 Our group project centers around: › The earliest African- Americans › The challenges they faced › How their actions affected the lives of future African- Americans

 Many theories exist  Many historians believe that the rebels were planning the rebellion for a while, but never had the opportunity  That opportunity came when the South Carolina Colonial Assembly passed the Security Act of 1739  The slaves were able to revolt because all white males who carry firearms had their firearms at church

 The Stono Rebellion took place on Sunday, September 9, 1739  Twenty slaves, lead by an Angolan named Jemmy, raided a firearms store and killed the two white shopkeepers  They then headed South toward Florida, because the Spanish King passed a decree stating that any slave escaping to Florida would be granted freedom  The rampaging slaves killed all slave-owning whites, whether they were man, woman, or child, and set fire to plantations  Twenty-one whites were killed in all, and only one white, Lieutenant Governor William Bull, was able to escape the fugitive slaves

 By eleven AM, the slave group was fifty strong  Lieutenant Governor Bull managed to call the militia, and around 100 were dispatched  The weary slaves stopped to rest in a field, and the militia caught up with them  A short firefight ensued, and by the end, forty- four slaves were killed  All but one of the escaping slaves were captured or killed within the next week, the one exception eluded capture for three years

 The South Carolina Colonial Assembly did not take lightly to this revolt  They hastily passed a law they had had in place for a while, but were reluctant to pass  Thus, the Negro Act of 1740 was passed  This act prohibited slaves from growing their own food, assembling in groups, earning money that went to them, not their master, and learning to read

 Many murders to make more space and air  Many suicides to get away from the torture  Many deaths from disease

 Slavery had caused a deep separation between North and South › South: slavery was important › North: opposed slavery  The conflict got worse over the issue of fugitive slaves.  Because slaves were treated as property in the South, slave owners felt it was their right to seek out and recapture slaves who had escaped to free Northern states.

 The slave act was when the federal government gave local authorities in both slave and free states the power to issue warrants to “remove” any black they thought to be an escaped slave.  It also made it a national crime to help a runaway slave.  This discouraged African American from running way because their chances of being free decreased.

 Some people saw this act as providing an excuse for the Southerners to kidnap free blacks.  Others did not like the ability of slave owners to repossess slaves who might have escaped many years ago and who had new lives in the North.  Northern states’ responded to the act by passing “personal liberty” laws, which protected suspected escaped slaves in various ways

 Our topics relate back to the theme of our presentation because: › The Stono Rebellion and the New York Rebellion relate because they and other rebellions of the 1700’s gave white people an excuse to control the lives of black people- whether they were slaves or not. › The Middle Passage relates because › The Fugitive Slave Act relates because