Enslaved people in transit on the Ohio River staged a slave rebellion in Breckinridge County, Kentucky, on September 17, 1826. It was the bloodiest recorded rebellion by enslaved people in Kentucky before the American Civil War.
Slave traders Howard and Edward Stone, David Cobb, and Humphrey David (or Davis) left Maysville, Kentucky, with one white passenger and between 75 and 77 Black captives bound for the Natchez slave market. Traveling down the Ohio by flatboat, some of the captives managed to free themselves after four days on the river. "Armed with clubs, axes, and knives," they killed their captors and the sole white passenger after a struggle and sank their bodies in the river. The rebels piloted the boat to the northern bank and sank the craft off the Indiana shore. Equipped with money taken from the wreck, they split into groups and headed north. The larger group of 56 freedom seekers was overtaken near Rome, Indiana, where they had sheltered overnight. Most of the freedom seekers in the second group were later captured and returned to Kentucky.
The captives were taken to Hardinsburg, Kentucky, and lodged in the Breckinridge County jail. Twelve prisoners were indicted for the murders of the Stones, Cobb, and Davis, and tried on November 20. Seven defendants were acquitted, while five were convicted and subsequently executed by hanging on November 29, 1826. Edward Stone's enslaved valet reportedly defended his enslaver during the rebellion and was later manumitted by Stone's widow. Those acquitted were transported for sale to the Deep South along with 38 others, while the remainder went to Paris, Kentucky.
See also History of slavery in Kentucky Slave rebellion and resistance in the United States
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Bibliography
Further reading Contemporary account of the rebellion in the Richmond Enquirer.