Publisher's Synopsis
Presided over by Robert C Grier, an associate justice of the US Supreme Court, and by US District Judge John K Kane, the trial began on Monday, 24 November 1851. The prosecution decided to try Hanway first and if a conviction was reached, then the other defendants would be tried separately. Hanway was charged with five counts of treason and the prosecution did its best to prove he had led and incited the blacks at William Parker's house. However, after 14 witnesses and three days of testimony all that was proved conclusively was that Hanway had refused to help US Deputy Marshall Kline to arrest four runaway slaves. It took the jury just 15 minutes to find Hanway not guilty. This account of the trial first published in 1852 also includes an Introduction upon the History of the Slave Question.
