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January 1859

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Achievement · literature
Jermain Loguen Published His Slave Narrative and Defied Recapture Publicly

Jermain Loguen, AME Zion bishop in Syracuse who had escaped Tennessee slavery by horse, published 'The Rev. J.W. Loguen as a Slave and as a Freeman' (1859). When his former enslaver wrote demanding $1,000 or his return, Loguen published his refusal in the Syracuse Standard: 'I stand among a free people, who, I thank God, sympathize with my rights and the rights of mankind.' His defiance was celebrated throughout the North.

Events

  1. January 1859
    Jermain Loguen Published His Slave Narrative and Defied Recapture Publicly

    Jermain Loguen, AME Zion bishop in Syracuse who had escaped Tennessee slavery by horse, published 'The Rev. J.W. Loguen as a Slave and as a Freeman' (1859). When his former enslaver wrote demanding $1,000 or his return, Loguen published his refusal in the Syracuse Standard: 'I stand among a free people, who, I thank God, sympathize with my rights and the rights of mankind.' His defiance was celebrated throughout the North.

  2. 1859
    Martin Delany Serializes Blake — Black Nationalist Novel

    Martin Delany serialized Blake; or, The Huts of America in the Anglo-African Magazine, depicting a pan-African revolutionary plot. The novel was the first to imagine coordinated Black rebellion across the Americas and established Delany as a foundational Black nationalist thinker and pioneering fiction writer.