Tacky’s Revolt by Vincent Brown has been shortlisted for the 2020 Cundill History Prize. In Long’s estimation, Tacky’s elevation stemmed not from his leadership abilities or military experience but from his supposed resemblance to “some favourite leader of their nation in Africa.” Acknowledging Tacky as a “young man of good stature, and well made,” he called him “handsome, but rather of an effeminate than manly cast.” Mocking and demonizing black sexuality was an important part of establishing racial hierarchy, and Long hastened to add that Tacky “had flattered himself with the hope of obtaining (among other fruits of victory) the lieutenant governor’s lady for his concubine”-that lady being Edward Long’s eldest sister. This theory gave the insurrection an identifiable scapegoat, whom Long could blame and belittle all at once. Mary’s, was a matter pre-concerted, and known to all the chief men in the different districts and the secret was probably confided to some hundreds, for several months before the blow was struck. These circumstances show the great extent of the conspiracy, the strict correspondence which had been carried on by the Coromantins in every quarter of the island, and their almost incredible secrecy in the forming of their plan of insurrection for it appeared in evidence, that the first eruption in St. By contrast, the first named historian to interpret Tacky’s revolt, Edward Long, agreed with his fellow colonists that the rebellion had been carefully planned: Another perspective casts the slaves’ actions as mostly reactive responses to immediate circumstances and opportunities, rather than as the outcome of careful organizing. Historians sometimes view slave-conspiracy trials as evidence of panic, projections by slaveholders upon hapless victims. Something important is at stake in the answer to this question. Thomas in the East, and Westmoreland part of a general insurrection? The colonists were guessing based on evidence garnered from torture, and historians have little more to go on than their speculations. Only the plotters truly knew if their plans had called for a general uprising from the beginning.

Tacky's revolt book