People, Locations, Episodes

Margaretta Forten, Suffragist, and Abolitionist born

*Margaretta Forten was born on this date in 1806. She was a Black suffragist and abolitionist. Margaretta Forten was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Her parents, Charlotte Vandine Forten and James Forten, were abolitionists, and her father founded the American Moral Reform Society. Due to the exclusion of women from the American Anti-Slavery Society, Forten, with her mother Charlotte and sisters […]

Silvia Hector Webber, Abolitionist born

*Silvia Webber’s birth is celebrated on this date, c. 1807. She was an enslaved Black woman and abolitionist. Born Sylvia Hector, she was from the Spanish West Florida parishes that became part of eastern Louisiana. There are few records of her childhood except a bill of sale on March 10, 1819.  The twelve-year-old Hector was […]

Solomon Northup, Abolitionist, and Author born

*Solomon Northup was born on this date in 1807. He was a Black musician, abolitionist, and author. Born in Rhode Island, he was taken with the Northup family when they moved to Hoosick, New York, in Rensselaer County.   His father, Mintus, was a freedman who had been a slave in his early life in […]

James Pennington, Author, and Abolitionist born

The birth of the Reverend James William Charles Pennington in 1807 is celebrated on this date. He was a Black educator, clergyman, orator, author, and abolitionist.

Samuel Bass, Laborer and Abolitionist born

*Samuel Bass’s birth is celebrated on October 30, 1807. He was a white-Canadian laborer and abolitionist. Bass was born and raised in Augusta Township, Upper Canada (now Ontario). His parents were John and Hannah Lakins Bass, who had twelve children. His grandparents, Adonijah and Lydia Draper Bass were United Empire Loyalists who lived in Walloomsac, […]

Salmon P. Chase, Abolitionist, and Judge born

Salmon Portland Chase, a white man, was born on this date in 1808. He was a White American teacher, abolitionist, lawyer, and judge.

Anne Hampton, Domestic and Chef born.

*Anne Hampton was born on this date in 1808. She was a free Black domestic and chef. She was raised in Hudson Falls, New York, and was of African, Indigenous, and European ancestry. In 1829, she married Solomon Northup, and she gave birth to their children Elizabeth in 1831, Margaret in 1833, and Alonzo Northup […]

Frances Dana Barker Gage, Abolitionist born

*Frances Dana Barker Gage was born on this date in 1808.  She was a white-American reformer, feminist, and abolitionist.   Frances Dana Barker was born near Marietta, Ohio, the daughter of farmers Elizabeth Dana and Col. Joseph Barker, the tenth of eleven children.  Baker wrote that her woman suffrage work began when she was ten years old in 1818. She helped her father […]

Benjamin ‘Pap’ Singleton, Abolitionist born

The birth of “Pap” Singleton in 1809 is celebrated on this date. He was a Black abolitionist who helped lead hundreds of African Americans out of the South and into the West, specifically to Kansas, during Reconstruction.

Francis Frederic, Writer, and Publisher born

*The birth of Francis Fredric is celebrated on this date in 1809. He was a Black abolitionist and publisher.

He was born a slave on a plantation in Fauquier County, Virginia. When he was fourteen years old, Fredric’s master moved to Mason County, Kentucky. His master’s wife used him as a house slave. However, after attending a prayer meeting he was so badly whipped he ran away. He was free for nine weeks but was captured and received 107 lashes of the whip.

Jane DeVeaux, Teacher, and Abolitionist born

*The birth of Jane A. DeVeaux is celebrated on this date in 1810. She was a Black mulatto teacher and abolitionist.  From Savanah, GA, she was the daughter of John Benjamin Deveaux (born into slavery) and Catherine Deveaux (a free woman from Antigua). Her father pastored the Third African Baptist Church in Savannah. She and her mother secretly taught […]

Robert Purvis, Abolitionist born

*Robert Purvis was born on this date in 1810. He was an African American political leader and abolitionist.

From Charleston, South Carolina, the second of three sons born to a white cotton merchant and a free woman of color, young Purvis was to be a determined opponent of slavery. At the age of nine, his father sent the family to Philadelphia where Purvis enrolled in the Pennsylvania Abolition Society’s Clarkson School. He later attended Amherst College in Massachusetts.

Cassius Marcellus Clay, Abolitionist born

*Cassius Marcellus Clay was born on this date in 1810. Nicknamed the “Lion of White Hall,” he was a Kentucky planter, politician, and abolitionist.   Cassius Marcellus Clay was born to Sally Lewis and Green Clay, one of Kentucky’s wealthiest planters and enslavers, who became a prominent politician. He was one of six children who survived to […]

Harriet Beecher Stowe, Writer, and Abolitionist born

*The birth of Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1811 is marked on this date.

From Cincinnati, she is probably the most famous of the Beecher daughters. She was given the approved religious education of the time, but was troubled her entire life with doubt and preoccupied with the problem of faith. It was not until the age of thirteen that Harriet was sent to Hartford, Connecticut, to attend a school for girls. Her closest confidant was her brother Henry, and throughout their lives they united in speaking out against the evils of slavery.

Adam Kok III, South African Leader born.

*Adam Kok III was born on this date in 1811. He was a Black leader of the Griqua people in South Africa. The son of Adam Kok II, Kok III was born in Griqualand, West South Africa. His family and father’s followers moved to the area after disputes with other groups, and he was educated […]