into the moonlight, her feet touched the carpet of rose of Sharon that glowed silver, like her gown, in the moonlight.