- [Voiceover] So Becca and
I have been talking about Uncle Tom's Cabin which is
this book from the 1850s that Abraham Lincoln actually
said started the Civil War. So how did this book start a war? So in this video we'll tell
you more about the plot. But in the previous video
we kind of discussed what was going on in
the country at the time and Harriet Beecher
Stowe again was from this abolitionist family. She was really deeply effected
by the Compromise of 1850 and the Fugitive Slave Act,
and also by slave auctions. So this video will get
a little bit more into the heart of the plot
of the novel which does have to do with the
family being torn apart. - [Voiceover] So what was Uncle
Tom's Cabin actually about? Uncle Tom's Cabin was set
on a plantation in Kentucky and it starts out with this
kind of group of slaves that are about to be sold
to other plantation owners. So Eliza and her son actually run away. They run up North, so Eliza goes up North and Uncle Toms is sold down the river. - [Voiceover] So, Eliza
is trying to make sure that she and her son are
not separated by being sold. So she decides that she is going to escape and take her son with her up to Canada. But Uncle Tom, he's not actually related, he is sold in the opposite direction. He's getting farther away from freedom by heading down the Mississippi. When you think about
the geography of slavery it's a much more urban
environment than some of the more coastal areas. So you might be in
Charleston, or you might even be in Baltimore as an enslaved person. You might have a pretty
high degree of freedom and also a possibility of escape either by crossing the border or by boat. When you're sold into the
deep South area you are deep in plantation country
and there might not be another soul that you could
rely on to help you escape for 100, 200 miles. - [Voiceover] And I think
this is really something that Harriet Beecher Stowe
wants to help point out in the book, that there
was this sense of doom for Uncle Tom. However, his Christian
faith was the only thing that really kept him going. He bonded with this young
white woman that he met, Eva, just about their Christian faith. And really, reading
his Bible was the thing that got him up in the morning. So where were those feelings
about religion coming from? - [Voiceover] You can definitely see that Harriet Beecher Stowe is influenced by her own family's
faith which is influenced by the Second Great Awakening. The Second Great Awakening
was this flowering of religious belief in
the 1830s and 1840s. It was kind of a reaction
against the Era of Enlightenment which was what had inspired the founders of the United States to think
of a more humanist world, a more rational, scientific world. People start going to camp meetings, they have religious revivals. They experience religious conversions. And in this time period
there's a shift in thinking about God in the United States. If you think back to
the puritans they have this incredibly punitive
sort of Old Testament destroyer God, right? One of the most famous early
sermons in the United States is sinners in the hands of an angry God, that at any moment God might
release you into the flames. Well there's a new emphasis
on Christ-like love in the early 1830s, 1840s. New interpretation of
God as being forgiving and gentle, family oriented,
it's very Victorian. Where God was seen as this punisher who condemned most people to hell, in the Second Great Awakening
there's a new emphasis on a forgiving, kind family-oriented Jesus who will save everyone. That's very incompatible
with the ideas of slavery. - [Voiceover] Exactly, and I
think that Uncle Tom's Cabin can really be considered a part of the Second Great Awakening because of the way that it
points out these fundamental inconsistencies and contradictions
between Christian faith and human bondage. How could a religion that
says treat thy neighbor as thyself actually sanction slavery? - [Voiceover] So Uncle Tom is
this martyr character, right? He is a devout believer in Christianity and the forgiveness of God right up until his very end. So how does Uncle Tom's
Cabin actually end? - [Voiceover] Uncle Tom's
Cabin ends with Uncle Tom is beaten by his overseers. He's sold through this chain
of different slave families in the deep South and he
ends up with just a terrible, terrible slave holder
who requests his death, actually partially because he was reading all of this religious text. [Voiceover] And this slave
owner was named Simon Legree. And this name, Simon Legree,
has actually stuck with us in popular culture to
mean a really evil, cruel, punitive master. - [Voiceover] The rest of the
family actually meets back up. Eliza is reunited with
a bunch of other people that were on the original
plantation and they really think about Uncle Tom as this
martyr, the hero's death. He's looked at as this sacrifice
for the cause of freedom. - [Voiceover] Right, also
Uncle Tom, he dies never having renounced his Christian faith. His example of martyrdom
actually leads everyone who witnesses his death,
including Simon Legree, to convert to Christianity
and to vow never to hold slaves again. - [Voiceover] But I think
the ending of the book really points out this main theme within a lot of Second Great
Awakening texts which was that if you just paid attention
to how you are falling away from your Christian
commitments then you could get back on track and maybe
bring people together by utilizing Christian
faith in a productive and public way. - [Voiceover] The book
is published in 1852, then what happens? How do people receive this book? - [Voiceover] We'll talk about
this Tom-mania that ensues in the next video.