Phillis Wheatley

Born c. 1753
West Africa
Died December 5, 1784
Boston, Massachusetts

Slave, poet

"In every human breast, God has implanted a Principle, which we call Love of Freedom."

Phillis Wheatley, who spent her childhood as a slave, has been called the "Mother of Black Literature." The young girl became a sensation in Boston in the 1760s when her well-crafted poems made her famous. Wheatley's writing abilities and intelligence were an impressive example to English and American audiences of how a person can triumph over the circumstances of oppression.

In the mid-eighteenth century, slave trading played a large role in America's economy. Ships would leave the American East Coast for the West Indies in the Caribbean Sea with products to trade there for rum. They then traveled on to Africa, where they traded the rum for men, women, and children, who were transported back to America to be sold as slaves. During the trip across the seas from Africa, people were jammed together in unsanitary conditions, and many died from sickness or starvation. Young Phillis was kidnapped from West Africa and brought across the Atlantic Ocean on the slave ship Phillis, which landed in Massachusetts's Boston Harbor on July 11, 1761.

Sold as a slave; becomes educated

After the Phillis arrived in Boston in 1761, the captain placed a notice in the newspaper that he had slaves for sale. Susanna Wheatley, the wife of John Wheatley, a wealthy Boston tailor, went aboard the Phillis to find a young girl to serve as her personal servant. A thin child with attractive features aroused her sympathy, and Susanna was able to purchase the young girl for a small sum from the captain. The captain was eager to sell Phillis, as he was afraid the thin child might die soon and he would lose his investment in her.

The Wheatleys lived with their twin children, Mary and Nathaniel, in a house with many slaves. They named the new slave Phillis after the ship on which she had sailed from Africa. Because of her size, and the fact that she was losing her front teeth, the Wheatleys thought Phillis to be about seven years of age. In time her health improved, but she remained a small and delicate person who suffered from the breathing ailment asthma for the rest of her life.

Young Phillis proved to be very intelligent, and Susanna Wheatley allowed her time off from her chores to be given lessons by the Wheatley's teenage daughter, Mary. Unlike the other slaves, Phillis was permitted to eat most of her meals with the family, except when they had company. After learning to read and write, she went on to study astronomy, ancient and modern geography, and ancient history, as well as English literature, Latin, the Bible, and poetry.

Phillis's dearest friend was a young woman named Obour Tanner, who lived in Newport, Rhode Island, as the slave of James Tanner. The two young women probably met when the Wheatleys visited in Newport. Though the two young women rarely saw one another, they sent letters back and forth for many years.

Early poems

Phillis wrote her first poems at about age thirteen. In the poem On Being Brought from Africa to America, she challenged members of white society who saw African people as less than human. Many of Phillis's early poems were tributes, written in praise of the achievements and character of someone who had died. Her poem On the Death of the Rev. Dr. Sewell when Sick, 1765 was widely read in New England.

During the 1700s, many in New England spoke of the evils of slavery, and in May 1766, several citizens of Boston requested that slavery be completely done away with. But the lawmakers took no action. Phillis herself seldom wrote about the issue of slavery.

One of Phillis's most famous poems, To the University of Cambridge, was written in 1767. The poem addressed the students of what is now Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Phillis had learned that the students, who had a reputation for being loud and unruly, were protesting because they had been served stale butter. Phillis, with the disadvantages of being black, a slave, and female, could only imagine what it would be like to receive a fine education. She thought it silly that they would waste their energies worrying about something so minor as stale butter and encouraged them to be grateful for their opportunities:

Students, to you 'tis given to scan the heights
Above, …
And mark the systems of revolving worlds, …
Improve your privileges while they stay,
Ye pupils, …
Let sin, that baneful evil to the soul,
by you be shun'd …
An Ebonite [African] tells you 'tis your greatest foe.

Gains fame locally for her poetry

It was not long before it became fashionable for upper class Bostonians to invite "Mrs. Wheatley's Phillis" to come to their homes and read her poetry. It seems that Phillis was aware of her unusual status in colonial society, in which many people believed that whites were superior to non-whites and acted accordingly. When Phillis was invited to the homes of wealthy whites, she always refused the seat offered her at their dining tables and asked that a small, simple side-table be set for her to have dinner apart from the rest of the company.

Phillis did light chores around the Wheatley house, but could ignore them when she felt ready to write her poems. Unlike the other slaves, she was granted her own room with both heat and light. She was given paper and pencils to keep near her bed in case she awoke with ideas to jot down. Despite the special attention she received, Phillis managed to remain friendly with the other slaves.

When she was doing housework, Phillis paid attention to events going on around her. Once two gentlemen named Hussey and Coffin came to the Wheatley house and told a tale of how they had narrowly escaped being washed overboard on a sailboat during a storm on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. She remembered this story and incorporated it into a poem entitled On Messrs. Hussey and Coffin. Critics praised Phillis's poem about their adventure for its intensity of emotion, well-crafted images, and spirituality.

