Frederick Douglass Documents Systematic Violence of Slavery

Frederick Douglass's 1845 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass documented with precise detail the violence endemic to slavery. He described overseer Austin Gore shooting an enslaved man named Demby for refusing to come out of the water where he stood after a whipping — and facing no legal consequences. He described the brutal beating of his Aunt Hester before he was seven years old, which he called his 'entrance to the hell of slavery.' He documented how Edward Covey, a hired 'slave-breaker,' beat him weekly until Douglass fought back. Douglass's Narrative became one of the most widely read abolitionist texts in the world and sold 11,000 copies in its first three years.