The Amazing Henry Box Brown: From Fugitive Slave to Ingenious Entertainer

The narrative recounts Douglass's life from his birth into slavery in Maryland, his separation from his mother, and his experiences under various slave owners. It details his self-education despite anti-literacy laws, his attempts to escape, and his eventual success in reaching freedom in the North. The book also critiques the hypocrisy of slaveholding Christianity and serves as a powerful anti-slavery treatise. After its publication in 1845, Douglass had to flee the United States to avoid recapture but later returned after his freedom was purchased by supporters in Britain and Ireland.