Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history from Radiotopia.

My name is Jody Abergen.

This day, March 28, 1839, an investigation begins into the death of a woman named Mira.

Mira was enslaved on the North Carolina farm of a 57-year year old named John Hoover.

Mira's body was dug up and a local coroner looked for signs of

mistreatment and foul play in her death.

And soon thereafter, Hoover was arrested in the death of Mira accused of torturing and then murdering the woman.

He went to trial, he was convicted, and he was executed for his actions.

So suffice it to say that enslavers being held legally

accountable for the treatment of their slaves is very very rare and suffice it to

say it gets into all sorts of convoluted legal and moral questions about how a system can both uphold slavery and then try in a moment like this to draw a line about what kind of abuse goes too far.

So a really fascinating, wrenching moment. Let's talk about the death of

Mira, the trial of John Hoover and Moore. Here as always, Nicole Hammer of

Vanderbilt and Kelly Carter Jackson of Wellesley. Hello there.

Hello Jody. Hey there. Hello dirty. Hey there.

Kelly this is you know your territory you write about violence and especially in

pre-civil war South or you know especially in the South racial violence did you know about this story or

even these instances of quote-unquote accountability which is interesting because

normally I'm looking at violence that like black people are committing

and slaveholders, but in this case it was not something that I saw come across

like abolitionist newspapers which is a little shocking

because I would have thought this is sort of the perfect story

...