Jefferson's Nephews: A Frontier TragedyU of Nebraska Press, 01.01.2004 - 462 Seiten The brutal axe murder and dismemberment of a Negro slave, committed in 1811 by two brothers, Lilburne and Isham Lewis, whose mother was Thomas Jefferson?s sister and whose father was his first cousin, form the core of this historical detective story and account of frontier life in western Kentucky in the first decades of the nineteenth century. On the night of December 15, 1811, drunk and enraged over the breaking of a pitcher, Lilburne bound his seventeen-year-old slave, George, and, in front of the assembled household?s other slaves, cut off his head. The brothers were indicted for murder, released on bail, and attempted suicide. Boynton Merrill Jr. explores the tragic combination of circumstances and social forces that culminated in this ghastly event: the lawlessness of the frontier settlements, the dehumanizing effects of chattel slavery, and the Lewis family?s history of mental instability and their ever-declining fortunes. |
Inhalt
Colonial Days | 3 |
The Fight for Freedom | 12 |
A Colonel in the Militia | 20 |
Prosperity | 29 |
The Virginia Planter | 38 |
The Shipwreck of the Fortunes | 44 |
Craven Peyton Thomas Jefferson and the Hendersons | 55 |
Jefferson and the Lewises | 71 |
Slavery in Livingston | 234 |
Tremors in the Dynasty | 240 |
Annus Mirabilis | 248 |
The Murder | 256 |
After the Murder | 266 |
The First Grand Jury | 274 |
The True Bill | 285 |
The Graveyard | 293 |
The Plan to Emigrate | 84 |
The Trip to Kentucky | 97 |
The Land and Towns | 111 |
Houses and Crops | 123 |
The Smithland Neighbors | 134 |
Issues in West Kentucky 1808 | 143 |
The County Court | 151 |
The Year of Trouble 1809 | 163 |
Lilburne Enters Public Life | 175 |
The Church in West Kentucky | 189 |
The Presbyterian Lewises | 203 |
Insecurity | 215 |
Community Affairs 1810 | 226 |
The Orphans | 303 |
During the War | 312 |
The Aftereffects | 322 |
The Epilogue | 329 |
Notes on Lewis Genealogy | 339 |
The Colle Sale | 348 |
Lilburne Lewiss Estate | 359 |
NOTES | 371 |
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451 | |
457 | |
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Häufige Begriffe und Wortgruppen
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