Poems become known internationally

In her 1768 poem To the King's Most Excellent Majesty Phillis praised King George III of England see entry for ending a tax called the Stamp Act of 1765, which was hated by the colonists. In 1770, Phillis wrote a poem in honor of a minister named George Whitefield who died from an asthma attack. Although Whitefield was a generous man who raised money to help homeless people, he had defended the practice of slavery using verses from the Bible. Still, Phillis had admired him.

In the mid-eighteenth century, it was customary to advertise poems for sale in the newspaper. The printing of Phillis's poem On the Death of the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield, 1770 may have been paid for by Susanna Wheatley or the printer himself who thought it would sell. The poem was distributed throughout New England. Susanna sent a copy to Great Britain to the Countess of Huntington, a close friend of both her and the deceased clergyman. The countess arranged to have the poem published in London and Phillis soon gained an international reputation.

In 1771, Phillis's long-time tutor, Mary Wheatley, married John Lothrop, pastor of the Second Congregational Church of Boston. Mary left the Wheatley house to set up a new home with him. That same year, John Wheatley retired.

During the winter of 1772, Phillis was troubled with asthma and tuberculosis, a serious lung disease. Still, she and Susanna chose twenty-eight poems and had them advertised in a Boston newspaper. But not enough people ordered the book to pay for its being printed. Susanna had Phillis write to the Countess of Huntington and ask for her support in getting the book printed in London. The countess admired the poems and promised to see that they would be printed.

Travels to Great Britain

In 1773, the Wheatleys' doctor suggested that Phillis take a trip to London, thinking that the sea air would help her regain her health. Susanna Wheatley arranged for the trip. Plans were then underway for the British publication of Phillis's collected poems in a single volume. Susanna wrote to the Countess of Huntington in gratitude for allowing the young poet to dedicate the book to the countess. Before her departure, Phillis wrote the poem Farewell to America, in which she revealed her sorrow at leaving Susanna.

During Phillis's stay in Great Britain, she met many important people who were impressed with her conversational skills and writing talents. She was given presents and books by several royal admirers and was delighted to possess her very own books for the first time.

Phillis's poems appeared in popular magazines in America and in Great Britain. With the help of the Countess of Huntington, a volume of thirty-nine of Phillis's poems, entitled Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, was published in Great Britain in 1773. It featured the poems for which she is most honored and remembered. The book was favorably received by critics and readers alike and has been reprinted many times. That year also saw the printing in Boston of several of Phillis's other poems in praise of people who had died.

Shortly before Phillis was to have the honor of being presented to King George III of England, she learned that Susanna Wheatley was very ill. She immediately left for Boston, though she herself was still in poor health. She arrived there in October 1773. In March 1774, Susanna Wheatley died. Phillis wrote to her friend Obour Tanner: "I was treated more like a child by her than her servant." She also informed Tanner that John Wheatley had granted her freedom from slavery shortly after her return from England.

Phillis made the acquaintance of some of the best known political figures of her time. When George Washington see entry was appointed head of the Continental army that fought to free America from Great Britain, Phillis sent the general a letter along with a poem she had written about him. The 1775 poem was entitled To His Excellency General Washington. A grateful Washington wrote back and invited her to come and visit his headquarters. In March 1776, Phillis made the trip to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to see him. It is interesting to note that during this same period, Washington continued to own black slaves.

Hard times begin

After Susanna's death, Phillis occasionally stayed at the Wheatley house and sometimes at the homes of Wheatley relatives. In 1778 John Wheatley died, leaving no money for Phillis in his will. Her friend and teacher, Mary Wheatley Lothrop, who died the same year, also failed to provide for her.

For the first time, Phillis had to find a way to take care of herself. With money tight and food scarce and expensive because of wartime shortages, she was unable to sell enough books to make ends meet. During the time of upheaval throughout the Revolutionary War (1775–83), she sewed for a living, earning just enough money to rent a little apartment.

Marries and has children

In 1778 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Phillis married a young, free black man named John Peters, whom she had met some years before. Phillis's biographers have portrayed her husband in different ways. One painted him as a handsome, respectable grocery store owner, with good manners, who ran into trouble with his business. Another described him as an intelligent man, and good speaker. He and Wheatley soon fled from Boston, where the Revolution was raging, to the village of Wilmington, Massachusetts. They lived there in poverty for several years.

In 1778 Wheatley wrote a poem to honor the memory of an American general. In the poem, the young woman spoke about freedom for America and freedom for the African slaves who lived there. She questioned how Americans could long for their own freedom and, at the same time, "hold in bondage Afric[a]'s blameless race."

In 1779 Phillis Wheatley had hoped to put together a book of thirty-three poems and thirteen letters. She advertised for buyers in the newspapers of Boston. Benjamin Franklin see entry tried to help her get them published. But even with his help, hard times caused by the war prevented her from getting enough buyers.

