History
Many of Richmond’s first citizens lie in unmarked graves here. Richmond’s gallows was above on the hillside. Executed here was Gabriel, a charismatic 24-year old blacksmith from Thomas Henry Prosser’s Brookfield Plantation.
Gabriel Prosser was born into slavery in 1776, the same year the United States declared its independence from Britain. The midwife who delivered him prophesied that he would serve a great purpose in life, and his parents named him after the archangel who would herald the Second Coming. Raised on a plantation six miles north of Richmond, Virginia, Prosser grew up in bondage while white Virginians celebrated their liberty. Gabriel and his colleagues believed that Nature’s God entitled them to equal station with men and women of all races.
By 1800, Prosser had a detailed plan for a revolt known later as Gabriel’s Rebellion, in which hundreds of enslaved people from Norfolk to Charlottesville would rise up and declare their freedom too. And Prosser himself would lead a division of men to take the capital at Richmond.
Ultimately, his revolt failed before it even began due to a combination of betrayal and bad weather. The rebels were forced to postpone their plan by 24 hours. Then, a latecomer to the rebellion named Pharaoh lost his nerve. Hoping for leniency, he revealed the plot to his owner at Meadow Farm, who promptly alerted the militia and sent word to Governor James Monroe in Richmond.
Twenty-six of the rebels would be hanged in the aftermath of the plot’s discovery. Gabriel was the last to be hanged when he was executed alone near the city’s slave jail in an area that is now a parking lot next to the interstate. His efforts terrified slaveholders and provided a symbol for enslaved people throughout the young country.