" It was this 'ripening' that the slaveholding classes of North American seemed to fear above all else: the dawning consciousness of enslaved persons that they had an inborn right to be free--and that they might take further steps to make it happen, because they already had superior numbers. All they would need in the future was a little more knowledge, a little more discipline, and some more key allies among the whites. "

― Tom Zoellner , Island on Fire: The Revolt That Ended Slavery in the British Empire