Celia a Slave summary
Chapter 3 summary
As the search proceeds, someone suggests that George might know something about Robert's disappearance. William Powell, one of Robert Newsom's neighbors, and the self-appointed leader of the search party, finds George and demands information. Frightened, George tells Powell what he knows, immediately making Celia the prime suspect in Robert's disappearance. Furious, Powell begins to threaten Celia's life, and the lives of her children. Terrified, Celia tells half the truth: Robert entered her cabin, where Celia struck him with a stick. However, Celia claims that Robert, still alive, staggered out of the cabin. Among the ashes, Virginia finds small objects that belonged to her father, confirming Celia's gruesome story. The next morning, June 25, the case of State of Missouri v. Celia, a Slave begins. The inquest is conducted by two justices of the peace: D. M. Whyte and Isaac P. Howe. The Callaway sheriff arranges for two men, Thomas Shoatman and Jefferson Jones, to interrogate Celia about having accomplices. The two men are very different: Shoatman is relatively poor, and owns no property or slaves. Jones, on the other hand, is wealthy, and is one of the county's leading attorneys. He owns many slaves. Jones takes the leading role during Celia's questioning. Celia explains that Robert Newsom regularly raped her, and that she'd threatened to hurt him if he proceeded to do so. She insists that she had no help in killing him. In the weeks following the killing, Harry Newsom becomes furious with the local newspapers for misreporting the details of the story. He writes an angry letter to the Republican, a popular newspaper, pointing out that the murder didn't take place in a kitchen. However, he doesn't correct the single biggest error in the Republican's account: that Celia killed without cause. His reason is very simple: he doesn't want to broadcast the fact that his father was raping his slave.
ch 6
Celia is sentenced to be hanged on November 16. Her only hope is that the Missouri Supreme Court will intervene on her behalf, some time before her execution.
ch 7
Celia's defense team drafts an appeal to the Missouri Supreme Court, but its exact contents aren't known. What is known is that by early December, the Supreme Court hasn't made any reply to the appeal. Jameson realizes that Celia stands a very high likelihood of being executed before the Supreme Court responds. On the night of November 11, Celia and a fellow slave escape from jail. Shortly afterwards, she's recaptured, and the state sets a new execution date: December 21. In response to Celia's upcoming execution, Jameson and his two aides draft a remarkable letter to Abiel Leonard, a circuit court attorney, in which they express their personal feelings on the case. They write that they're highly sympathetic to Celia, and add that the issue of Celia's trail has divided the white community in Missouri. They beg Leonard and the circuit court to reexamine the trial record, which they insist shows that Judge William Hall gave illegal jury instructions and refused to make fair rulings for the defense.. Furthermore, once it appeared that the Missouri Supreme Court would have the opportunity to hear Celia's appeal after all (because the original date of the execution passed), Celia's allies may have returned her to jail, rather than violate further laws by moving her to a free state. In response to the Topeka Convention, supporters of slavery in Missouri and Kansas formed the "Law and Order party," and passed a resolution claiming that civil war would break out if Congress recognized the Free State party's constitution. By November, tensions between the two new political parties had reached their peak. Both sides armed themselves in preparation for war. Then, on November 21, a pro-slavery settler shot and killed a free state settler in the city of Lawrence, Kansas. The next day, the Free State party staged protests in the streets. David R. Atchinson sent armed men to confront the protesters in Lawrence, supposedly to "sustain the law."In late November, at a time when the state seemed to be on the verge of civil war, the Missouri Supreme Court met in St. Louis to address Celia's case. The three justices, William Scott, John F. Ryland, and Abiel Leonard, have all ruled against Dred Scott in 1852, suggesting that they'll most likely affirm the decision from Celia's trial. he court upholds the original decision and orders that Celia's execution be performed as ordered, at the end of the month. Jameson is out of legal means of preventing Celia's execution. It's clear that he considers Celia's conviction a "travesty of justice."
