Nat Turner remains a name as inspirational for the oppressed as it is terrifying for the ruling class. Briggs, the former leader of the African Blood Brotherhood, bows his head in respect on the 199th anniversary of Turner’s execution.

‘Nat Turner, Negro Champion and Martyr’ by Cyril V. Briggs. Vol. 7 No. 271. November 11, 1930.

TODAY, November 11, is the anniversary of the murder by the American slave holding class of the Negro revolutionary leader, Nat Turner.

On this day while the American bourgeoisie make a mockery of the working-class dead in the last war with their fake phrases of democracy, self-determination, etc., the thoughts of the Negro masses and of the revolutionary white workers will turn to the heroic figure of Nat Turner, the daring Negro revolutionary who with sixty followers challenged the power of the slave-holding state of Virginia and threw terror into the hearts of the brutal slave owners of that day.

Bosses Try to Destroy Revolutionary Traditions.

The American bosses, with the support of the treacherous Negro petty bourgeois misleaders (preachers, landlords, businessmen) have very nearly succeeded in wiping out of the minds of the Negro masses all revolutionary traditions.

The white imperialists and their Negro tools have set up in the place of such heroic figures as Nat Turner, Frederick Douglas, Denmark Vesey, etc., the pitiful figures of such serviles and traitors as Booker T. Washington and the even more despicable Moton. By pretending that Negroes are “inferior,” that their character and role have been immemorially servile and subordinate the imperialist oppressors seek to justify their savage oppression and super-exploitation of the Negro masses.

In support of this policy, the utmost care is taken by the prostitute bourgeois historians to consistently present the picture of the Negro as a slave, satisfied with his slave status and incapable of revolt. This policy is faithfully supported by misleaders like Kelly Miller, and the officials of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the Urban League and other Negro reformist organizations.

Negro Misleaders Support Enemy.

To these Negro misleaders any thought of the frightfully oppressed Negro masses joining ranks with the revolutionary white workers of this country for the overthrow of their mutual oppressors is unthinkable and horrible. For these traitors there is, then, no inspiration in revolutionary traditions. For the Negro masses, however, groaning under a ruthless oppression and virtual slavery, the case is different.

Nat Turner launched his revolt on the night of August 31, 1831. John Brown invaded Virginia with 19 men, and with the expressed determination to take no lives save in self-defense. Nat Turner, far more resolute and capable, attacked Virginia from within, with only six men, and with the revolutionary determination to spare no life of the slave-holding class until slavery was completely crushed.

Slaves Flock To Arms.

The slaves quickly rallied to his standard, and before the night was over he had sixty followers armed with whatever weapons came to hand.

The white slave owners quaked with fear in memory of countless wrongs inflicted upon the insurrected slaves, of men and women savagely beaten, of many wantonly murdered, of countless Negro women habitually polluted. Blind panic took possession of the slave owning class, that not even the arrival of United States troops and naval detachments served to dispel.

Nat Turner’s strategy was based upon a surprise attack and a quick march on Jerusalem, the county seat. Persuaded to pause at one of the plantations, he failed in his objective of reaching Jerusalem with its huge stores of arms and munitions. His force thereafter became fugitives.

Most of the revolted slaves refused to surrender, preferring to die fighting than to accept the fate in store for those who fell into the hands of the master class now recovered from its terror and in a frenzy of fury determined to make an example of the rebellious slaves. A bloody reign of terror was initiated. Thousands of Negroes were murdered in cold blood regardless of whether they had participated in the revolt. The aim was to terrorize the slaves.

Nat Turner Fearless to the End.

Nat Turner took his capture with the utmost equanimity. Cool and fearless to the last, he made no denial of his leadership of the revolt, but like a good revolutionary, utilized the courts of the master class as a tribunal from which o thunder his denunciations against the oppressors of his race.

He was sentenced to death on November 5, and was executed six days later, on November 11. Even his enemies record that he met his death with perfect composure.

Long live the memory of Nat Turner, Negro Revolutionary Leader!

Long live the Revolutionary traditions of the Negro Masses!

Long live the international solidarity of Negro and white workers!

Support the struggle of the Negro Masses for full equality and the right of self-determination!

Down with the servile reformist misleaders who today betray the struggles of the Negro Masses!

The Daily Worker began in 1924 and was published in New York City by the Communist Party US and its predecessor organizations. Among the most long-lasting and important left publications in US history, it had a circulation of 35,000 at its peak. The Daily Worker came from The Ohio Socialist, published by the Left Wing-dominated Socialist Party of Ohio in Cleveland from 1917 to November 1919, when it became became The Toiler, paper of the Communist Labor Party. In December 1921 the above-ground Workers Party of America merged the Toiler with the paper Workers Council to found The Worker, which became The Daily Worker beginning January 13, 1924.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1930/v07-n271-NY-nov-11-1930-DW-LOC.pdf