Abolitionism

“I ask no monument, proud and high,
To arrest the gaze of the passers-by;
All that my yearning spirit craves,
Is bury me not in a land of slaves.”
—Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Bury Me in a Free Land (1858)
Harper
Engraving of Harper from William Still’s UGRR book (House Divided Project)

Types of Abolitionism

  1. Moral Suasion
  2. Political Abolitionism
  3. Violent Abolitionism
  4. Interventionists (UGRR Operatives)
Cazenovia
Cazenovia NY anti-slavery convention daguerreotype detail, featuring Frederick Douglass, Gerrit Smith, Theodosia Chaplin, and the Edmonson sisters (Madison Co Historical Society)

William Lloyd Garrison vs. Frederick Douglass

  • 1831 – The Liberator
  • 1833 – American Anti-Slavery Society
  • 1838 – Douglass self-emancipates
  • 1841 – Douglass & Garrison join forces
  • 1845 – Douglass’s Narrative
  • 1847-1851 – Garrison & Douglass split
Garrison
William Lloyd Garrison (House Divided)
Douglass 1852
Douglass in 1852 (Wikipedia)

Underground Railroad

  1. What was it?
  2. Personal Liberty Laws
  3. Free Black communities

UGRR cover

Sojourner Truth

  • 1797 – born Isabella Baumfree in Ulster County, NY
  • 1826 – self-emancipated
  • 1827 – NY’s emancipation law went into effect
  • Cult of True Womanhood
Truth
Sojourner Truth (Library of Congress)

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

  1. Born free in Baltimore in 1825
  2. “Bridge Generation” or “Antebellum Freeborn Generation”
Harper grave
Frances Harper, buried “in a free land” at Eden Cemetery near Philadelphia
Students in front of statues
Students at the Gathering at the Crossroads with Lenwood Sloan