In 1830 at a clothier's shop near Boston Harbor, David Walker carefully sewed a leaflet into the lining of a sailor's coat. The volume was thin enough to be completely hidden, but its content was far from unusual.
In fact, many members of the US government at the time considered this pamphlet to be one of the most dangerous documents in US history. So to ensure that this volume reached his audience, Walker had to disguise his work as willing co-conspirators and unknown sailors.
Smuggling of pamphlets throughout the country.
But what was this incendiary document?
And who was the person who wrote it? The son of a slave father and a free woman, David Walker was born free in Wilmington, North Carolina in the late 18th century.
From a young age, he sought to extend his freedom to all black Americans, and after moving to Charleston as a young man, he became closely associated with the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
At the time, the mainstream abolitionist movement consisted of societies led by wealthy white men who favored gradual change and avoided confrontation with slaves. But the AME Church practiced a more radical brand of abolitionism.
In 1822, AME leader Denmark Vesey planned a major uprising aimed at violently freeing Charleston's enslaved community and burning the city.
It is unclear whether Walker collaborated with Vesey's plan, but he was not among the many AME members who were arrested and executed for attempting this coup. In 1825, Walker appeared in Boston, where he rejoined the anti-slavery movement.
In addition to marrying fellow worker Eliza Butler and opening his own clothing store, Walker helped fund America's first black-owned newspaper. Do passionate essays and public speeches attempt to instill pride and sympathy in black freedom fighters.
But to truly unite free and enslaved black Americans,
Walker would have to go beyond Boston. In 1829, he put his thoughts into "An Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World." The paper bore the marks of an angry exclamation and emphasized the spiritual righteousness of resistance.
He described the suffering of enslaved people in graphic detail to prove that the reality for black Americans was often to "kill or be killed." And given these circumstances, Walker defended the right to radical action. This was not his only departure from the moderate mainstream.
To emphasize the importance of black solidarity,
Walker linked American abolitionism to global black liberation movements. He called for an international black liberation struggle, which in its early manifestations would be called Pan-Africanism.
But at the same time, he opposed the popular movement for black Americans to migrate to Africa.
While "Appeal" criticized the Founding Fathers for their hypocrisy, Walker insisted that black people were essential to the creation of the country, and that they had an inalienable right to American citizenship.
Walker suspected that these incendiary arguments would lead to torture. But despite the danger, he continued to use sailors to smuggle his work. The "appeal" went into the hands of vendors, church leaders, political organizers, and underground abolitionist networks down the coast.
For these readers, Walker's words fueled militant efforts to overthrow slave owners and his call to arms instilled fear among white officials. Police intercepted its shipments, and black sailors were quarantined in southern ports.
The pamphlet inspired Louisiana to ban antislavery literature,
and both North and South Carolina cracked down on black education to prevent literacy among enslaved people. Southern officials even put a bounty on Walker's head, worth the modern equivalent of $322,000.
But when friends urge him to escape, Walker refuses to give up his goal. Tragically, his bravery could not save him from the deadliest disease of his time. In August 1830, Walker was found dead.
And while his colleagues ruled him a victim of murder, it is now widely believed that he died of tuberculosis. After his death, Walker's message continued to resonate.
Frederick Douglass credited him as the founder of radical abolitionism, and his "appeal" inspired some of the most influential members of the 20th century independence movement.
From Malcolm X's militaristic approach to black resistance to James Cone's writing on black spirituality, Walker's legacy is crucial to the history of black resistance movements and his vision for the future.
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