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Lincoln and Black Abolitionists The full version of Professor Sinha’s essay appears on p. 167-96 of Our Lincoln. I’d recommend that you also consult this wonderful compendium of sources and commentaries that she coedited with John H. Bracey: African American Mosaic: A Documentary History from the African Slave Trade to the Twenty First Century and Contested Democracy: Freedom, Race and Power in American History Upper Saddle River. Two earlier issues of History Now (and my resource pages there) touch on several of the topics discussed in Professor Sinha’s essay: Our September 2005 issue on abolition and our December 2005 issue on Lincoln. Perhaps of greatest interest is Douglas Wilson’s essay on Lincoln and Abolitionism in our December 2005 issue: /historynow/12_2005/historian3.php and my resource page: /historynow/12_2005/ask2f.php The September 2005 issue includes an essay specifically on the role of
African American women in the abolitionist movement, and my resources
page there may be helpful: Let me add one relevant book on that subject that appeared after I compiled the 2005 list: King, Wilma. The Essence Of Liberty: Free Black Women During The Slave Era. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, c2006. These books look at African-American abolitionists in general: Blackett, R. J. M. Building An Antislavery Wall: Black Americans In The Atlantic Abolitionist Movement, 1830-1860. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, c1983. Goodman, Paul. Of One Blood: Abolitionism And The Origins Of Racial Equality. Berkeley: University of California Press, c1998. Horton, James Oliver and Lois E. In Hope Of Liberty: Culture, Community, And Protest Among Northern Free Blacks, 1700-1860. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. Timothy Patrick McCarthy and John Stauffer, eds. Prophets Of Protest: Reconsidering The History Of American Abolitionism. New York: New Press: Distributed by W. W. Norton, 2006. Essays focusing on African Americans and women in the movement. Rael, Patrick, ed. African-American Activism Before The Civil War: The Freedom Struggle In The Antebellum North. New York: Routledge, 2008. Collection of essays. Rael, Patrick. Black Identity & Black Protest In The Antebellum North. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, c2002. Stauffer, John. The Black Hearts Of Men: Radical Abolitionists And The Transformation Of Race. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002. Focuses on two pairs of abolitionists: two African-American, two white men. And I’ll recommend (as I have in the past) a wonderful documentary resource on all African American abolitionists. Not only does it include printed texts of their speeches, pamphlets, and correspondence, but it also provides biographical sketches and other background information you won't find elsewhere: Ripley, C. Peter et al., eds. The Black Abolitionist Papers.
Five volumes. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1985-1992).
These books focus on Lincoln’s relations with Frederick Douglass,
the best-known African-American abolitionist of his time: Oakes, James. The Radical And The Republican: Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, And The Triumph Of Antislavery Politics. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., c2007. By the author of another contributor to this issue. Here are some good biographies of Douglass and other abolitionists mentioned in Professor Sinha’s essay: The Works Of William Wells Brown: Using His "Strong, Manly Voice". Ed. by edited by Paula Garrett and Hollis Robbins. Oxford: New York: Oxford University Press, c2006. Farrison, William Edward.William Wells Brown: Author & Reformer. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1969. Adeleke, Tunde. Without Regard To Race: The Other Martin Robison Delany. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, c2003. Griffith, Cyril E. The African Dream: Martin R. Delany And The Emergence Of Pan-African Thought. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, c1975. Sterling, Dorothy. The Making Of An Afro-American: Martin Robison Delany, 1812-1885. Garden City, N.Y., Doubleday, 1971. McFeely, William S. Frederick Douglass. New York: Norton, c1991. Schor, Joel.. Henry Highland Garnet: A Voice Of Black Radicalism
In The Nineteenth Century. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1977. Cheek, William F. and Aimee Lee. John Mercer Langston And The Fight For Black Freedom, 1829-65. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, c1989. For the colonization movement, you’ll find suggestions in my resource
page for our September 2005 issue, “Religion and Abolitionism”
essay. That same resource page has suggestions for materials on the African-American
clergy and William Lloyd Garrison. However, your best resource for stimulating
ideas on this topic is Eric Foner’s “Lincoln and Colonization”
an essay appearing on p. 135-66 of Our Lincoln. Trefousse, Hans Louis. The Radical Republicans: Lincoln's Vanguard For Racial Justice. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1975, c1968. As for African-American soldiers in the Civil War – there’s so much material that we could do two or three issues on the subject and not exhaust all of the possibilities. These are just some of the more recent, general works: Berlin,Ira, Joseph P. Reidy, Leslie S. Rowland, eds. Freedom's Soldiers: The Black Military Experience In The Civil War. Cambridge, U.K.: New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Absolutely terrific documentary history based on original sources. Glatthaar, Joseph T. Forged In Battle: The Civil War Alliance Of Black Soldiers And White Officers. New York: Free Press: London: Collier Macmillan, c1990. Scholarly account of the interaction of white officers and African-American troops. Hargrove, Hondon B. Black Union soldiers in the Civil War. Jefferson,
N.C.: McFarland, c1988. Workmanlike, comparatively brief overview. Smith, John David, ed. Black Soldiers In Blue: African American Troops In The Civil War Era. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002. Interesting collection of essays. Trudeau, Noah Andre. Like Men of War: Black Troops in the Civil War, 1862-1865. Boston: Little, Brown, c1998. Full accounts of battlefield experiences of these units. This remains the best study of the free African-American community in New Orleans during and after the War: Blassingame, John W. Black New Orleans, 1860-1880. Chicago, University of Chicago Press [1973] Internet Resources In addition to the resources you’ll see recommended in my “Archivist” pages for the September and December 2005 issues on Abolitionism and Lincoln, you may want to look at these: American Memory’s new segment on the Library of Congress’s
Frederick Douglass Papers: And “Learning Page” with suggestions for classroom use: American Abolitionism Website at Indiana-Perdue University: American Memory’s “Learning Page” on black soldiers
in the Civil War is well worth a visit as is the National Archives “Teaching
with Documents” lesson plan on the subject: |
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