Introduction

During the US Civil War (1861–1865), it was illegal for the vast majority of African Americans to learn to read and write. Therefore, it is unusual to anticipate the existence of publications written by African Americans from this time period. However, an early African American print culture did exist, although the works produced are not highly visible or readily available. For example, the first newspaper owned and operated by African Americans, Freedom’s Journal, was founded on March 16, 1827, which was before the Civil War. Moreover, a significant number of Black women were part of this early African American print culture.

The works of many of the earliest African American women writers frequently addressed issues of the enslaved. Three autobiographical accounts document the diverse strategies and generally unheralded means employed by these female freedom seekers. In From the Darkness Cometh the Light or Struggles for Freedom, we are introduced to Lucy Delaney, whose mother hired a lawyer and obtained freedom for herself and Lucy through the court system; in Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House, we are introduced to Elizabeth Keckley, who brokered a financial deal between herself, her business clients, and her owner to purchase her and her son's freedom; in Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom; or, The Escape of William and Ellen Craft from Slavery, we are introduced to Ellen Craft, who could pass for a white individual. She and her enslaved husband traveled north to freedom together, disguised as a white male plantation owner and an enslaved valet. This small set of examples illustrates the forward thinking and resilience of these authors and expands our knowledge of African American history by documenting the business savvy of these women gaining their freedom.

One of the values of historical documents, emphasized by Ronald W. Bailey in his 2023 essay “Contextualizing AFRO PWW in the Digital Age,” is to share more information about the Black experience with the broader society (licensed under CC by 4.0). When the voices of all these women are recognized and explored, our knowledge of American history will be expanded because these texts identify in previously unseen ways the experience of Black women in the nineteenth century.

Through its collection of primary sources (over 140 full-text publications, over 100 author images, and over 140 historic newspaper articles), the project introduces and expands the user’s knowledge of lesser-known Civil War–era African American authors. Kim Gallon, in her chapter “Making a Case for the Black Digital Humanities,” asserted that one of the foundations of digital humanities relates directly to unveiling historic texts written by African Americans: “recovering lost historical and literary texts should be foundational to the black digital humanities.” Likewise, this project consists of lesser-known historic African American texts, speeches, essays, and more, all authored by Civil War–era African American women. These diverse women produced a variety of works that embraced their individual challenges, triumphs, politics, and spirituality. As activists during a time when challenges seemed insurmountable, these women stood up, spoke up, and responded to difficult circumstances. They had no rights, no encouragement, and no role models, yet their lives and writings are a source to encourage women today to continue the fight for social justice. Kim Gallon further asserted that the continued exploration of digital humanities and literary texts is an important means for “recovering alternate constructions of humanity that have been historically excluded from that concept.” The works of the women collected in this project reflect the struggles of their day and serve as a contemporary inspiration for activism.

Moreover, these early writings expand and develop our knowledge of a neglected component of American history with concrete examples of events and happenings during the American nineteenth century. For example, when considering the history of the suffrage movement, African American women are generally omitted. With the opportunity to review the works collected in this project, which includes early African American women activists, we have the potential to learn about the struggles, strategies, and contributions of these women in the suffrage movement.

The utilization of texts by African Americans to illuminate the humanity and capability of the African American people continues a tradition that can be found as early as the 1900 Exposition Universelle (the Paris International Exposition). At this event, a special “Negro” exhibit was prepared to specifically refute the theory that the African American race was inferior to other races. One major component of the “Negro” exhibit was a comprehensive display of works written by African Americans.

As an extensive and varied collection of primary sources written by Civil War–era African American women, this project offers an unprecedented resource for K-12 educators. The Library of Congress website explores the value of primary source material such that it becomes clear that this digital resource will not only help students learn and relate to events of the past and promote a deeper understanding of history, but also prompt curiosity and improve critical thinking and analysis skills.

Scope and Methodology of the Project

The project features female African American authors who were alive during the US Civil War (1861–1865) and whose works are digitized and available with free and open access.

The project was initiated by a request to FREED (Female RE-Enactors of Distinction) for a “handout.” FREED is an auxiliary organization of the African American Civil War Memorial Museum in Washington, DC. Each member of FREED researches and portrays a specific African American woman from the Civil War era. The initial concept for the handout was inspired by the digitized biography of Frederick Douglass’s wife, titled "Anna Murray Douglass, My Mother as I Recall Her." I decided the handout should consist of works written by or about Civil War–era African American women, digitized, and available with free and open access. A Word document was created that contained links to these works. The document was emailed to requestors. Instead of simply providing a list of works by these authors, it provided access to the full text of all the works. This was an important distinction. The motivating principle was to enable all requestors—regardless of the digital divide, access to a rare book collection, or other factors—to have complete access to the full text of all the documents.

The handout grew into an extensive collection as I consulted a variety of historic publications, electronic resources, and the handwritten records of the Daniel Murray Collection. These tools provided documentation of the women as a set of very diverse writers. The compilation of their work consists of an array of various types of fiction and nonfiction: autobiography, biography, poetry, novels, cookbooks, newspapers, science fiction, short stories, children’s books, essays, speeches, a textbook, a dissertation, a medical text, and a travel narrative.

As the original handout evolved, it eventually became a resource that compiled not only the authors’ writings, but also resources related to the authors. It was then converted into a Web Guide on the Library of Congress website. One major advantage of the Web Guide was that access was available 24/7 and no longer limited to requestors who supplied me their email addresses. Over time, the Library of Congress adopted the LibGuide format, widely used by libraries. Conversion to the LibGuide, "African American Women Authors of the Civil War Era: A Resource Guide" permitted the inclusion of a variety of resources related to the authors digitized by the Library of Congress, notably historic newspaper articles and author images. The LibGuide was subsequently developed as an Omeka S database, which afforded further opportunities to update and expand the resources, plus take advantage of the capabilities of Omeka S to augment the collections. For instance, initially 25 author images were identified; the new version showcases 100+ author images. This includes multiple images of some authors. Initially 90 historic newspaper articles were included; now 140+ historic newspaper articles are available. In addition, a couple of new resource sets were compiled to interlink with the authors. One new resource is the set of 80+ images of book covers and title pages. Another new resource is the set of 75+ books and dissertations included as secondary material for further reading pertaining to specific authors.

More importantly, the affordance of Omeka S allows the project to be conceived from a unique and more functional vantage point. Traditionally, documents are collected together by similar format. In the Omeka S version of the project, the documents are arranged, not by similar format, but by author! This compilation of author items is known as the author resource page. Each author has an individual author resource page. Thus, if a user locates an author of interest or locates any item that pertains to an author, with one click, the user can easily access the author resource page, which contains all the material compiled that focuses on that author. This method of organization, by author instead of by format, will help to ensure that a user can locate the complete set of material compile­­d for a specific author.

Resources Used to Compile the Collection

While each individual work includes reference material within the metadata for its digitized location, here, I offer a sense of the diversity of digital and print resources available to users studying nineteenth-century African Americans. As part of my research into these women, I used the following resources and databases:

Project Overview

The project features five distinct components: the documents created by Civil War–era African American women; historic biographical essays plus demographic data about the authors; historic newspaper articles about them; images of the authors, book covers, and title pages; and finally, resources for further reading. All online resources included are free and open access, with full text. The books and dissertations for further reading about the authors may be borrowed from an indicated library, and some dissertations are available as free downloads.

As described above, the project has a resource page for each individual author that links to all the available components pertaining to that author. Unfortunately, a few authors may not have all components available. However, this page is designed to provide concrete assurance that all the material compiled for an author can be readily and easily accessed. It maximizes the potential that many of the “discovered” little known authors will become known, analyzed, enjoyed, and perhaps further researched. Below, I offer an overview of all five components and the exhibit.

"Exhibit" introduces the user to the project by displaying three separate items in an integrated manner. The exhibit, “Three Freedom Seekers,” looks at the autobiographies of Lucy Delaney, Ellen Craft, and Elizabeth Keckley to illustrate the forward thinking and resilience of these women and expand our knowledge of African American history by documenting their business savvy to gain their freedom. When the voices of African American women are recognized and explored, our knowledge of American history is expanded, because these texts identify in previously unseen ways the experience of Black women in the nineteenth century.

"Biographical Data" offers information about the authors collected within the project. This provides insight into their lives. The demographic information incorporated includes status at birth (free or enslaved), birth year, place of birth, residence, and occupation. The page for each author also includes links to a historic essay and a Wikipedia entry about the author. The historic essays contextualize the women within their time period. The Wikipedia entries provide a potential means to locate and evaluate primary biographical sources pertaining to each author.

"Full-Text Documents" links to the full text of the authors’ writings. These documents consist of an array of various types of fiction and nonfiction, including poetry, cookbooks, newspapers, novels, autobiographies, biographies, short stories, children’s books, essays, speeches, a textbook, a dissertation, a medical text, and a travel narrative. As mentioned above, their writings provide us with a unique perspective on the trials and triumphs of the enslaved. Their texts also reflect their post-slavery politics, spirituality, and humor. This collection of documents enables users to acquire new information regarding African Americans that has traditionally been omitted.

"Images" collects portraits and other forms of authorial images. Their images verify the authors as proud, beautiful, and sophisticated professionals. They are portrayed as competent individuals, which effectively questions the stereotype held by some Americans of African American women from this time period. The images also reflect the beauty and creativity of their works. In addition, this section includes images of the book covers and title pages, which tend to be very decorative. These stimulate our curiosity and encourage us to examine the works further.

"Historic Newspaper Articles" links to the full text of historic newspaper articles written about the authors, including book reviews, obituaries, death notices, news items, association activities, reviews of speeches, and more.  These offer further context into the lives of the authors by highlighting their intellectual activities, community activism, and professional achievements. The articles also provide glimpses of how the authors were perceived by their contemporaries. Each article page includes a brief summary. All the newspaper articles are retrieved from Chronicling America, the historic newspaper database of the Library of Congress. When a newspaper article is accessed using Chronicling America, a search box is available that will permit a full-text search of the entire database. Chronicling America continues to grow; thus, additional articles pertaining to the authors may be available.

"Further Reading" links to resources for continued reading or additional research. The resources listed are all from WorldCat, the major database of library holdings. The resources may be borrowed from an indicated library, and some dissertations are available as free downloads. WorldCat continues to grow, and additional titles pertaining to the authors may be available.  

Works Cited

Bailey, Ronald W. “Contextualizing AFRO PWW in the Digital Age.” Unpublished essay, 2023.

Craft, William, and Ellen Craft. Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom; or, The Escape of William and Ellen Craft from Slavery. William Tweedie, 1860.

Delaney, Lucy A. From the Darkness Cometh the Light or Struggles for Freedom. J. T. Smith, 189?. 

Gallon, Kim. "Making a Case for the Black Digital Humanities." In Debates in the Digital Humanities 2016, edited by Matthew K. Gold and Lauren F. Klein. University of Minnesota Press, 2016. 

Keckley, Elizabeth. Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. Carleton, 1868.

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