Leonard Black

Leonard Black was an African American minister and author best known for The Life and Sufferings of Leonard Black, a Fugitive from Slavery, published in 1847. Reliable sources identify him as born enslaved in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, in 1820, even though some later editions and catalog records list 1822.

After about twenty years in slavery, he escaped and made his way north to New England. There he became a Baptist preacher and used his autobiography to describe the violence of slavery, his search for freedom, and the importance of religion in his life.

Later, Black served as a pastor in Virginia, including at prominent Baptist churches in Norfolk and Petersburg. Today he is remembered both as a religious leader and as the author of an important slave narrative that preserves a firsthand voice from nineteenth-century America.