Reverend John Corbley and the Whiskey Rebellion

In seventeen ninety-four, western Pennsylvania farmers erupted in revolt against a federal excise tax on whiskey, one of the new nation's first major domestic crises. Reverend John Corbley, a prominent Baptist minister serving congregations in this region, was among those who opposed the tax.

On the night of November thirteenth, seventeen ninety-four, federal troops arrested Corbley along with roughly one hundred fifty other men in what locals called the Dreadful Night. He was held for a time. But Corbley returned to southwestern Pennsylvania to continue his ministry. His story illustrates the tension between frontier communities who depended on distilling grain into whiskey and a young federal government testing the limits of its taxing power.