Nathaniel Gordon: Difference between revisions - Wikipedia

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| parents =

| children =

| death_cause = [[Execution by hanging]]

| beginyear = 1851

| endyear = August 78, 1860 (allegedly did another voyage in 1848)

| apprehended = August 78, 1860

| targets = Africans

| victims = Hundreds

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In 1848, Gordon's boat, ''Juliet'', was searched by the [[United States Navy|U.S. Navy]] for evidence of slave trading. After no evidence of slave trading could be found, Gordon was released from their custody. However, there were allegations that Gordon had indeed gone to Africa, taken a cargo of slaves, and returned to [[Brazil]], where slavery was still legal at the time.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web |title=Sample text for Library of Congress control number 2005055897 |url=http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0641/2005055897-s.html |access-date=2022-05-11 |website=catdir.loc.gov}}</ref>

In 1851, Gordon, captaining the ''Camargo,'' went on another expedition from Brazil to Africa. Gordon took on 500 Africans and set sail for Brazil. He had to take numerous measures to avoid naval patrol ships. Gordon was nevertheless chased by a British [[man-of-war]]. After arriving in Brazil and dropping off the Africans, Gordon burned his ship to destroy evidence. The Africans were seized and some of Gordon's men were arrested and charged. Gordon himself escaped by dressing intoin women's clothes.<ref name=":1" />

Shortly after the ''Camargo'' voyage, Gordon, captaining ''Ottawa'', made a slaving voyage to Cuba, where slavery was also still legal, with a cargo of Africans. Only about 25 percent of the Africans survived, with Gordon later claiming that a rival trader had poisoned them. After landing in Cuba, Gordon again burned his ship afterwards to destroy evidence.<ref name=":1" />

In late July 1860, Gordon set sail aboard the ''Erie'' for the west coast of Africa. On August 7, 1860, he loaded 897 slaves aboard ''Erie'' at [[Sharks Point]], [[Congo River]], [[West Africa]],<ref name="Spears 1900 464">{{Citation

| last = Spears

| first = John R.

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| year = 1900

| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=VR5fi49ZUs0C&pg=PA464

}}</ref> of whom only 172 were grown men and 162 grown women. Gordon apparently preferred to carry children because they would not rise up to free themselves. The day after loading, ''Erie'' sailed from the Congo River, only to be captured by the [[USS Mohican (1859)|USS ''Mohican'']] within hours.<ref name=":0" /><ref name="harpers">[http://www.sonofthesouth.net/slavery/slave-trader.htm "The Execution of Gordon, The Slave-Trader"], ''[[Harper's Weekly]]'', March 8, 1862.</ref> Commander [[Sylvanus William Godon]] had a [[prize crew]] take command of ''Erie'' and ordered them to sailfirst transport the freed slaves to [[Liberia]], and then return to New York. Liberia was the American colony established in West Africa by the [[American Colonization Society]] for the settlement of free blacks from the United States, and then return to New York. According to reports, during the 15-day passage to Liberia at least 29 captives died and were thrown overboard.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Execution of Gordon The Slave-Trader |url=https://blackhistory.harpweek.com/7illustrations/slavery/ExecutionOfSlavetrader.htm |access-date=2022-05-11 |website=blackhistory.harpweek.com}}</ref> In New York, the ship was to be auctioned off, and Nathaniel Gordon, [[first mate]] William Warren, and [[second mate]] David Hall would stand trial.<ref name="Spears 1900 464" /><ref name=":4">{{Cite book |last=Howard |first=Warren S. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rbmSrE5-B7IC |title=American Slavers and the Federal Law |date=1963 |publisher=University of California Press |pages=223 |language=en}}</ref>

