Denmark Vesey’s Garden

Slavery and Memory in the Cradle of the Confederacy

by Ethan J. Kytle; Blain Roberts

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Pub Date Apr 03 2018 | Archive Date Apr 03 2018

History | Nonfiction (Adult)

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Description

One of Janet Maslin’s Favorite Books of 2018, The New York Times

One of John Warner’s Favorite Books of 2018, Chicago Tribune

Named one of the “Best Civil War Books of 2018” by the Civil War Monitor

“A fascinating and important new historical study.”
—Janet Maslin, The New York Times

“A stunning contribution to the historiography of Civil War memory studies.”
—Civil War Times

In the tradition of James Loewen's Lies My Teacher Told Me, a deeply researched book that uncovers competing histories of how slavery is remembered in Charleston, South Carolina—the heart of Dixie

A book that strikes at the heart of the recent flare-ups over Confederate symbols in Charlottesville, New Orleans, and elsewhere, Denmark Vesey's Garden reveals the deep roots of these controversies and traces them to the heart of slavery in the United States: Charleston, South Carolina, where almost half of the U.S. slave population stepped onto our shores, where the first shot at Fort Sumter began the Civil War, and where Dylann Roof shot nine people at Emanuel A.M.E. Church, the congregation of Denmark Vesey, a black revolutionary who plotted a massive slave insurrection in 1822.

As early as 1865, former slaveholders and their descendants began working to preserve a romanticized memory of the antebellum South. In contrast, former slaves, their descendants, and some white allies have worked to preserve an honest, unvarnished account of slavery as the cruel system it was.

Examining public rituals, controversial monuments, and whitewashed historical tourism, Denmark Vesey's Garden tracks these two rival memories from the Civil War all the way to contemporary times, where two segregated tourism industries still reflect these opposing impressions of the past, exposing a hidden dimension of America's deep racial divide. Denmark Vesey's Garden joins the small bookshelf of major, paradigm-shifting new interpretations of slavery's enduring legacy in the United States.

Advance Praise

Denmark Vesey’s Garden uses the small place of Charleston, South Carolina to tell a large tale, what we remember of history and what we prefer to forget. It is a fascinating and unflinching performance, showing that all of American history can inhabit a few greying square miles.

-- Edward Ball, National Book Award-winning author of Slaves in the Family

Nothing has shaped this nation more than slavery and its legacy. Kytle and Roberts’ meticulous research, compelling writing and thoughtful analysis is vital to our nation at a time when we were haunted by a history we need to understand more deeply.

--Bryan Stevenson, New York Times bestselling author Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption

Denmark Vesey’s Garden reveals that the long struggle over how Americans remember slavery has been inseparable from the long struggle for racial justice.

-- Ibram X. Kendi, National Book Award-winning author of Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America

Ethan Kytle and Blaine Roberts remind us that the cost of whitewashing the history of racial enslavement and its legacies continues to be too great a burden to bear for American democracy. For any reader interested in current political debates over Civil War memory and monuments, this book is a must read.

-- Manisha Sinha, author of The Slave's Cause: A History of Abolition

Denmark Vesey’s Garden will have enormous implications for the entire country.

– Douglas Egerton, author of Year of Meteors, Thunder at the Gates, and The Wars of Reconstruction

Denmark Vesey’s Garden uses the small place of Charleston, South Carolina to tell a large tale, what we remember of history and what we prefer to forget. It is a fascinating and unflinching...