Twelve Years A Slave

Solomon Northup

Sep 2013 · Sold by Harper Collins

About this ebook

First published in 1853, Twelve Years a Slave is the narrative of Solomon Northup’s experience as a freeman sold into slavery, having spent twelve years in bondage before finally escaping. Northup’s memoir reveals unimaginable details, detailing the slave markets and horrors of life on a plantation from the perspective of a man who lived more than thirty years as a free person before being forcibly enslaved.

Written in the year after Northup was freed and published in the wake of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Northup’s story was quickly taken up by abolitionist groups and news organizations as part of the fight against slavery.

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Ratings and reviews

Amazing story. Shows the horror of slavery.

Stolen into slavery

About the author

SOLOMON NORTHUP was born in 1808 and lived as a free man in Saratoga Springs, New York, with his wife and three children until his capture and enslavement in 1841. He was one of very few who were able to regain their freedom after being kidnapped and sold into slavery. After he returned to New York, he published his memoir and became an active abolitionist, lecturing throughout the Northeast about his experiences.