slave narratives — Bunk History

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Illustration of Henry Brown in a box

Rare Ephemera Shows Legacy of Henry "Box" Brown

In his day, Brown was a celebrated stage magician who incorporated performance into his lectures on abolitionism in the United States and England.

by Eric Colleary via Ransom Center Magazine on May 6, 2021

Eric Sheppard standing in front of two log cabins in the Great Dismal Swamp

The Great Dismal Swamp was a Refuge for the Enslaved. Their Descendants Want to Preserve It.

A Virginia congressman has filed a bill to make the swamp a National Heritage Site.

by Meagan Flynn via Washington Post on April 11, 2021

An illustration of people digging in an archaeological site in the shape of a cross.

Unearthing the Faithful Foundations of a Historic Black Church

In Colonial Williamsburg, a neglected Christian past is being restored.

by Daniel Silliman via Christianity Today on December 21, 2020

The Douglass Republic

How today's protests are struggling to reclaim the vision of the great abolitionist leader.

by Jabari Asim via The New Republic on August 14, 2020

A Meditation on Natural Light and the Use of Fire in United States Slavery

Responding to “Race and the Paradoxes of the Night,” by Celeste Henery.

by Tyler D. Parry via Black Perspectives on January 13, 2020

What Should a Slavery Epic Do?

If there’s anything the 2010s taught us, it’s that there is no getting these stories right, no honoring with grace the dead and ghosts.

by Lauren Michele Jackson via Vulture on December 26, 2019

The Prophet Is Human

A towering new biography of the great American orator and public intellectual Frederick Douglass.

by Mary F. Corey via Los Angeles Review of Books on April 11, 2019

Illlustration: Mrs. Auld teaches fredrick Douglass to read

A Frederick Douglass Reading List

Reading recommendations from a lifelong education.

by Jaime Fuller via Lapham’s Quarterly on February 21, 2019

Frederick Douglass.

Frederick Douglass, Abolition, and Memory

On Douglass’s monumental life, the voice of the biographer, memory and tragedy, and why history matters right now.

by David W. Blight, Martha Hodes via Public Books on November 26, 2018

A Wretched Situation Made Plain on Paper

How an engraving of a slave ship helped the abolition movement.

by Cheryl Finley via Lapham’s Quarterly on July 25, 2018

Julia Ann Jackson, age 102, whose narrative was recorded by the WPA, 1937-1938.

Demanding to Be Heard

African American women’s voices from slave narratives to #MeToo.

by Stephanie Richmond via Nursing Clio on June 12, 2018

Thomas Jefferson's two-volume personal copy of George Sale's 1734 translation of the Qur'an. Library of Congress.

Why Thomas Jefferson Owned a Qur’an

Islam in America dates to the founding fathers, says Smithsonian’s religion curator Peter Manseau.

by Peter Manseau via Smithsonian on January 31, 2018

Why A 19th Century American Slave Memoir Is Becoming A Bestseller In Japan's Bookstores

Why "Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl" by Harriet Ann Jacobs (1861), became a hit in Japan when it was published there in 2013.

by Jake Adelstein via Forbes on November 15, 2017

The Forced Migration of Enslaved People

An interactive set of maps and narratives of the forced migration of approximately 850,000 enslaved people from 1810-1860.

by Ed Ayers, Robert K. Nelson, Justin Madron, Nathaniel Ayers via American Panorama on December 1, 2015

Will the Real Henry “Box” Brown Please Stand Up?

New information on Henry Box Brown, an enslaved man who would turn escape into an art form.

by Martha J. Cutter via Commonplace on September 1, 2015

Adolphe Duperly’s painting depicting the destruction of the Roehampton Estate in Jamaica during the Baptist War in January 1832.