Commander Godon had four other of Gordon's crewmen placed on the [[USS Marion|USS ''Marion'']]: Thomas Nelson, Samuel Sleeper, Thomas Savage, and John McCafferty. The ship''Marion'' sailed to Portsmouth, [[New Hampshire]], where they were put on trial. In November 1860, the four crewmen were convicted of voluntarily serving on a slave ship but acquitted of engaging in the slave trade. Each of them was fined $1 and sentenced to about ten months in prison.<ref>{{Cite book |last=White |first=Jonathan W. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=avu6EAAAQBAJ |title=Shipwrecked: A True Civil War Story of Mutinies, Jailbreaks, Blockade-Running, and the Slave Trade |date=2023 |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield |isbn=978-1-5381-7502-6 |pages=132–133 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=HISTORY OF THE NEW HAMPSHIRE FEDERAL COURTS |url=https://www.nhd.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/NHFedCtHistory.pdf}}</ref>

==Trials==

[[File:Slave trading criminal case involving Nathaniel Gordon.png|right|250px|thumb|Slave[[Presentment]] tradingby criminala casefederal involving[[Grand juries in the United States|grand jury]], charging Nathaniel Gordon before the [[United States District Court for the Southern District of New York|US District Court for the Southern District of New York]] with the crime of slave trading, October 25, 1860]]

The [[United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York]], [[James I. Roosevelt]], offered Gordon a $2,000 fine and two-year sentence in exchange for information about his financial backers. However, Gordon, confident that he wouldn't face any severe consequences, rejected the deal, believing it was not lenient enough.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web |title=Historian sheds light on a shameful period - The Boston Globe |url=http://archive.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2006/08/01/execution_case_puts_slave_trade_under_the_microscope/?__goto=loginpage |access-date=2022-05-11 |website=archive.boston.com |language=en}}</ref> The case was repeatedly delayed due to the onset of the Civil War. By the time of Gordon's trial, a new district attorney, [[Edward Delafield Smith]], had been appointed. Smith saw the Gordon case as a chance to become prominent and an opportunity to set an example for all future slave traders. He wanted Gordon executed.<ref name=":2" />

Gordon's first trial in [[New York City]] in June 1861 ended in a mistrial, with the jury voting 7-57–5 in favor of a conviction, allegedly due to bribes. Smith immediately pushed for a retrial. To counter potential tampering and bribes, the government had the jury [[Jury sequestration|sequestered]]. Among the arguments used by Gordon's lawyers during his second trial were technicalities that had successfully been exploited in other trials:<ref name=":3">{{Cite book |last=Miller |first=William Lee|author-link=William Lee Miller |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H_EWaLCjXTgC |title=President Lincoln: The Duty of a Statesman |date=2009 |publisher=Vintage Books |isbn=978-1-4000-3416-1 |language=en}}</ref>

* The federal government did not have the authority to try Gordon, on the ground that ''Erie'' was not an American ship, because it had been sold to foreigners.

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<blockquote>

You are soon to be confronted with the terrible consequences of your crime, and it is proper that I should call to your mind the duty of preparing for that event which will soon terminate your mortal existence, and usher you into the presence of the Supreme Judge.

Let me implore you to seek the spiritual guidance of the ministers of religion; and let your repentance be as humble and thorough as your crime was great. Do not attempt to hide its enormity from yourself; think of the cruelty and wickedness of seizing nearly a thousand fellow-beings, who never did you harm, and thrusting them beneath the decks of a small ship, beneath a burning tropical sun, to die in of disease or suffocation, or be transported to distant lands, and be consigned, they and their posterity, to a fate far more cruel than death.

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==Further reading==

* Thomas, Hugh (1997). ''The Slave Trade: The Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade: 1440-1870.'' New York: Simon and Schuster.

* White, Jonathan W. (2023). ''Shipwrecked: A True Civil War Story of Mutinies, Jailbreaks, Blockade-Running, and the Slave Trade''. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, pp. 131-144&nbsp;131–144.

* ''Annual reports and charter, constitution, by-laws, names of officers, committees, members, etc., etc.'' [https://books.google.com/books?id=RmUZAAAAYAAJ&dq=nathaniel+gordon+trial+andrews&pg=RA1-PA120 googlebooks] Retrieved September 12, 2009

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[[Category:People executed by the United States federal government by hanging]]

[[Category:Presidency of Abraham Lincoln]]

[[Category:Piracy in the Atlantic Ocean]]

[[Category:Piracy in the United States]]