American Uprising: The Untold Story of America’s Largest Slave Revolt

By Daniel Rasmussen

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It’s a good bet—anyone who knows anything about American history has heard of the slave revolts led by John Brown and Nat Turner. They resonate as symbols of slave resistance, signs of changing times and of a growing consciousness and conscience in the early 19^th-century population. But there was, according to author Rasmussen, another revolt that had far more impact and was of larger scale than either of the better known events. This occurred in 1811 in New Orleans and offers fascinating new insight into the rise of slavery in the South and our nation’s tragic course toward Civil War.

Rasmussen unearths for the reader a gripping tale of bravery. Not of ignorant, uneducated and downtrodden slaves, but of an elaborate, well-designed plot to take New Orleans and wrest freedom from slave owners.  In the end, the brave effort failed. More than 100 slaves from plantations across several states were slaughtered by Federal troops and French planters, their bodies or heads displayed for weeks afterward as a warning to others who might contemplate spreading the hope of freedom.

This is a highly recommended book, carefully researched and poignantly written, that brings to light a secret shame in our history.