For Enslaved People, the Holiday Season Was a Brief Window to Fight Back

The week between Christmas and the new year offered a rare opportunity for enslaved people to reclaim their humanity.

by Ana Lucia Araujo via The Conversation on December 18, 2024

Book cover that reads: "The Next Great American Novel," with the American flag in the background

"James" Is a Retelling of "Huckleberry Finn" that America Desperately Needs

It puts the people in the most peril in the center of the story: the people being systematically exploited, chained, whipped and raped.

by Jarvis Deberry via MSNBC on March 19, 2024

Past Tense

The historical novel isn’t cool. Popular? Yes. Enduring? Yes. A bit, well — for nerds? Also yes. Coolness lies in being at the right place at the right time.

by David Schurman Wallace via The Drift on March 12, 2024

The Varner-Hogg Plantation House, Brazoria County, Texas.

The Texas Historical Commission Removed Books on Slavery From Plantation Gift Shops

An agency spokesperson claimed that the move had nothing to do with politics. Internal emails show otherwise.

by Steven Monacelli via Texas Monthly on December 7, 2023

Painting of the english surgeon Edward Jenner inoculating a child.

How Far Back Were Africans Inoculating Against Smallpox? Really Far Back.

When I looked at the archives, I found a history hidden in plain sight.

by Elise A. Mitchell via Slate on September 4, 2023

Portrait of a girl wearing a red coral necklace.

The Labor of Polyps and Persons

The meaning of coral jewelry in nineteenth-century America.

by Michele Currie Navakas via Lapham’s Quarterly on July 12, 2023

Frederick Douglass.

Frederick Douglass and the “Faithful Little Band of Abolitionists” in Uxbridge, Massachusetts

This is the story of how a visit by Frederick Douglass to south-central Massachusetts, epitomizes the movement’s ability to spread in the region.

by C. J. Martin via Commonplace on June 6, 2023

Illustration of West Ford with laborers working fields in the background, by John P. Dessereau

Did George Washington Have an Enslaved Son?

West Ford’s descendants want to prove his parentage—and save the freedmen’s village he founded.

by Jill Abramson via The New Yorker on March 4, 2022

William Wells Brown

William Wells Brown, Wildcat Banker

How a story told by a fugitive from slavery became a parable of American banking gone bad.

by Ross Bullen via The Public Domain Review on November 24, 2021

Portrait of Zalumma Agra.

Circassian Beauty in the American Sideshow

Among P. T. Barnum's “human curiosities” was a supposed escapee from an Ottoman harem, marketed as both the pinnacle of white beauty and an exotic other.

by Betsy Golden Kellem via The Public Domain Review on September 16, 2021

Photographs of Kim Lee Finger and Michelle Brooks

Two Women Researched Slavery in Their Family. They Didn’t See the Same Story.

Trying to learn more about a woman named Ann led her descendants to confront a painful past; ‘I just wanted to know the truth.’

by Amy Dockser Marcus via The Wall Street Journal on April 16, 2021

Colorized photograph of formerly enslaved family outside of their cabin

The Color of Freedom

This collection of colorized portraits transforms ex-slave narratives into freedom narratives in order to better remember the individuals who survived slavery.

by Lee Hedgepeth via Scalawag on February 5, 2021

Digital art with "Help Wanted Sign", square with word "Tuna" and bottle

Solidarity Now

An experiment in oral history of the present.

by Wen Stephenson via The Baffler on January 15, 2021

Priest standing at pulpit. Caption: Timothy Kesicki, S.J., apologizes for the Jesuits’ sin of owning and selling people. Gaston Hall, Georgetown University, April 18, 2017.

The Jesuits and Slavery

Despite extensive historiography, most people are not aware that the Society of Jesus owned people.

by Adam Rothman via Journal Of Jesuit Studies on December 15, 2020

A stone marked as a slave auction block and tagged with graffiti.

What PTSD Tells Us About the History of Slavery

June, PTSD Awareness month, is a time to recognize how trauma has shaped our history.

by Tyler D. Parry via Made By History on June 28, 2020

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