According to most accounts, Wheatley had three children with John Peters, and all suffered from ill health. Her first child, a son, was born in June 1779. That same year Wheatley's family moved back to Boston. For a time John may have held a job sailing on a seagoing ship. The couple lived for a while with the niece of Susanna Wheatley, but finally ended up in a boarding house in the slums of Boston, Massachusetts, where Wheatley did chores to earn money for food.

Hard times for Phillis and her family

After the signing of the 1783 Treaty of Paris that ended the Revolutionary War, Phillis wrote the poem Liberty and Peace, in which she rejoiced in her country's independence. That April the last of John and Susanna's children, Nathaniel Wheatley, died; no mention was made of Phillis in the wealthy man's will. That same year Phillis gave birth to a little girl, but lost her son to a stomach ailment.

Although they were still in grief over the death of their son, the family tried to look to the future. John Peters decided to try running a business again, and opened a bookstore in Boston. Unfortunately, the business did not succeed, and Peters soon went broke. Unable to pay his debts, he ended up in prison. Phillis barely scraped by, taking in other people's laundry to support her family.

A tragic end

When relatives of the Wheatleys sought out Phillis in the fall of 1784, they found her living under horrible circumstances. By that time, two of Phillis's children were already dead. After observing the ailing Phillis and her dying third child in a filthy apartment, one of the Wheatley relatives wrote: "The woman who had stood honored and respected in the presence of the wise and good of that country which was hers by adoption … was numbering the last hours of life in a state of [terrible] misery."

Phillis Wheatley and her last child died in Boston on December 5, 1784. She was only thirty-one years old. Several local newspapers reported her death, but the names of the friends and family who attended her funeral went unreported. At the time of her death, Phillis's husband was probably still in prison. The burial places of Phillis and her children are unknown.

Some time after the death of his wife, John Peters reportedly visited the daughter of the Wheatley relative who had cared for Phillis and her child just before their deaths. He demanded and received the unpublished manuscript of the second edition of Phillis's poetry. He was said to have already sold the books she had received as gifts during her trip to London. Peters eventually moved to the South. No one knows what happened to the second volume of Phillis's poetry; it was never found and never published.

For More Information

Mason, Julian D., Jr. The Poems of Phillis Wheatley. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1966.

Robinson, William H. Phillis Wheatley and Her Writings. New York: Garland, 1984.

Robinson, William H. Phillis Wheatley in the Black American Beginnings. Detroit: Broadside Press, 1975.

Sherrow, Victoria. Phillis Wheatley. Broomall, PA: Chelsea House Publishers, 1993.

Shields, John C., ed. Phillis Wheatley: A Bio-Bibliography. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.

Weidt, Maryann N. Revolutionary Poet: A Story about Phillis Wheatley. Minneapolis: Carolrhoda Books, 1997.

Wheatley, Phillis. Poems of Phillis Wheatley: A Native African and a Slave. Bedford, MA: Applewood Books, 1995.

Web Sites

Liberty! Chronicle of the Revolution. Diversity. [Online] Available http://www.pbs.org/ktca/liberty/chronicle/diversity-phillisw.html (accessed on 4/5/99).

The Middle Passage. [Online] Available http://3mill.bitshop.com/middlePassage/mphome.htm (accessed on 4/5/99).

Slavery in the Americas

The shameful practice of slavery has existed in the world since ancient times. A slave is a person who functions as a servant to another and is considered a form of property. A slave can be bought or sold.

After their discovery of the New World in the fifteenth century, Europeans began kidnapping people from the coast of West Africa and sending them on ships to perform labor in North and South America. The process of acquiring Africans for the transatlantic slave trade was known as the Middle Passage. It included organizing the voyages to Europe and the Americas, capturing individuals from various African nations, building holding areas for the slaves, transporting them across the seas to the Americas, and distributing them there once they arrived.

An estimated 8 to 80 million Africans were enslaved and sent to work in the Americas from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. Arriving at an accurate figure is impossible because of the inaccuracy of shipping records of that time. Most slaves were captured in West Africa or West Central Africa. The majority of those enslaved and transported to the Americas were males between the ages of fourteen and twenty-five, but the ships also carried a small percentage of women and children to America's shores.

In North America, although some slaves worked in towns or cities in the North and South, most lived on large farms in the southern part of the United States, where they toiled as servants and fieldworkers. How the slaves were treated depended largely on the type of work they did. House servants, such as Phillis Wheatley, generally had a much more comfortable existence than did the field slaves, who usually lived under terrible conditions. Slave families were often torn apart and children were separated from their parents and sold to the highest bidder.

Some historians believe that slavery was instituted in America by landowners because it was the only way to profitably raise large-scale crops on the vast areas of free, American land. Native Americans originally inhabited these open plots of land until the Europeans used force to seize the land from them. Because of the huge amounts of available and cheap land, most free laborers would not work for someone else when they could have their own land to work for themselves.

In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, European nations began to outlaw the slave trade. In the United States, the slaves were freed only after decades of political battles that ended in the bloody American Civil War (1861-65).