Harriet Jacobs

• Harriet Jacobs was born in the year 1813 in Edenton, North Carolina to her mother Delilah, who was a slave to a woman named Margaret Horniblow, and her father Daniel Jacobs, who was a slave to a man named Andrew Knox.
• Harriet Jacobs did not know that she was born a slave or that she was the property of Margaret Horniblow until she was six years old.
• Harriet's mother died in the year 1819. Harriet was then sent to live with Margaret Horniblow, who was nice enough to teach her how to read and sew. Unfortunately, her mistress died in the year 1825 and, because of what she ordered in her will, Harriet was to become Horniblow's niece's slave, Mary Matilda Norcom, who at the time was only three years old.
• Harriet was now under the control of Mary's father, Dr. Norcom, who would make sexual advances on Harriet without her consent.
• After becoming illicitly involved with a man named Samuel Treadwell Sawyer and having two children with him, Dr. Norcom sent Harriet to one of his plantations. Harriet soon went to hide at her grandmother's house for close to seven years. This happened before her children could join her.
• In the year 1842, Harriet ran way from Edenton by boat and arrived in New York where she worked as a maid for the abolitionist family of Nathaniel Parker Willis.
• She eventually reunited with her children by traveling between New York and Boston.
• Around that same time, Harriet began working with anti-slavery feminists, who later convinced her to write the story of her life.
• Harriet's previous slave owners wanted to re-enslave her. To keep them away, Willis' family bought Harriet and granted her freedom in the year 1852.
• It was the year after that she began working on her autobiography Incidents in the Life of A Slave Girl and it finally became published in the year 1861 after failed attempts to do so.
• During the Civil War, Harriet spent her time in Washington D.C. helping with contra bands, teaching, and nursing black soldiers in the way.
• In the year prior to her death, she was involved in the National Association of Colored Women in Washington D.C.
• Harriet Jacobs died in the year 1897

Works Cited:
http://www.ncwriters.org/services/lhof/inductees/hjacobs.htm
http://www.lkwdpl.org/wihohio/jaco-har.htm
http://docsouth.unc.edu/fpn/jacobs/bio.html