Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass (February 1817 or 1818-February 20, 1895) was an African American social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. After escaping from slavery in Maryland, he became a national leader of the abolitionist movement in Massachusetts and New York, becoming famous for his oratory and incisive antislavery writings. He was described by other abolitionists as a living counter-example to the slaveholders’ arguments that slaves lacked the intellectual capacity to function as American citizens.

Douglass wrote three autobiographies, describing his experiences as a slave: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave (1845), My Bondage and My Freedom (1855), and following the Civil War, Douglass wrote his last autobiography, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass.