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Manuscript Slave Deed, Dated February 2, 1830, Rockbridge County, Virginia, From Larkin Powers To Thomas Johnston., Larkin Powers

Documents Related to Slavery

Know all men by these presents that I Larkin Powers of the County of Rockbridge and the State of Virginia have .?. by these presents do sell unto Thomas Johnston of the county and state aforesaid a negro woman named Hannah for the consideration of one sorrel horse of the value of fifty dollars and in cash fifteen dollars the act of which I ackowledge and I do warrant and defend the health and title of said negro against the claims or clauses of all persons in writing whereof I have herewith Let my hand and seal this 2nd day …

Walker’S Appeal, In Four Articles; Together With A Preamble, To The Coloured Citizens Of The World, … (Boston, 1830), David Walker, Paul Royster , Editor & Depositor

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Walker’s Appeal ... is a radical antislavery and antiracist manifesto by a free American of African ancestry. Its bold denunciation of European culture was unprecedented, unrestrained, and startling, viz.:

“The whites have always been an unjust, jealous, unmerciful, avaricious and blood-thirsty set of beings, always seeking after power and authority.”

Walker attacks the slave system and its rampant racism from the viewpoint of America’s allegiance to the idea of freedom; he quotes the Declaration of Independence at length, and strikes a recognizably jeremiad note:

“O Americans! Americans!! I call God—I call angels— I call men, to witness, that your destruction …