LibGuides: U.S. History: Anti-Slavery Literature: Primary Sources

PeliCAT

PeliCAT is the online catalog of the Katharine Brush Library.

Library Resources

U.S. History Modules

Library Databases

Discovery Search

Research and Citation Guides

NoodleTools

Primary Source Websites

Abolitionist Movement: Fighting Slavery and Racial Injustice from the Revolution to the Civil War
Contains 50 essential documents of the Abolitionist Movement
Black Abolitionist Archive
A collection of over 800 speeches by antebellum blacks and approximately 1,000 editorials from the period. These important documents provide a portrait of black involvement in the anti-slavery movement
Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936 to 1938
Contains more than 2,300 first-person accounts of slavery and 500 black-and-white photographs of former slaves. These narratives were collected in the 1930s as part of the Federal Writers' Project (FWP) of the Works Progress Administration, later renamed Work Projects Administration (WPA).
Chronicling America
Searches America's historic newspaper pages from 1836-1922 from throughout the United States. Chronicling America also has a U.S. Newspaper Directory to find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present.
Documenting the American South
A collection of digital primary sources on southern culture and history. Useful collections include: First-Person Narratives of the American South, North American Slave Narratives, and the Southern Homefront, 1861-1865.
Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress
Presents the papers of the nineteenth-century African American abolitionist who escaped from slavery and then risked his freedom by becoming an outspoken antislavery lecturer, writer, and publisher.
HathiTrust
This digital library is a partnership of academic & research institutions, offering a collection of millions of titles digitized from libraries around the world.
James Birney Collection of Anti-Slavery Pamphlets
The collection contains materials gathered by James Birney in the course of his anti-slavery labors, and items gathered by William Birney while preparing a biography of his father.
Library of Congress American Memory Project
This project focuses on many different aspects of U.S. History. There are over fifty collections that are found electronically. There is the ability to browse “Collections by Title” and “Collections by Subject.”
Making of America
A digital library of American 19th century books and journal articles. There are a total of 9,500 full-text books and 50,000 journal articles. The main focus of the library is on social history. The user is only able to search by keyword.
Samuel J. May Anti-Slavery Collection
Numbering over 10,000 titles, May's pamphlets and leaflets document the anti-slavery struggle at the local, regional, and national levels. Sermons, position papers, offprints, local Anti-Slavery Society newsletters, poetry anthologies, freedmen's testimonies, broadsides, and Anti-Slavery Fair keepsakes all document the social and political implications of the abolitionist movement.
Sidney Lapidus Slavery and Abolition Collection
Close to one hundred books and documents from the Lapidus Collection are now available online. Among the manuscripts are a 1699 “Epistle from the yearly meeting of Friends Brethren in Philadelphia”; and a 1789 ship’s cargo invoice of merchandise on the voyage of the Brig Dauphin, among many other resources.
Slave Narratives (Museum of the African Diaspora)
The few slave narratives that are presented in this exhibit reflect only a fraction of the millions upon millions of stories that could have been told by people who had the misfortune to toil under the yoke of slavery.

Primary Source Databases

American Periodicals Series Online (APS) This link opens in a new window
Includes over 1,500 digitized American magazines and journals published from colonial days to the beginning of the 20th century. Off campus access available.
Archive of Americana This link opens in a new window
Provides online access to the printed record of early America, featuring books, pamphlets, broadsides, newspapers and government publications. The Archive of Americana contains these collections: Early American Imprints, Series I and Series II, 1639-1819, Early American Newspapers, Series I, 1690-1876, American State Papers, 1789-1838, U.S. Congressional Serial Set, 1817-1899, and American Broadsides and Ephemera. Off campus access available.
ProQuest Historical Newspapers This link opens in a new window
A collection of newspapers that includes The New York Tribune (1841-1922), The Chicago Defender (1909-1975), The Washington Post (1877-2004), Wall Street Journal (1889-2003), The Los Angeles Times (1881-1996), The Atlanta Constitution (1868-1984), The Boston Globe (1872-1989), The Hartford Courant (1764-1995), and the British publications The Guardian and The Observer (1791-2003). Off campus access available.

If you are off campus, click here for instructions on accessing select databases from off campus.

Finding Primary Sources in PeliCAT

When searching for primary sources in PeliCAT, consider adding one of these keywords to your search:

Correspondence
Diaries
Interview
Personal narrative
Sources
Pamphlet