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Frederick Douglass Biography
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Biography: Life of Frederick Douglass
Born 1817, Died 1895
Frederick Douglass, whose original name was Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey, was born a slave in February 1817 in Tuckahoe, Maryland. Frederick Douglass, who was separated from his mother as an infant, lived with his grandmother on the Aaron Anthony plantation.
In 1825 when he was about eight years old, Frederick Douglas was sent to Baltimore to serve as a house servant in the home of Hugh Auld. Mrs. Auld defied the law and began to teach Frederick Douglass to read and write. When Hugh Auld discovered what she was doing, he made her quit teaching the boy because it would make him unfit for his life as a slave. Frederick Douglass continued his education on his own.
When Frederick Douglas was sixteen his master, Aaron Anthony, died. Douglas was passed on to the possession of Anthony’s son-in-law, Thomas Auld. Put to work as a field hand, his hatred of slavery grew. Frederick Douglass was later hired out to work as a ship caulker in Baltimore. He made several attempts to escape, but was found out before he could get away. While in Baltimore, Frederick Douglass met and fell in love with Anna Murray, a free black woman.
On September 3, 1838, with false identification papers, Frederick Douglass managed to reach New York City. Here he changed his name from Bailey to Douglass to avoid capture by slave hunters. Frederick Douglas married Anna Murray and they moved to New Bedford, Massachusetts.
Frederick Douglas began attending anti-slavery meetings. After being asked to tell his story he became an anti-slavery lecturer. Frederick Douglass was so articulate that people began to question whether he had ever been a slave. To counter these doubts, in 1845 Frederick Douglass wrote an autobiographical account of his live as a slave. Douglass had given the name and location of his former owner in “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass”. To avoid recapture Frederick Douglass fled to England for a two-year speaking tour.
Frederick Douglass returned home with funds from his European friends which enabled him to purchase his freedom. He then began his newspaper, the North Star. Douglass wrote editorials expressing his strong views on many subjects. Frederick Douglass came to realize that writing about injustice was not enough and began to support political action. He did not, however, believe in violence and was against the raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia in 1859.
Frederick Douglas was a consultant to Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War. He proposed that former slaves be armed to fight for the North and that the abolition of slavery be part of the war. During the Reconstruction period Frederick Douglass fought to obtain full civil rights for the now free former slaves.
Frederick Douglass held several high ranking offices in the United States government. He died on February 20, 1895 in Washington, D.C.
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