For
instance in 1856 when an unruly slave on a plantation shortly below New
Orleans upon being threatened with punishment seized an axe and was
thereupon shot by his overseer, the rumor of an insurrection quickly ran to
and through the city.[25]
[Footnote 22: _Columbian Museum and Savannah Advertiser_ (Savannah, Ga.),
Feb. 24, 1797.]
[Footnote 23: Paducah _Kentuckian_, quoted in the New Orleans _Bee_, Apr.
3, 1844.]
[Footnote 24: New Orleans _Bee_, Aug. 1, 1845, citing the Arkansas
_Southern Shield_.]
[Footnote 25: New Orleans _Daily Tropic_, Feb. 16, 1846.]
If all such rumors as this, many of which had equally slight basis, were
assembled, the catalogue would reach formidable dimensions. A large number
doubtless escaped record, for the newspapers esteemed them "a delicate
subject to touch";[26] and many of those which were recorded, we may be
sure, have not come to the investigator's notice. A survey of the revolts
and conspiracies and the rumors of such must nevertheless be attempted; for
their influence upon public thought and policy, at least from time to time,
was powerful.
[Footnote 26: _Federal Union_ (Milledgeville, Ga.), Dec. 23, 1856,
editorial.
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