Master Slave Husband Wife: An Epic Journey from Slavery to Freedom
Winner of the 2024 Pulitzer Prize in Biography
“A rich narrative of the Crafts, an enslaved couple who escaped from Georgia in 1848, with light-skinned Ellen disguised as a disabled white gentleman and William as her manservant, exploiting assumptions about race, class, and disability to hide in public on their journey to the North, where they became famous abolitionists while evading bounty hunters.” —The Pulitzer Prizes
Named one of the best books of the year by The New York Times, The New Yorker, Time, NPR, Smithsonian Magazine, and Oprah Daily
In 1848, a year of international democratic revolt, a young, enslaved couple, Ellen and William Craft, achieved one of the boldest feats of self-emancipation in American history. Posing as master and slave, while sustained by their love as husband and wife, they made their escape together across more than 1,000 miles, riding out in the open on steamboats, carriages, and trains that took them from bondage in Georgia to the free states of the North.
Along the way, they dodged slave traders, military officers, and even friends of their enslavers, who might have revealed their true identities. The tale of their adventure soon made them celebrities, and generated headlines around the country. Americans could not get enough of this charismatic young couple, who traveled another 1,000 miles criss-crossing New England, drawing thunderous applause as they spoke alongside some of the greatest abolitionist luminaries of the day—among them Frederick Douglass and William Wells Brown.
But even then, they were not out of danger. With the passage of an infamous new Fugitive Slave Act in 1850, all Americans became accountable for returning refugees like the Crafts to slavery. Then yet another adventure began, as slave hunters came up from Georgia, forcing the Crafts to flee once again—this time from the United States, their lives and thousands more on the line and the stakes never higher.
With three epic journeys compressed into one monumental bid for freedom, Master Slave Husband Wife is an American love story—one that would challenge the nation’s core precepts of life, liberty, and justice for all—one that challenges us even now.
“A rich narrative of the Crafts, an enslaved couple who escaped from Georgia in 1848, with light-skinned Ellen disguised as a disabled white gentleman and William as her manservant, exploiting assumptions about race, class, and disability to hide in public on their journey to the North, where they became famous abolitionists while evading bounty hunters.” —The Pulitzer Prizes
Named one of the best books of the year by The New York Times, The New Yorker, Time, NPR, Smithsonian Magazine, and Oprah Daily
In 1848, a year of international democratic revolt, a young, enslaved couple, Ellen and William Craft, achieved one of the boldest feats of self-emancipation in American history. Posing as master and slave, while sustained by their love as husband and wife, they made their escape together across more than 1,000 miles, riding out in the open on steamboats, carriages, and trains that took them from bondage in Georgia to the free states of the North.
Along the way, they dodged slave traders, military officers, and even friends of their enslavers, who might have revealed their true identities. The tale of their adventure soon made them celebrities, and generated headlines around the country. Americans could not get enough of this charismatic young couple, who traveled another 1,000 miles criss-crossing New England, drawing thunderous applause as they spoke alongside some of the greatest abolitionist luminaries of the day—among them Frederick Douglass and William Wells Brown.
But even then, they were not out of danger. With the passage of an infamous new Fugitive Slave Act in 1850, all Americans became accountable for returning refugees like the Crafts to slavery. Then yet another adventure began, as slave hunters came up from Georgia, forcing the Crafts to flee once again—this time from the United States, their lives and thousands more on the line and the stakes never higher.
With three epic journeys compressed into one monumental bid for freedom, Master Slave Husband Wife is an American love story—one that would challenge the nation’s core precepts of life, liberty, and justice for all—one that challenges us even now.
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Community Reviews
Master Slave Husband Wife was initially a captivating and powerful read. Many of us were deeply drawn in by the incredible story of Ellen and William Craft’s daring escape from slavery—a story that deserves to be more widely known. The early chapters offered a compelling look at their ingenuity, courage, and the oppressive systems they sought to defy.
As the book progressed, however, the narrative began to lose some of its emotional grip. The shift toward a more documentary-style approach—while clearly reflecting the depth and rigor of the author’s research—often read more like a textbook than a narrative-driven biography. The many historical figures introduced along the way, though important, came across as flat or underdeveloped, which made it harder to remain emotionally invested.
Despite this, we all agreed that the book highlights a profoundly important chapter in American history. It sheds light on the lives of Ellen and William Craft with valuable historical context. Still, we were left wanting more—particularly about Ellen’s inner world, her relationship with her mother, and the complexities of her and William’s life after their escape. We wanted to feel more immersed in their personal journey, not just their historical footprint.
While the book succeeds in honoring the facts, some of us found ourselves longing for the depth and intimacy that historical fiction often brings to stories like this—stories where the emotional truth can be as powerful as the historical one.
-Fremont Ladies Book Club
A very well written story of historical events we should all know. Showed both the good and bad of humanity.
“At heart, this is an American love story – not in the fairytale sense, but an enduring relationship between a man and a woman, a couple and a country…Theirs is a love story that begins in a time of revolution – a revolution unfinished in the American War for Independence, a revolution that endures.”
“They had survived slavery in the South, outwitted kidnappers in the North, outrun the laws of the nation they once called home. They had overcome illness and, finally, the throes of nature itself, to find freedom, at last, on a new shore. They had run so many miles: one thousand from South to North, a thousand more across New England, and these last three thousand miles over troubled waters. They had run for each other, with each other, and now had each other in this place and time, where, strong enough together, they would have room to explore their own identities apart. Whomever, whatever they may have lost, they could fulfill their dreams of building a family that no one could break down.”
“Through their audacious escape and daring lives, their restless improvisation, persistent innovation, inventive narration, for themselves and for others, the Crafts continually wrote and revised their own American love story. Their love for each other carried them over state lines and conti-nents, real and imagined markers, and made it possible for them to accomplish together what they might never have achieved apart. They ran for each other, with each other, and as they did, they pushed not only themselves and each other, but also the nation—and the world— to reach for better. In this sense, the lack of a definitive happy ending to their story represents not so much a gap or absence, as, potentially, a space or an opening in the story of America, whose reckonings with the past have the power to transform.”
In Master Slave Husband Wife, Ilyon Woo offers “an orchestral accompaniment to the melody the couple provide in their narrative, in harmony with a chorus of other voices [so that] this telling, together with the sources identified in notes, will spark further conversation about the past that will give new light to both present and future.”
An incredible true story about a married couple, both slaves, who escaped to the North and were never caught even though they lived public lives. Enjoyed this very much!!
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