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Why Celia Couldn’t Claim Self-Defense After Killing Her Rapist
No Such Thing as Self-Defense for the Enslaved
In either 1819 or 1820, Robert Newsome left Virginia with his wife and children, eventually settling in Callaway County, Missouri, where he purchased 800 acres of land. Newsome raised livestock, including horses, pigs, milk cows, sheep, and two oxen. Missouri had been admitted to the Union as a slave state as part of the Missouri Compromise in 1820. By 1850, Newsome had five enslaved men helping him work his farm. It was that year he purchased his first female slave, a fourteen-year-old girl named Celia.
Newsome bought Celia from a neighboring Audrain County, and when he got Celia home, he promptly raped her. For five years, Newsome kept Celia in a remote cabin, raping her as he pleased. Celia gave birth to two children during those years, one of them Newsome’s son.
Sometime during that fifth year, Celia began a relationship with another enslaved person named George. Celia got pregnant with no way of knowing before giving birth if the father was George or Newsome. Newsome was still “visiting” Celia regularly during her pregnancy.
George, also owned by Newsome, began to feel some kind of way about the potential mother of his child having regular sex with the master. George told Celia…
