Description

Hughes (1832-1913) was born a slave to a plantation owner near Charlottesville, Virginia. Whilst he remained in bondage for over 30 years, mostly in Tennessee, he secretly learned to read and write. After he was finally successful in escaping towards the end of the Civil War, he settled in the North with his family, whose freedom he had also been able to secure, and became a professional nurse. In this account of his life published in 1897 he details the lives of slaves and the hardships they suffered, and also describes his family's struggle to earn a living and establish themselves after the War.

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