Ahead of Her Time: Abby Kelley and the Politics of Antislavery
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- 15,99 €
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- 15,99 €
Publisher Description
“[The author] tells this remarkable story with honesty and compassion. Readers will find a wealth of new information not only about Kelley’s outstanding contribution to abolitionism but about the movements to bring about the end of slavery and to advance the cause of women.” —Mari Jo Buhle, Brown University
In the tumultuous years before the Civil War, a young white woman from a Quaker background came to embody commitment to the cause of antislavery and equal rights for black people. Abby Kelley became the abolitionist movement’s chief money-raiser and organizer and its most radial member. She traveled hundreds of miles to awaken the country to the evils of slavery, braving hardship and prejudice as well as opening the way for other women, black and white, to take leadership roles. Now the full story of this principled woman has been told in Dorothy Sterling’s compelling biography.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A little-noticed figure in the early civil rights movement is brought to the forefront by Sterling, whose We Are Your Sisters depicts the experiences of black women in the 19th century. Twenty years before the Civil War, Abby Kelley, a young white Quaker, became a noted Abolitionist. In her travels through the North, she was vilified not only for her stand against slavery but also for protesting the exclusion of women from voting rights. While joining such renowned leaders in both movements as Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, Lucy Stone and Lucretia Mott, Kelley remained true to her rural roots and, as wife and mother, loyal to Quaker simplicity. At an 1839 meeting of the American Anti-Slavery Society, she led the fight to substitute the word ``persons'' for men in official records. This useful, detailed and enlightening biography will appeal more to the student of history than to the general reader. Illustrations not seen by PW.
