Abolition
Sojourner Truth
c. 1797 – 1883
Born into slavery in Ulster County, New York, as Isabella Baumfree. Walked away from bondage with her infant daughter in 1826. Successfully sued a white man in 1828 to recover her son, becoming the first Black woman in U.S. history to win such a case. Her extemporaneous 1851 speech at the Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, is one of the foundational texts in American oratory.
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