Overview

A fascinating study of freedom and slavery, told through the life of an escaped slave who built a life in the Hudson Valley In 1793 James F. Brown was born a slave, and in 1868 he died a free man. At age 34 he ran away from his native Maryland to pass the remainder of his life as a gardener to a wealthy family in the Hudson Valley. Two years after his escape and manumission, he began a diary which he kept until his death. In Freedom’s Gardener, Myra B. Young Armstead uses the apparently small and domestic details of Brown’s diaries to construct a bigger story about the transition from slavery to freedom. In this first detailed historical study of Brown’s diaries, Armstead utilizes Brown’s life to illuminate the concept of freedom as it developed in the United States in the early national and antebellum years. That Brown, an African American and former slave, serves as such a case study underscores the potential of American citizenship during his lifetime.

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9781479825233

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This in-depth study of the life of an African American slave turned master gardener is an enlightening examination of a period of American history that seems to have slipped from public scrutiny in recent years. -Marilyn K. Alaimo, garden writer, Chicago Botanic Garden

Author Information

Myra B. Young Armstead is Professor of History at Bard College. Her books include “Lord, Please Don’t Take Me in August”: African Americans in Newport and Saratoga Springs, 1870-1930 and Mighty Change, Tall Within: Black Identity in the Hudson Valley.

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