Gabriel’s rebellion was inspired by the revolutionary language of freedom that was popular at the time. but, unlike the american revolution, gabriel’s rebellion wasn’t a success. the former slave’s attempt to liberate slaves was foiled, and ultimately blacks experienced even less freedom in the early nineteenth century.

The older translation is wrong because it assumed that the default category for all human experience is male.
In the past, only men were allowed to obtain education, so it's safe to assume that people who could read are almost certainly a male. Therefore, they rarely refers to the translation as a woman