d finding that he was
willing to make a full and free confession of the origin, progress and
consummation of the insurrectory movements of the slaves of which he was
the contriver and head; I determined for the gratification of public
curiosity to commit his statements to writing, and publish them, with
little or no variation, from his own words. That this is a faithful
record of his confessions, the annexed certificate of the County Court
of Southampton, will attest. They certainly bear one stamp of truth and
sincerity. He makes no attempt (as all the other insurgents who were
examined did,) to exculpate himself, but frankly acknowledges his full
participation in all the guilt of the transaction. He was not only the
contriver of the conspiracy, but gave the first blow towards its
execution.

It will thus appear, that whilst every thing upon the surface of society
wore a calm and peaceful aspect; whilst not one note of preparation was
heard to warn the devoted inhabitants of woe and death, a gloomy fanatic
was revolving in the recesses of his own dark, bewildered, and
overwrought mind, schemes of indiscriminate massacre to the whites.
Schemes too fearfully executed as far as his fiendish band proceeded in
their desolating march. No cry for mercy penetrated their flinty bosoms.
No acts of remembered kindness made the least impression upon these
remorseless murderers. Men, women and children, from hoary age to
helpless infancy were involved in the same cruel fate. Never did a band
of savages do their work of death more unsparingly. Apprehension for
their own personal safety seems to have been the only principle of
restraint in the whole course of their bloody proceedings. And it is not
the least remarkable feature in this horrid transaction, that a band
actuated by such hellish purposes, should have resisted so feebly, when
met by the whites in arms. Desperation alone, one would think, might
have led to greater efforts. More than twenty of them attacked Dr.
Blunt's house on Tuesday morning, a little before day-break, defended by
two men and three boys. They fled precipitately at the first fire; and
their future plans of mischief, were entirely disconcerted and broken
up. Escaping thence, each individual sought his own safety either in
concealment, or by returning home, with the hope that his participation
might escape detection, and all were shot down in the course of a few
days, or captured and brought to trial and punis