Hannah Crafts
Parts of this article (those related to updating research from, Hecimovich, Gregg. (2023) "The Life and Times of Hannah Crafts:The True Story of The Bondwoman's Narrative". Harper Collins. ISBN 9780062334732 ) need to be updated. (April 2024) |
Hannah Bond, also known by her pen name Hannah Crafts (born c. 1830s),[1] was an American writer who escaped from slavery in North Carolina about 1857 and went to the North. Bond settled in New Jersey, likely married Thomas Vincent, and became a teacher. She wrote The Bondwoman's Narrative by Hannah Crafts after gaining freedom.[2] It is the only known novel by an enslaved woman.[3]
Written between 1853 and 1861, the novel was published in 2002 for the first time after
Bond's identity was documented in 2013 by Gregg Hecimovich of Furman University, who found that she had been owned by
Life
Hannah Bond, according to Gregg Hecimovich of Furman University, was born into slavery. Bond worked for Wheeler's wife Ellen as a lady's maid, and learned to read and write.[1] Her novel revealed close knowledge of the Wheeler household and his tenure as US Minister to Nicaragua. She quotes liberally from novels by prominent authors found to have been part of Wheeler's extensive library.
About 1857 Bond took on disguise with men's clothes, perhaps helped by someone in the Wheeler family, and escaped from the plantation, traveling as a white boy. She reached freedom in the North, living for a time in upstate New York with a couple named Crafts. She apparently took their surname as her pseudonym.[1] Later she settled in New Jersey. There she married and became a school teacher.[1]
External videos | |
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Washington Journal interview with Henry Louis Gates on The Bondswoman's Narrative, April 18, 2002, C-SPAN |
Bond wrote a novel,
Most literary scholars believed that the name Hannah Crafts was a pseudonym, and they have considered the work to be a fictionalized autobiography.[5] From her writing, Crafts appears to be self-taught. References in the work suggest that she may have been born in the 1830s.
The paper of the manuscript is a distinct one, identified by historians as from the library of
Hecimovich learned that girls from a nearby school often boarded at the plantation; part of their curriculum required memorizing Charles Dickens' Bleak House, which influences Bond also expressed in her novel. She may have heard the girls reading aloud, or read the book herself.[1] It was serialized in Frederick Douglass's newspaper, which had wide circulation among fugitive slaves.[7]
Other scholars, including Joe Nickell, who authenticated the manuscript, had previously tied Crafts to John H. Wheeler. She had accurately described him as the US Minister to Nicaragua and his duties, as shown by his own diary. Believing that the novel was autobiographical, scholars speculated from its plot that Crafts had married a Methodist minister and lived in New Jersey. Her married name may have been Hannah Vincent, the wife of Thomas Vincent, as they were both listed in the census records of New Jersey in 1870 and 1880.[8][page needed][9]
Background of book
Research suggests the book was written some time between 1855 and 1869. For instance, the book shows knowledge of and adaptation from Dickens' novel Bleak House (1853). The surname Crafts, her pen name, was at one time thought to be a tribute to the slaves Ellen and William Craft, whose bold escape in 1848 was covered by the national press.[10] Hecimovich believes it is more likely Hannah took this name after living with a Crafts couple in upstate New York in her early time after reaching the North by the Underground Railroad.[1] Most scholars believe the manuscript was written before the American Civil War. They think Bond would have referred to the war if she had been writing her work during or after it. She referred to other contemporary events, as well as creating fictional ones.
See also
- Harriet Wilson
- Our Nig
- William Wells Brown
- List of enslaved people
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Bosman, Julie (September 18, 2013). "Professor Says He Has Solved a Mystery Over a Slave's Novel". The New York Times.[original research?]
- OCLC 1086231994.
- ^ Rodriguez, Crystal (2013). "Hannah Bond". NCPEDIA. Retrieved October 19, 2019.
- ISBN 978-0-446-69029-4.
- ISBN 978-1-60473-283-2.
- ISBN 9780759527645.
- ^ "Blackening Bleak House: Hannah Crafts's The Bondwoman's Narrative," in In Search of Hannah Crafts: Critical Essays on the Bondwoman's Narrative, eds. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Hollis Robbins. Basic/Civitas, 2004
- ^ Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Hollis Robbins, editors, In Search of Hannah Crafts (2003)
- ISBN 0-313-33197-9.
- ISBN 978-0-8203-3005-1. Retrieved April 7, 2011.