Sojourner Truth

Sojourner Truth was born Isabella Baumfree, enslaved in Dutch-speaking New York, walked away from her master in 1826 with her infant daughter, sued for her son’s return from Alabama and won, and in 1843 took the name under which she preached across the North for abolition and women’s rights, unable to read, six feet tall, with a voice every account remarks on. Ain’t I a Woman?, the speech at Akron in 1851, exists in a contemporary report and in Frances Gage’s reconstruction of 1863, from which the refrain comes. She met Lincoln, recruited Black soldiers, and campaigned for land for the freedpeople.