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Sojourner Truth: The Fight For Freedom

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The Fight for Freedom

Ever since cotton became the majority of the crops grown in the South, Southerners used slaves to plant, grow, and harvest the crops for them. But as the demand for cotton was growing, so was the need for slaves. Slaves were treated very harshly and did not have any rights as ‘property’ of white farmers, in the North and the South. Abolitionists, or people who wanted to abolish, or end, slavery, fought and spoke to end this cruelty.
Sojourner Truth was one of these abolitionists. Isabella Baumfree, Sojourner Truth’s real name, was born a slave in New York State in 1797 and was the youngest of ten or twelve children. At just the age of nine, she was separated from her family when she was sold to John Nealy, a slave owner, …show more content…

She stayed with the family for about a year, and during that time they bought Isabella’s and her baby’s freedom. They were finally free. During her stay though, she heard that her five-year-old son, Peter, had been illegally sold to a slave owner in the South. Even though she had no money and she was illiterate, she had courage and determination. With the help of some abolitionists, she got a lawyer and took the matter up to court. After several months, she won the court case and her son was returned to her. She was the first black woman to ever win a court case against a white man. With her two children, she moved to New York, where she joined a church. Her faith in God grew stronger, and she had a realization: She would become a preacher. On that day, she changed her name. She would travel, or sojourn, preaching about religion and abolitionism. She believed that truth is powerful and that it always prevails.Thus, her name became Sojourner Truth. Throughout the rest of her life, she traveled to Massachusetts, New York, and Connecticut. She often turned hostile, jeering crowds into hushed silences with her powerful, electrifying …show more content…

His exact birthdate is unknown, but he was born around 1818 in Talbot, Maryland. He was owned by the same man as his mother-Aaron Anthony. But at about age seven, his mother died. A year later, he was moved to Baltimore to work for one of his owner’s relatives. He was now owned by Hugh Auld and his wife Sophia. When he was about twelve years old, Sophia Auld started teaching young Frederick how to read and write. But this was illegal because people feared that slaves might revolt against them if they became smart due to education. But Hugh’s wife defied the ban on teaching anyway, but later was found out by her husband and he immediately forbade the lessons. Though he only knew a few letters of the alphabet, he became inspired to learn how to read and write. Over the course of the next several years, he taught himself to read and write. Young Frederick sought out newspapers and other literature when he could. He also read political newspapers, and this helped to shape his “ideological opposition to slavery”. He soon began to teach other slaves how to read and write, especially the New Testament. Every week, they would meet up to read together. But this was soon found to be displeasing to the slave owners, and they broke up the “congregation”. At age sixteen, Frederick was ‘rented’ to work for Edward Covey, who was known as a “slave

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