Candace

In 1742 a child was brought to the town of Gosport on the Isles of Shoals, off the coast of New Hampshire, and enslaved by the town's minister. We know that her name was Candace but little else about her, apart from two brief church records. She spent her life in Gosport.

Diane Taraz explores what that life may have been like, based on the experiences of others in Candace's situation, facts about the family that kept her in bondage, the records of the town in which she lived, and what we know about life in the New England colonies during the eighteenth century. These explorations are conjecture, but they are based on a wealth of research from primary source documents.

Most of the book is about the world in which Candace found herself nearly 300 years ago. Taraz recognizes that she has no way of knowing anything about this woman's inner life and has tried to avoid taking liberties with her memory. But Candace can be placed in the midst of an ocean of facts, and it is worthwhile to envision her as a live person rather than just a fading bit of ink on a page.

At least four other people were enslaved in Gosport. In the years leading up to the American Revolution they lived through a major earthquake, continent-wide warfare, a calendar adjustment, and growing conflict with Britain. They entered a new nation, conceived in liberty, that did not extend the right of liberty to all. The legacy of this injustice remains very much with us.