Sojourner Truth biography

A detailed Summary of Sojourner Truth biography

Sojourner Truth was one of the earliest and most passionate female abolitionists, for she herself had once been a slave. She came to be known as the nationally known speaker on human rights for slaves and women. Sojourner Truth was born Isabella Baumfree between 1797 and 1800 in Hurley, New York. (There is no exact record of her date of birth.) She was one of 13 children born to slave parents. She spoke only Dutch until she was sold from her family around the age of eleven. Because of the cruel treatment she suffered at the hands of her new master she learned to speak English quickly, but would continue to speak with a Dutch accent for the rest of her life. Still quite a young woman, she escaped from her New York owner in 1826 after being brutally treated. She had to leave all but one of her children behind. She was forced to submit to the will of her third master, John Dumont who denied her the choice of a husband, and married an older slave named Thomas. They had five children. She labored for a succession of five masters until the Fourth of July, 1827, when slavery was finally abolished in New York State. Then Isabella became legally free. After prevailing in a courageous court action demanding the return of her y

She lived long enough to see her people brought to freedom, but never stopped in her efforts to win more equality for them. Right up until her death, in Battle Creek, Michigan, she continued to speak out for her race and died in 1883. She went to her grave a much lamented and beloved figure in abolitionist history.

By the 1840s, Truth had become a powerful speaker against slavery, often moving her audiences to tears and horror with her firsthand accounts of what many of her black brothers and sisters were enduring at the hands of cruel masters. She would tell listeners of how some slaves were kept intimidated and afraid to act because of the harsh punishments such as beatings, sometimes with spiked sticks and chains. She herself, as a teenager, had been taken into the barn by her master one afternoon for absolutely no reason and tied up by the wrists. The story goes that he tore the shirt from her back and whipped her with a bundle of sticks until her back bled. She described how she refused to give him the satisfaction of screaming, by clenching her fists so hard her fingernails drew blood from her palms.

Sojourner Truth came to Northampton, Massachusetts in 1843 to live at the Northampton Association of Education and Industry, a utopian community in Florence. It had been founded in 1841 as a cooperative community dedicated to abolitionism, pacifism, equality and the betterment of human life. There, she met progressive thinkers like William Lloyd Garrison, Frederick Douglass and David Ruggles. When the association separated in 1846, Truth remained in Northampton, moving

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Approximate Word count = 1074
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English