The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano: Written by Himself

My Bondage and My Freedom

Frederick Douglass · 359 pages

"Born and raised a slave, Frederick Douglass (1817?-1895) made two escape attempts before reaching freedom, educated himself against all odds, and became a leading abolitionist and spokesperson for African Americans." "My Bondage and My freedom is his account of his life, and that of slaves generally, in antebellum Maryland. Just as impressive as Douglass's gift for conveying the stark terrors and

Twelve Years a Slave

Solomon Northup · 228 pages

Twelve Years a Slave is a harrowing memoir about one of the darkest periods in American history. It recounts how Solomon Northup, born a free man in New York, was lured to Washington, D.C., in 1841 with the promise of fast money, then drugged and beaten and sold into slavery. He spent the next twelve years of his life in captivity on a Louisiana cotton plantation.

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

Harriet Jacobs · 228 pages

The true story of an individual's struggle for self-identity, self-preservation, and freedom, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl remains among the few extant slave narratives written by a woman. This autobiographical account chronicles the remarkable odyssey of Harriet Jacobs (1813–1897) whose dauntless spirit and faith carried her from a life of servitude and degradation in North Carolina to l

The History of Mary Prince: A West Indian Slave Narrative

Mary Prince · 72 pages

Narrative of Sojourner Truth

Sojourner Truth, Olive Gilbert · 144 pages

"A symbol of the strength of African-American women, and a champion of the rights of all women, Sojourner Truth was an illiterate former slave named Isabella who became a vastly powerful orator. Dictated to a neighbor and first published in 1850, Truth's celebrated story chronicles her life as a slave in New York State, her 1827 emancipation under state law, her religious experiences and her trans

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave / Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

Frederick Douglass, Harriet Jacobs · 190 pages

Up from Slavery

Booker T. Washington · 192 pages

Booker T. Washington, the most recognized national leader, orator and educator, emerged from slavery in the deep south, to work for the betterment of African Americans in the post Reconstruction period. "Up From Slavery" is an autobiography of Booker T. Washington's life and work, which has been the source of inspiration for all Americans. Washington reveals his inner most thoughts as he transi

Behind the Scenes Or, Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House

Elizabeth Keckley · 172 pages

Roots: The Saga of an American Family

Alex Haley · 704 pages

Roots is a novel written by Alex Haley and published in 1976. It portrays the story of Kunta Kinte, an 18th-century African, captured as an adolescent and sold into slavery in the United States, and follows his life and the lives of his alleged descendants in the U.S. down to Haley. The release of the novel, combined with its hugely popular television adaptation, Roots (1977), led to a cultural se

Dave the Potter: Artist, Poet, Slave

Laban Carrick Hill · 40 pages

Chronicles the life of Dave, a nineteenth-century slave who went on to become an influential poet, artist, and potter.

The Black Jacobins: Toussaint L'Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution

C.L.R. James · 426 pages

En 1789, les deux tiers du commerce extérieur de la France se faisaient avec sa colonie antillaise de Saint-Domingue, laquelle représentait le plus grand marché de la traite européenne des esclaves. La plus grosse colonie du monde, fierté de la France et objet de convoitise de toutes les autres nations impérialistes, faisait partie intégrante de la vie économique d'alors. Tout cet ensemble reposai

Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II

Douglas A. Blackmon · 474 pages

In this groundbreaking historical expose, Douglas A. Blackmon brings to light one of the most shameful chapters in American history--an "Age of Neoslavery" that thrived from the aftermath of the Civil War through the dawn of World War II.Under laws enacted specifically to intimidate blacks, tens of thousands of African Americans were arbitrarily arrested, hit with outrageous fines, and charged for

The Hemingses of Monticello

Annette Gordon-Reed · 798 pages

Historian and legal scholar Gordon-Reed presents this epic work that tells the story of the Hemingses, an American slave family, and their close blood ties to Thomas Jefferson.

To Be a Slave

Julius Lester · 160 pages

A compilation, selected from various sources and arranged chronologically, of the reminiscences of slaves and ex-slaves about their experiences from the leaving of Africa through the Civil War and into the early twentieth century.

The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism

Edward E. Baptist · 543 pages

Americans tend to cast slavery as a pre-modern institution —the nation's original sin, perhaps, but isolated in time and divorced from America's later success—. But to do so robs the millions who suffered in bondage of their full legacy. As historian Edward E. Baptist reveals in the prizewinning *The Half Has Never Been Told*, the expansion of slavery in the first eight decades after American inde

In the Shadow of Liberty: The Hidden History of Slavery, Four Presidents, and Five Black Lives

Kenneth C. Davis · 295 pages

Here are the stories of five enslaved people who witnessed the birth of America: Billy Lee, valet to George Washington; Ona Judge, who escaped from Martha Washington; Isaac Granger, servant of Thomas Jefferson; Paul Jennings, who witnessed the War of 1812 in James Madison's White House; and Alfred Jackson, "owned" by Andrew Jackson. These true stories explore our country's great, tragic contradict

Between the World and Me

Ta-Nehisi Coates · 155 pages

An Amazon Best Book of July 2015: Readers of his work in The Atlantic and elsewhere know Ta-Nehisi Coates for his thoughtful and influential writing on race in America. Written as a series of letters to his teenaged son, his new memoir, Between the World and Me, walks us through the course of his life, from the tough neighborhoods of Baltimore in his youth, to Howard University—which Coates dubs “

Jefferson's Sons

Kimberly Brubaker Bradley · 400 pages

A fictionalized look at the last twenty years of Thomas Jefferson's life at Monticello through the eyes of three of his slaves, two of whom were his sons by his slave, Sally Hemings.

When I Was a Slave: Memoirs from the Slave Narrative Collection

Norman R. Yetman · 157 pages

Harriet Tubman: The Moses of Her People

Sarah Hopkins Bradford · 132 pages

The Underground Abductor (An Abolitionist Tale about Harriet Tubman)

Nathan Hale · 128 pages

Araminta Ross was born a slave in Delaware in the early 19th century. Slavery meant that her family could be ripped apart at any time, and that she could be put to work in dangerous places and for abusive people. But north of the Mason-Dixon line, slavery was illegal. If she could run away and make it north without being caught or killed, she'd be free. Facing enormous danger, Araminta made it, an

Bury the Chains

Adam Hochschild · 466 pages

An account of the first great human rights crusade, which originated in England in the 1780s and resulted in the freeing of hundreds of thousands of slaves around the world. In 1787, twelve men gathered in a London printing shop to pursue a seemingly impossible goal: ending slavery in the largest empire on earth. Along the way, they would pioneer most of the tools citizen activists still rely on t

The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story

Nikole Hannah-Jones · 590 pages

Someone Knows My Name

Lawrence Hill · 499 pages

Dreaming of escaping her life of slavery in South Carolina and returning to her African home, slave Aminata Diallo is thrown into the chaos of the Revolutionary War, during which she helps create a list of black people who have been honored for their service to the king.