Not picky at all, Brent--enlightening.  Thanks.

I had forgotten (if I ever knew) that the name Prosser was not how  
Gabriel identified himself.  That's important information, all the  
moreso because the Library of Congress has gotten the matter wrong in  
its subject headings, such as the following:

Prosser, Gabriel, ca. 1775-1800

This needs to be corrected.

As for your point about "conspiracy" rather than "rebellion":  no  
argument there, but since Doug Egerton chose to call his book  
Gabriel's Rebellion, that one may be a lost cause.

--Jurretta


On Sep 4, 2007, at 8:07 AM, Tarter, Brent (LVA) wrote:

> I'm gonna be charged with being picky, picky, picky, as editors often
> are, but:
>
> There are no contemporary documents that refer to Gabriel with a
> surname. If he had one, it does not appear in the records. There is no
> evidence and little reason to believe that he adopted the surname  
> of his
> owner or that his friends and coconspirators, who never referred to  
> him
> as Gabriel Prosser, applied that name to him.
>
> His name was Gabriel. The trial records often refer to him as  
> Prosser's
> Gabriel to distinguish him from another Gabriel who was the enslaved
> property of another white man.
>
> And there was no rebellion. There would have been if a flood hadn't
> washed out the bridges and made it impossible for the conpirators to
> assemble and if two men hadn't given away the secret so that the
> authorities could be alerted.
>
> It was therefore Gabriel's Conpiracy. And it was Gabriel, not Gabriel
> Prosser.
>
> Brent Tarter
> The Library of Virginia
> [log in to unmask]
>
> Please note the new w-mail address.
>
> Please visit the Library of Virginia's Web site at
> http://www.lva.virginia.gov