Description: This edition recovers the extraordinary life of John Brown (ca. 1805-ca. 1876), a self-emancipated African American and victim of medical experimentation who fled enslavement in Georgia in the early 1840s and crossed the Atlantic to claim his future as a medical practitioner. After a dangerous 2,300-mile journey through the United States and Canada, Brown settled in England, where he became an antislavery lecturer; free labor, free produce, and emigration advocate; author of the 1855 slave narrative Slave Life in Georgia; and medical botanist and herbalist. Despite two prior scholarly editions, Brown's life in freedom has remained largely unexamined. This new annotated edition of Slave Life in Georgia presents the most comprehensive and accurate account of his life before and after the publication of Brown's narrative. Grounded in extensive archival research and featuring, for the first time, the rich material record of periodical advertisements and broadsides that he created as a lecturer and practitioner, this edition celebrates the life, liberatory labors, and imaginative and curative endeavors of John Brown, who rose from slavery to become "The Celebrated American Herbalist."
Brief description: SIDONIA SERAFINI is assistant professor of English at Appalachian State University. With Barbara McCaskill, she coedited The Magnificent Reverend Peter Thomas Stanford, Transatlantic Reformer and Race Man (Georgia). Her essays have appeared in The Southern Quarterly, Women's Studies, The Journal of Transatlantic Studies, American Periodicals, and American Literature. Her work has been supported and/or recognized by the Mellon Foundation, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Council on Public History, and Georgia Historical Records Advisory Council. She lives in North Carolina.