"Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. When Caesar, a recent arrival from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they decide to take a terrifying risk and escape. Though they manage to find a station and head north, they are being hunted. Their first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But the city's placid surface masks an insidious scheme designed for its black denizens. And even worse:...

Born into slavery on a Maryland farm, Josiah Henson (17891883) worked as a foreman, married, and became a preacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church. Faced with the prospect of separation from his family, Henson fled with his wife and children to Ontario, where he became a leader in the Afro-Canadian community. The Life of Josiah Henson, Formerly a Slave, Now an Inhabitant of Canada, as Narrated by Himself first appeared in 1849. The book's avid readers...

Tells of the Civil War's first contraband camp that began when three escaped slaves were granted protection at a Union-held fort, prompting runaway slaves to seek freedom there and build the country's first African American community.

Hetty "Handful" Grimké, an urban slave in early nineteenth century Charleston, yearns for life beyond the suffocating walls that enclose her within the wealthy Grimké household. The Grimké's daughter, Sarah, has known from an early age she is meant to do something large in the world, but she is hemmed in by the limits imposed on women. On Sarah's eleventh birthday, she is given ownership of ten year old Handful, who is to be her handmaid. Over...

Who could forget the pranks, the adventures, the sheer fun of Tom Sawyer? It's something every child should experience and every child will love. From Tom's sly trickery with the whitewashed fence, when he cleverly manipulates everyone so they happily do his work for him, to his and Becky Thatcher's calamities in the Bat Cave, the enjoyment just never ends.

Staring unflinchingly into the abyss of slavery, this spellbinding novel transforms history into a story as powerful as Exodus and as intimate as a lullaby. Sethe, its protagonist, was born a slave and escaped to Ohio, but eighteen years later she is still not free. She has too many memories of Sweet Home, the beautiful farm where so many hideous things happened. And Sethe's new home is haunted by the ghost of her baby, who died nameless and whose...

Here is one of the few slave narratives written by a women. Slavery is a terrible thing, but it is far more terrible and harrowing for women than for men. Harriet Jacobs was, owned by a brutal master, who beat his slaves regularly and subjected them to indignations that were far worse. Jacobs eventually escaped her master and moved to a northern state. Though she was unable to take her children with her at the time, they were later reunited. Read...

Ellen and William Craft were two of the few slaves to ever escape from the Deep South. Their first escape took them to Philadelphia, then on to Boston pursued by slave hunters, and finally 5000 miles across the ocean to England, where they were able to settle peacefully.

"A young woman who is a bard-and a warrior-seeks to repay her debts and settle scores in this thrilling historical fantasy series. The young warrior and bard Liobhan has lost her brother to the Otherworld. Even more determined to gain a place as an elitefighter, she returns to Swan Island to continue her training. But Liobhan is devastated when her comrade Dau is injured and loses his sight in their final display bout. Blamed by Dau's family for the...

President George Washington and his wife enslaved more than 150 people in the mid-1700s. In 1796, one of their slaves escaped. Her name was Oney Judge. Oney Judge: Escape from Slavery and the President's House explores her story and her legacy.