The Resurrection of Nat Turner, Part 2: The Testimonial (20 page)

Judgment? At Turner's Meeting Place?

You are My precious sons and daughters! And they have cast lots for My people; and have given a boy for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink.

And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death. If a man be found stealing any of his brethren of the children of Israel, and maketh merchandise of him, or selleth him; then that thief shall die; and thou shalt put evil away from among you. It is the law: Death is the judgment.

He was an ordinary man, even smaller than most.

The captors will be stunned by the loss of their children and loved ones, just as it was in Egypt long ago. Rage will fill them.

They will bear you in chains to Jerusalem. They will hang you from a tree. But even then they will not be satisfied.

Nat Turner saw a vision of himself being beaten. He was bloody, bound in chains, and being dragged to Jerusalem. He saw himself standing before ten judges. Why would ten judges hear the case of a slave?

As Nat Turner was lowered again to his resting place, the breezes of the Great Dismal Swamp whispered to him.
And ye shall be brought before governors and kings for My sake, for a testimony against them and the Gentiles.

They will hate you for doing what I have commanded. They will hate you because you have heard My words.

They will mourn at the lost families and say they will promise to set My people free. They will say your blood is enough. They will make promises to free the captives. But then their hearts will harden. They are a stiff-necked people. Like Egypt, they will make things worse for My children. In the end, they will not free the captives until the nation's blood has been shed, until their own blood has watered the earth. The war has already been loosed in heaven.

Then the voice of God spoke to him of a more distant future.

I will raise up an army to fight for you; they will take up arms against themselves. And the brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death. And ye shall be hated of all men for My name's sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.

Nat Turner saw men wading through fields, carrying weapons. He saw white men fighting other white men, saw their blood sprinkled on the corn. Then he saw black men fighting with white.

My children will be free in name, but it will not be over. Those who hold them captive will remain prideful and arrogant. They will put themselves first while they ignore the suffering of others. They will demand for themselves the best homes, the best food, the best of everything, while others around them suffer.

But despite them, freedom will come. They will see before their eyes the valleys being exalted and the hills being leveled. They will see the crooked places being made straight, just as I promised. They will see before their eyes Ethiopia being exalted. Princes shall come out of Egypt; Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God. They will see the end coming and the threat of their own captivity, but they will still be hard-hearted and refuse to repent and turn. They will rail and set themselves against what I do.

He had already sacrificed so much, too much. Everything Nat
Turner dreamed of had been taken away from him. He had lost his dreams and the only family he had ever had. Why did he have to give more? Why give his life?

I have called you from beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, My son. You will not live to see freedom. You will fall for My sake; the yoke of Jesus will be upon you. It is a hard thing to hear; but the first resurrection will be your reward.

Behold, at that time I will undo all that afflict thee: and I will save her that halteth, and gather her that was driven out; and I will get them praise and fame in every land where they have been put to shame.

At that time will I bring you again, even in the time that I gather you: for I will make you a name and a praise among all people of the earth, when I turn back your captivity before your eyes.

But we have waited too long. We have cried ourselves dry. We have fainted, and we have died.

Will you take up My yoke?

I am not Jonah or the Prophet Nathan. I am not a prince or a prophet. Just a slave.

You are who I say you are.

Whereas thou has been forsaken and hated… I will make thee an eternal excellency, a joy of many generations. Thou shalt know that I the Lord am thy Savior and thy Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob. Violence shall no more be heard in thy land, wasting nor destruction within thy borders; but thou shalt call thy walls Salvation, and thy gates Praise. The sun shall be no more thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee: but the Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory. Thy sun shall no more go down; neither shall thy moon withdraw itself: for the Lord shall be thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended.

Thy people also shall be all righteous: They shall inherit the land forever, the branch of My planting, the work of My hands, that I may be glorified.

When strength came back to him, Nat Turner opened his eyes.
Still lying on the ground, he thought of the woman he had seen tethered by the canal. He thought of Cherry and his mother, he thought of Hark, and Nat Turner thought of his son. He thought of poor Mother Easter, and the girl Charlotte. What peace and joy would he have knowing that they were left behind and suffering? He thought of the babies and the old ones abandoned by the road.

He sat up, bowed his head, and prayed. He prayed for forgiveness. He prayed for strength, courage, and wisdom to obey all God had commanded. And because he knew the wrath of God, Nat Turner prayed for his enemies.

He saw Sallie and young Putnam; he saw the Whiteheads and John Clarke Turner. The people whom God had called to judgment were people he had known all his life. He had lived among them. Nat Turner prayed that, like Xerxes and all of Nineveh, the people of Turner's Meeting Place would turn, repent, give mercy, and beg for their own.

He rose and bathed himself in the brown, healing water of the stream that ran beside him. He ate enough to fortify himself. Then he fell asleep humming an old Methodist hymn he had been taught as a boy.

Equip me for the war,

And teach my hands to fight,

My simple, upright heart prepare,

And guide my words aright;

Control my every thought,

My whole of sin remove;

Let all my works in thee be wrought,

Let all be wrought in love.

It was a tune he had not thought of in years.

O arm me with the mind,

Meek Lamb! which was in thee,

And let my knowing zeal be joined

With perfect charity;

With calm and tempered zeal

Let me enforce thy call,

And vindicate thy gracious will

Which offers life to all.

He slept, deeper than he had slept in years, and then rose at daybreak. Nat Turner left Hebron, peace, and freedom behind him—he made his way back through the forest. He made his way back to Cross Keys.