CHapter 4
Celia's trial is set to begin in October 1855. Around this time, a vigorous debate raged across America, concerning the morality of slavery. The previous year, Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois lent his support to the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which would allow slavery to expand into new federal territories, provided that a majority of the residents vote for it. In April 1855, members of the Blue Lodge, one of the self-protection societies founded by Atchinson, travel to Parkville to "protest" a local paper that has criticized Atchinson's electoral tampering. An angry mob runs the editors of the paper out of town. This leads many Northern papers to condemn Atchinson for his bully tactics. In July, James Shannon, the pro-slavery president of the University of Missouri, makes a speech in which he attacks the abolitionist cause and praises Atchinson. In the fall of 1855, opponents of slavery, calling themselves the Free State party, hold a convention in which they declare their own state constitution. Thus, Kansas now has two governments, each one claiming to represent a majority of the people. Because of all this, on the eve of Celia's trial, which is scheduled for October 9, 1855, slavery is rapidly becoming a violent political issue—not only in Kansas and Missouri, but throughout the country.
CHapter 2
In 1821, Missouri was admitted to the Union as a slave state, on the condition that Maine be admitted as a free state, and slavery be banned in all future territories north of Missouri. Southern politicians scored a huge victory: they created a process whereby slave states could be admitted into the Union, and pressured the federal government to give a slave state formal recognition. By the 1840s, Callaway was one of the leading slave counties in the state. This time, Missouri is divided on the issue: one of the state's two senators, David R. Atchinson, supports the expansion while the other, Thomas Hart Benton, does not. In the years leading up to 1855, Celia begins a romantic relationship with another slave, George. Some time shortly before June 23, 1855, Celia confronts Robert Newsom directly. She tells him that he must stop raping her, but doesn't say that she's in a relationship with George—instead, she tells Robert that she's been sick because of her pregnancy. She beats Robert over the head, two times, since she's afraid that if she hesitates, he'll attack her. Robert crumples to the floor, dead. she'll burn Robert's body in her fireplace, destroying any evidence that she killed him.
Chapter 5 summary
The judge at Celia's trial is a man named William Augustus Hall. The defense attorney for Celia is John Jameson, the uncle of Jefferson Jones. He's a respected figure in the county, not just as a community leader but as a gregarious, fun-loving fellow. He's served in the Missouri House of Representatives, but failed to distinguish himself as a great politician. Hall appoints two additional attorneys to the defense, to assist Jameson with research. The first is Nathan Chapman Kouns, the son of a prominent Missouri slave owner. Nathan is a young man, and this is his first trial. The second is Isaac M. Boulware.The defense begins by pleading Celia not guilty to the charge of murder. The next day, the prosecution calls its first witness, Jefferson Jones. Jones reports that, during his interview with Celia, Celia claimed she'd had "sexual intercourse" with Robert Newsom, and that she'd tried to end the sexual relationship with Newsom.
ch 8
The rape of female slaves was all-too common during the antebellum period. Female slaves whose masters raped them often had no way of retaliating. They couldn't band together with other slaves, meaning that whatever retaliation they could muster had to be individual. During the antebellum period, the vast majority of white women from slave-owning families tolerated the rape of female slaves. White women were themselves their husbands' property, and weren't in a position where they could easily oppose the rape of slaves. Celia's case also raises some important points about antebellum law. Southern laws recognized slave owners' right to own slaves as property. And yet other Southern laws recognized that slaves were people, who had the right to live. When these two sets of laws came into conflict with each other, the American legal establishment almost always favored the property rights of the master over the human rights of the slave. Above all, Celia's case raises the fundamental problem with slavery. Abolitionists argued that slavery was an evil institution, and that slave owners knew, whether they admitted it or not, that it was evil to own another human being. In order to avoid the truth, slave owners hid behind various rationalizations: most notably that slaves were property, not people. It's impossible to calculate "the psychic cost" of those rationalizations, both for black and white Americans.
Chapter 1
The year is 1850, and Robert Newsom is a farmer living in Callaway County, Missouri. He's a father and a proud, financially independent farmer. In the early 19th century, he moved his family—a wife, her name lost to history, a son named Harry Newsom, another son named David Newsom, and a daughter named Virginia—from Virginia out to Missouri, in search of better land. The journey from Virginia to Missouri was probably hard, and the family probably traveled by canoe up the Missouri river. John Jameson is among the most respected people living in Callaway. In 1839, he's elected to serve in the Missouri House of Representatives
