Conspiracies and plans of insurrection were discovered.

Negroes were tortured or terrified into confessions.

Obnoxious white men were put to death without any legal trial and in defiance of those rules of evidence which are insisted on by southern laws.

Thus a sudden and convincing terror was spread through the South.
Every man was made to know that if he should become obnoxious to the guardians of the great southern 'institution' he was liable to be denounced and murdered.

It was distinctly and imperatively demanded that nobody should be allowed to say anything anywhere against slavery.