In 1789, a man named Olaudah Equiano published the story of his life. He wrote that as a boy he had been kidnapped in West Africa, carried across the Atlantic in a crowded slave ship and sold. He later bought his own freedom. His book was read all over Britain and helped turn many people against the slave trade.
Key idea
In Britain, William Wilberforce spoke against the slave trade in Parliament year after year. In 1807 Britain banned the slave trade, and from 1834 slavery ended in most of the British Empire. In the United States, Frederick Douglass escaped slavery and became a great speaker and writer for freedom. Harriet Tubman escaped too, then went back again and again to lead others north to freedom on the Underground Railroad.
In the United States, the question of slavery helped lead to the Civil War (1861 to 1865). President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, and the Thirteenth Amendment ended slavery in the whole country in 1865. Brazil, the last country in the Americas, ended slavery in 1888.
Worked example: How long a fight?
- 1,888 − 1,807 = 81.
Answer: 81 years. Ending slavery took a long time and great courage.
Common mistake
Try it at home
- On a clear night, find the Big Dipper. The two stars at the end of its cup point to the North Star. People escaping slavery followed it north.
- Read a few sentences from Frederick Douglass's writings together, and talk about why he thought reading was the "pathway from slavery to freedom."