H
e left the covering of the trees, the healing stream, and made his way back into the world of white men. After a month in the spongy marsh, the ground outside was hard and dusty under his feet, and Nat Turner saw the roads and the farms differently. The world outside, with its houses and farms, had seemed natural to him before his time in the Great Dismal. Now, as he traveled back, it seemed to him that the trees had been taken captive and that much of the land had been starved, raped, and finally murdered.

All his life, his mother reminded him that they were captives and not slaves. As Nat Turner walked, he began to understand. There was hopelessness and resignation in the word “slave.” But there was hope for captives—captivity could be turned. Those held captive were stolen, and manstealing was a sin, a sin punishable by death.

On the third night after leaving the Great Dismal Swamp, Nat Turner had reached Southampton County and Cross Keys. He stood at the edge of Giles Reese's farm. The house was dark except for dim candlelight shining from the window of the room where Cherry slept.

By now the ship that hired him had set sail. By now he could have been on board in free waters. Instead he was in Southampton about to give himself back into the hands of his captors. But he wanted to see his wife first. He wanted to, for once in his life, and maybe the only time, stand in front of her as a free man.

He hooted to her like an owl, hoping she would awaken and recognize his call. He hid himself behind a tree where he would be
able to see her if she came to the back door. He called three times before he saw someone stirring inside. When she came to the door, Nat Turner stepped out of the shadows to reveal himself.

Cherry ran to him and wrapped him in her arms. He felt her warm tears on his face. He didn't know what to say, so he said nothing. He ran with her to the great oak.

She whispered into his ear, “You could have gotten away. You could have hidden someplace where no one knew your name. I imagined you in Philadelphia or on board a ship sailing to Ethiopia. Why would you come back here?”

Nat Turner felt the warmth of his wife's body pressed against his own. No man could separate them, no law. He might not see her, they might be miles apart, but they would always be one. “How could I leave the one who is my life? I will never leave you. I will never leave my family again.” They held each other and swayed underneath the moon and stars as if there was music playing. “I will never leave you.”

He was humbled by her love, by her beauty. She had been scarred and shamed, she had been abandoned, but she found the courage to still love him. “I will never leave you again,” Nat Turner promised.

Cross Keys

February 1831

T
en years had passed since Nat Turner's return from the Great Dismal Swamp. Now he waited for a sign. Standing next to Yellow Nelson, he looked over the Whitehead farm, then back toward the fields, toward the singing. No one told the love story like a prostitute, a leper, a slave. There was nothing like God loving you when everyone and everything said He should not, including the law.

He had learned to give thanks for them—for the singing captives and their troubles—just as he did for the cold and the frost on the ground.

They believed each day might be the day when God would turn their captivity. It was strange that no one seemed to believe God's promises more than those who had already paid with their blood.

Since his return, Nat Turner had continued his prayers—for the captives and for the captors. He prayed that he would be ready for war at the same time that he prayed for change, hoping there would be no need to be ready. He prayed that the captors would turn, and each day, with the miracle of each new sun, he prayed for the miracle of new hearts. He prayed for mercy. He prayed for vengeance, that the captors would receive their just reward.

How long, Lord?
The men were tired and angry. The women were heartbroken. The children had never learned hope.

Nat Turner carried a burden—a burden from his mother and from Christ's yoke—he hoped he would never have to lay on his people's
shoulders. Every day he prayed for mercy for his enemies—his brothers. Every day he prayed that the call he'd been given would not have to be fulfilled, that they would choose mercy and not judgment.

God had given him the gift of His holy confession, but it was a weighty gift. It was a God-sized burden resting on his too-human shoulders.

Every day he prayed it would not happen. Every day part of him tried to convince himself that he had hallucinated. But when he looked around him, at the suffering of the people, Nat Turner knew it was true and he waited for a sign.

He preached to those who would listen to the warning that God had given. Most of them laughed and called him crazy. No white man would listen to a word from a black man, not even a word sent from God. But there was the case of the cruel overseer Ethelred Brantley.

Brantley was known and admired about Cross Keys, in Jerusalem, and throughout Southampton County as a violent and sadistic man. There was nothing he would not do to torment a captive. He had been known to hack limbs off those he had charge over for missing quotas. He smiled as he beat them, even killed them—man, woman, or child.

But there was a time when, covered with boils, Brantley sought out Nat Turner. Brantley had heard there was healing in Nat Turner's hands. He preached to Brantley God's warning. Nat Turner expected the man to beat him, to be like Pharaoh, but instead Brantley fell to his knees and begged forgiveness. He became a follower of the way and begged to be baptized.

Many of the slaves had grumbled at the thought of Brantley being forgiven. They had nodded agreement—though for different reasons—when Richard Whitehead, the pastor of Turner's Meeting Place, refused to baptize him.

“How dare you approach me, you savage? You might be pampered and fawned over by others, but I know who you are. I've known who you were since we were boys. You are a soulless demon
using your tongue and your wit to fool innocent people. But I know who you are!” Richard Whitehead spit at him.

“You may think you are more than the others, but you are nothing. I would no more baptize you, no more baptize you with Jesus' sweet name than I would a dog!”

Whitehead pointed a shotgun at the two of them. “You have seduced this fool Brantley, Nat Turner, but you will not fool me. You are a cunning one, aren't you. What is your plan, to be baptized and then petition the court for your freedom? You heathen!