Coltrane, John 177protective jacks buried by enslaved blacks in order to elicit
the aid of powerful spiritual forces.
According to a number of African spiritual systems,
certain items found in nature were imbued with an innate
amount of spiritual force that could become even more po-
tent when prepared by a conjurer. Th e frequent presence
of charms in enslaved and free African American com-
munities from as early as the 17th century exemplifi es the
perseverance of important African religious concepts. It
should be mentioned that charms were not always used for
benevolent purposes. A charm could also be employed to
harm, inhibit, or kill others, particularly if it contained the
intended victim’s hair or nail clippings. In this case, “friz-
zled” chickens were oft en employed to fi nd evil charms
and gris-gris that were buried by conjurers. In addition to
frizzled chickens, a number of counter-charms were uti-
lized to ward off the eff ects of evil. Red pepper, salt, grave
dirt or goofer powder, and strips of red fl annel cloth were
frequently used in counter-charms for a variety of reasons.
In this manner, counter-charms were believed to prevent
anything from insanity to death caused by evil charms.
See also: Africanisms; Black Folk Culture; Slave CultureWalter C. RuckerBibliography
Blassingame, John. Th e Slave Community: Plantation Life in the
Antebellum South. New York: Oxford University Press, 1972.
Georgia Writers’ Project. Drums and Shadows: Survival Studies
among the Coastal Negroes. Athens: University of Georgia
Press, 1940.
Puckett, Newbell Nile. Folk Beliefs of the Southern Negro. Chapel
Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1926.
Raboteau, Albert J. Slave Religion: Th e “Invisible Institution” in the
Antebellum South. New York: Oxford University Press, 1978.
Rucker, Walter. “Conjure, Magic, and Power: Th e Infl uence of
Afro-Atlantic Religious Practices on Slave Resistance and
Rebellion.” Journal of Black Studies 32 (2001):84–103.Coltrane, John
John William Coltrane (1926–1967), a saxophonist and
composer, was most famous for playing and writing highly
textured and fl uid music with rapid tempos and lengthy
arrhythmic phrasings. He was committed to bringing
jazz, an original American music form created and infl u-
enced by African American artists, into innovative areasof all multiple ethnic backgrounds who respected him as
both conjurer and “general” of the plot. Not only was Jack
claimed to have a “charmed invulnerability” that would pre-
vent him from being harmed at the hands of whites, but he
also produced and distributed charms to slave combatants
that were said to render them invincible. For Gullah Jack’s
protective charms to work, conspirators had to fi rst fast
the night before the planned revolt. Th e following morn-
ing, they were to place the charms, consisting of crab claws,
in their mouths to be fully protected from harm. Th e fact
that not one slave questioned the validity of Jack’s powers
during the course of the trials is singular testament to the
continuing connection they had to African spiritual beliefs
and values.
Another example of the use of protective charms n an
act of slave resistance is recounted in the story of William
Webb. In this case, Webb—a conjurer living in Kentucky
during the 1840s—became concerned about the abusive
treatment faced by slaves on a neighboring plantation. Aft er
secretly meeting with this group, he urged them to gather
roots that were then placed into bags. Th e slaves were then
instructed to walk around their own quarters a few times
and to position the conjure bags in front of their owner’s
house during the early morning hours. Th ese steps were
taken to induce their owner to have disturbing nightmares
about the slaves gaining retribution for past wrongs. In the
following weeks, the owner reportedly began to treat the
slaves decidedly better, and Webb’s infl uence over them in-
creased dramatically as a direct result.
Bags that held special items and used as protective
charms were generally known as “hands” or “jacks” and
were either worn or buried to work properly. A hand or
jack would typically contain a variety of objects, including
roots, tree bark, human hair and fi ngernail clippings, grave-
yard dirt, horseshoe nails, hog bristles, animal and insect
parts, red pepper, gunpowder, and other substances. In this
regard, the fi nding of a “conjure’s cache” in an Annapolis,
Maryland, house in 1996 proves instructive. Buried some-
time during the 18th century in the northeast corner of this
home, the items in this cache included beads, pins, buttons,
a coin with a hole in it, rock crystals, a piece of crab claw, a
brass ring and bell, and pieces of bone and glass. Th is was
one of 11 such fi ndings in Virginia and Maryland, which
indicates a clear pattern—especially given the fact that
the caches were always buried in the northeast corner of
rooms or slave quarters. In all likelihood, these items were