Mar 20 at 10:30 AM - Sale 2697 -

Sale 2697 - Lot 358

Estimate: $ 600 - $ 900
(SLAVERY.) Newspaper accounts of two early slave rebellions, one in Curaçao and one on a slave ship off the coast of Africa, in an issue of the "New-York Gazette Revived in the Weekly Post-Boy." 4 pages, 12¼ x 8½ inches, on one folding sheet; folds, moderate foxing, crude stitch holes. New York: James Parker, 6 August 1750
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Two stirring reports of slave uprisings can be found on page 3. In one, the slave ship Ann of Liverpool was leaving the coast of what is now Gabon, "when having 60 Negroes on board, and the most of their white Men being sick, the Negroes secretly got the Powder and Arms, and about 3 o'Clock in the Morning, rose upon the Whites; and after wounding all of them very much, except two who hid themselves; they run the Vessel ashore a little to the southward of Cape Lopez, and made their Escape." The mostly sick and wounded crewmen barely made it ashore themselves before the ship sank, and some perished.

Next is the story of an uprising on the Dutch-ruled Caribbean island of Curaçao, where the planters spent three weeks "racking and executing a Parcel of new Negroes, who had plotted to destroy all the Whites and creole Negroes in the Island; which they began on a Plantation belonging to the West-India Company, where they cut of the Head of one white Man and several Negroes, and were marching to Town armed. . . . 38 of the Negroes had been executed, most of whom were rack'd, cut open, and their Hearts taken out and dash'd in their Faces. It was observed that the chief of them died stubborn and resolute, and would not move or speak a Word."

In the fore-edge margin of the first page is a New York slave sale advertisement: "A likely Negro Wench, about 23 Years old, to be sold. Enquire of the Printer hereof."

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