h, and
plundered and burnt the houses of Sacheveral, Nash, Spry, and others.
They killed all the white people they found, and recruited their ranks
from the Negroes they met. Gov. Bull was "returning to Charleston from
the southward, met them, and, observing them armed, quickly rode out
of their way."[495] In a march of twelve miles, they had wrought a
work of great destruction. News reached Wiltown, and the militia were
called out. The Negro insurrectionists were intoxicated with their
triumph, and drunk from rum they had taken from the houses they had
plundered. They halted in an open field to sing and dance; and, during
their hilarity, Capt. Bee, at the head of the troops of the district,
fell upon them, and, having killed several, captured all who did not
make their escape in the woods.

The Province was thrown into intense excitement. The Legislature
called attention to the insurrection,[496] and declared legal some
very questionable and summary acts. In 1743 the people had not
recovered from the fright they received from the insurrection. On the
7th of May, 1743, an Act was passed requiring every white male
inhabitant, who resorted "to any church or any other public place of
divine worship, within" the Province to "carry with him a gun or a
pair of horse pistols, in good order and fit for service, with at
least six charges of gun-powder and ball," upon pain of paying "twenty
shillings."

As there was a law against teaching slaves to read and write, there
were no educated preachers. If a Negro desired to preach to his
fellow-slaves, he had to secure written permission from his master.
While Negroes were sometimes baptized into the communion of the
Church,--usually the Episcopal Church,--they were allowed only in the
gallery, or organ-loft, of white congregations, in small numbers. No
clergyman ventured to break unto this benighted people the bread of
life. They were abandoned to the superstitions and religious
fanaticisms incident to their condition.

In 1704 an Act was passed "_for raising and enlisting such slaves as
shalt be thought serviceable to this Province in time of Alarms_." It
required, within thirty days after the publication of the Act, that
the commanders of military organizations throughout the Province
should appoint "five freeholders," "sober and discreet men," who were
to make a complete list of all the able-bodied slaves in their
respective districts. Three of them were competent to decide up