Civil War Book Report: Narrative of Frederick Douglass

Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. Dover Publications Inc. 1845.

I remember back when I was in sophomore year that we read a small excerpt from Frederick Douglass's book as a small study of slavery during my world history class. I forgot about it until recently of doing the civil war project and given the assignment of reading a book about the civil war. I decided to read it. The book is about Frederick Douglass, one of the most famous abolitionists to end slavery. He talks about how he came to be and how he lived in Maryland before the civil war had started.

Frederick Douglass assumes that he was born around 1818 from overhearing his master. He grows up on a plantation that has is owned by Colonel Lloyd. He tells of how his master Captain Anthony whips his Aunt Hester and how she gets raped by a drunk Captain Anthony. He talks about how he is whipped severly by an overseer appropriately named "Mr.Severe". However he soon dies and is replaced by Mr. Hopkins, who all the slaves say he is a fair seer. He soon learns to read and write from after moving to Baltimore through Mrs. Auld for the 7 years he's there. He soon gets further education through Thomas Auld, Mrs.Auld's son's old books. During this time he learns about the situation of slavery and becomes desperate to escape. With the knowledge he acquires and his various owners dying, taking, and managing property along with Frederick. He plans and plans his escape from his final master of Hugh Auld and escapes to New York. He is taken by a free black-man named David Ruggles and gets help to move to Massachusetts. He works miscellaneous jobs and soon saves enough money for an abolition magazine. He attends an antislavery convention and was urged to speak about his life as a slave. After that moment, he continually worked for the freedom of slaves.

Frederick Douglass's autobiography shows how much physical and mental will he had to desperately become free. His story tells an incredible tale of how he had managed to escape the inevitable system what would have trapped him as a slave forever. He had an iron-will at most times and there were few instances where he was in incredible despair and had glimmer of hopes appear to him during those times, and I think that each time that he over came those despairs his will became ever stronger.

After finally finding the time to read this book. I think that it is one of the most important books during 19th century. His book coming from his perspective as a slave gave further proof to the North that slavery cannot go on forever, as it was inhumane. I also think that the book ultimately showed me that you should never give up regardless of your situation.


Frederick Douglass has written this book right before the start of the tensions building up that eventually led to the Civil War in 1861. He was a figure of hope for many slaves at the time and of the most well known abolitionists at the time.