Granite State Stories - Harriet Wilson's "Our Nig: or, Sketches from the Life of a Free Black"

Throughout New Hampshire's history, we've taken pride in our staunch abolitionist history. Men and women bringing our belief of "Live Free or Die" into the issue of slavery. But Harriet Wilson’s autobiographic novel "Our Nig: or, Sketches from the Life of a Free Black" exposes a completely different side. Considered to be the first novel published by an African American woman, Wilson's book retells her story living as an indentured servant in pre-Civil War Milford, New Hampshire. During that time she endured harsh physical punishments, long hours of unrelenting chores, mean treatments and very little education. We’ll look at both sides of our abolitionist past through Harriet Wilson’s Our Nig on the next Granite State Stories. Laura's guests are JerriAnne Boggis, Project Director for the Harriet Wilson Project and Barbara White, Professor Emeritus of Women's Studies at the University of New Hampshire and Historian and Research Director for the Harriet Wilson Project. Wilson's article "'Our Nig' and the She-Devil" was about the real life Heyward Family of Milford, New Hampshire from whom Wilson's fictional family was based on.