tless some of the
blacks likewise.[90] The next, exposed in the fall of 1837, was in the
neighborhood of Alexandria. Nine slaves and three free negroes were hanged
in punishment,[91] and the negro Lewis who had betrayed the conspiracy was
liberated at state expense and was voted $500 to provide for his security
in some distant community.[92] The third was in Lafayette and St. Landry
Parishes, betrayed in August, 1840, by a slave woman named Lecide who was
freed by her master in reward. Nine negroes were hanged. Four white men
who were implicated, but who could not be convicted under the laws which
debarred slave testimony against whites, were severely flogged under a
lynch-law sentence and ordered to leave the state.[93] Rumors of other
plots were spread in West Feliciana Parish in the summer of 1841,[94] in
several parishes opposite and above Natchez in the fall of 1842,[95] and at
Donaldsonville at the beginning of 1843;[96] but each of these in turn was
found to be virtually baseless. Meanwhile at Augusta, Georgia, several
negroes were arrested in February, 1841, and at least one of them was
sentenced to death. A petition was circulated for his respite as an
inducement for confession; but other citizens, disquieted by the testimony
already given, prepared a counter petition asking the governor to let the
law take its course. The plot as described contemplated the seizure of the
arsenal and the firing of the city in facilitation of massacre.[97]

[Footnote 90: _Niles' Register_, XLIX, 331.]

[Footnote 91: _Ibid_., LIII, 129.]

[Footnote 92: Louisiana, _Acts_ of 1838, p. 118.]

[Footnote 93: _Niles' Register_, LXIX, 39, 88; E.P. Puckett, "Free Negroes
in Louisiana" (MS.).]

[Footnote 94: New Orleans _Bee_, July 23, 29 and 31, 1841.]

[Footnote 95: _Niles' Register_, LXIII, 212.]

[Footnote 96: _Louisiana Courier_ (New Orleans), Jan. 27 and Feb. 17,
1843.]

[Footnote 97: Letter of Mrs. S.A. Lamar, Augusta, Ga., Feb. 25, 1841, to
John B. Lamar at Macon. MS. in the possession of Mrs. A.S. Erwin, Athens,
Ga.]

The rest of the 'forties and the first half of the 'fifties were a period
of comparative quiet; but in 1855 there were rumors in Dorchester and
Talbot Counties, Maryland,[98] and the autumn of 1856 brought widespread
disturbances which the Southern whites did not fail to associate with the
rise of the Republican Party. In the latter part of that year there were
rumors afloat from Williamsburg, Virginia, and