An Eyewitness History of Slavery in America From Colonial Times to the Civil War

(New York: Checkmark Books, 2001). 277 x 214 mm; laminated pictorial wraps; pp. (vi) + 458, incl. index; monochrome illustrations in text. Wraps very slightly shelf-soiled, with a little curl to corners. Very good condition. "The history of the enslavement of African Americans in North America stretches from the beginning of European colonization and lasted until the end of the Civil War. An Eyewitness History of Slavery in America recounts this history by examining, chapter by chapter, many of its aspects: the slave catchers and their coffles in Africa, the crowded slave ships that transported Africans along the triangular trade routes to America, slave auctions, life and labor on the plantation, escape attempts and insurrections, and finally the Civil War and eventual emancipation. The authors capture the complexities and the extent of slavery and document the wide differences in the ways people reacted to this terrible institution. An Eyewitness History of Slavery in America provides hundreds of firsthand accounts - from diary entries, letters, speeches, and newspaper accounts - that illustrate how historical events appeared to those who lived through them. Among the eyewitness testimonies included are those from Sojourner Truth, Nat Turner, Benjamin Franklin, Harriet Tubman, and Abraham Lincoln. In addition to the firsthand accounts, each chapter provides an introductory essay and a chronology of events. The book also includes such critical documents as the 1672 charter of the Royal African Company, the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, the Emancipation Proclamation, and the Thirteenth Amendment, as well as capsule biographies of more than 100 key figures, notes, a bibliography, an index, and 80 black-and-white photographs." .