Contents

• Introduction: "Strange to ever keep in mind": The World of David Walker
• 1. Born Free into Slavery: David Walker’s Early Years
• 2. "There is a great work for you to do": Coming of Age in Vesey’s Charleston
• 3. "Even here in Boston, pride and prejudice have got to such a pitch": Settling Down in Massachusetts
• 4. "To make them think and feel, and act, as one solid body": The Appeal and the Black Reform Movement
• 5. Getting the Good Word Out: Circulating Walker’s Appeal
• 6. History and Oratory: The Intellectual Background of the Appeal
• 7. "I am one of the oppressed, degraded and wretched sons of Africa": An Exegesis of the Appeal
• 8. "Why are the Americans so very fearfully terrified respecting my book?": The Appeal and the Problem of Antebellum Black Resistance
• App. A. Analysis of Names on the Charleston AME Petition
• App. B. Slave and Free Black Members of the African Church Who Were Associated with the Vesey Affair
• App. C. David Walker’s Associates in Boston
• App. D. Distribution of Occupations in Black Boston, 1826
• App. E. David Walker’s Death and the History of His Family