Gullah Jack (died July 12, 1822), also known as Couter Jack and sometimes referred to as "Gullah" Jack Pritchard, was an African Methodist and Hoodoo conjurer whom Paul Pritchard enslaved in

Charleston, South Carolina Charleston is the List of municipalities in South Carolina, most populous city in the U.S. state of South Carolina. The city lies just south of the geographical midpoint of South Carolina's coastline on Charleston Harbor, an inlet of the Atla ...

Background

Little is known about his background, except that he was of Angolan origin and was shipped from

Zanzibar Zanzibar is a Tanzanian archipelago off the coast of East Africa. It is located in the Indian Ocean, and consists of many small Island, islands and two large ones: Unguja (the main island, referred to informally as Zanzibar) and Pemba Island. ...

to America under Zephaniah Kingsley's direction. He was sent first to Florida, to the

Kingsley Plantation Kingsley Plantation (also known as the Zephaniah Kingsley Plantation Home and Buildings) is the site of a former estate on Fort George Island, in Duval County, Florida, that was named for its developer and most famous owner, Zephaniah Kingsle ...

. However, in 1812 after a

Seminole The Seminole are a Native American people who developed in Florida in the 18th century. Today, they live in Oklahoma and Florida, and comprise three federally recognized tribes: the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma, the Seminole Tribe of Florida, ...

raid on the Kingsley Plantation, he escaped to

, where he was eventually purchased by Paul Pritchard in 1821.

Role in the 1822 Slave Revolt

Gullah Jack is known for his role as a co-conspirator, along with

Denmark Vesey Denmark Vesey (also Telemaque) (July 2, 1822) was a Free Negro, free Black man and community leader in Charleston, South Carolina, who was accused and convicted of planning a major Slave rebellion, slave revolt in 1822. Although the alleged pl ...

, in planning the rebellion that would become known as Denmark Vesey's slave conspiracy in 1822. Both Vesey and Gullah Jack were involved in some capacity with the

AME Church The African Methodist Episcopal Church, usually called the AME Church or AME, is a Methodist denomination based in the United States. It adheres to Wesleyan–Arminian theology and has a connexional polity. It cooperates with other Methodist ...

in Charleston. It was at the AME Church that Vesey recruited Gullah Jack for his planned uprising in Charleston. Using his

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

-based influences, Gullah Jack was crucial in recruiting African-born enslaved people as soldiers and provided them with charms as protection against the " buckra" (whites). He is also said to have used his spiritual powers to terrify others into keeping silent about the conspiracy. Historians believe Jack's strong African culture, contrasted against Vesey's preaching, helped attract many of the enslaved people that joined the revolt. The Vesey plot involved taking over the state armory to arm enslaved people from rural areas and the local sea islands, who would rise and assist the others in revolt. The enslaved people would then kill the whites of Charleston, take the city, and finally use the city's ships to escape, supposedly, to

Haiti Haiti, officially the Republic of Haiti, is a country on the island of Hispaniola in the Caribbean Sea, east of Cuba and Jamaica, and south of the Bahamas. It occupies the western three-eighths of the island, which it shares with the Dominican ...

, where enslaved people had overthrown the white government and now ruled. Eventually, the Vesey plot was leaked by other enslaved people who were coerced into confession. Gullah Jack was arrested for his part in the plot on July 5, 1822, and was tried for his role in the planning, along with 130 others. Ultimately, South Carolina authorities

hanged Hanging is killing a person by suspending them from the neck with a noose or ligature strangulation, ligature. Hanging has been a standard method of capital punishment since the Middle Ages, and has been the primary execution method in numerou ...

Vesey, Gullah Jack, and 34 other leading conspirators.

References

Bibliography

* Rodriguez, Junius P., ''The Historical encyclopedia of world slavery, Volume 1; Volume 7'', ABC-CLIO, 1997,

External links

Executions in the U.S. 1608-1987: The Espy File (by state)
(

PDF Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...

) * Murrin, John M. & Johnson, Paul E. & McPherson, James M. & Gerstle, Gary & Rosenberg, Emily S. & Rosenberg, Norman L. (2002). ''Liberty Equality Power: A History of the American People Volume I: To 1877'' (3rd ed.). Wadsworth: Thomson Learning. .
Starobin, Robert S. "Terror in South Carolina 1822: An Introduction to Denmark Vesey & the Slave Conspiracy in Charleston". ''ChickenBones: A Journal'', 5 October 2007.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gullah Jack Year of birth missing 1822 deaths Methodists from South Carolina American people of Angolan descent American rebel slaves 19th-century American slaves 19th-century executions by the United States 19th-century African-American people People executed by South Carolina by hanging Executed African-American people Executed Angolan people 19th-century executions of American people 1822 crimes in the United States Hoodoo conjurors People enslaved in South Carolina Rebel slaves