Description
Three-quarter length portrait of the African American itinerant preacher, abolitionist, and women's rights advocate born into slavery and originally known as Isabella Baumfree. Shows Truth, seated, and attired in a dark-colored, long sleeved dress with white collar, white shawl with fringe, and a white cap. She wears wire-rimmed glasses and faces front and is turned slightly to her left. She holds knitting in her left hand which rests on a small table that has a decorative table cloth. A notebook and vase of flowers adorn the table. A string of yarn runs across her lap. During the period of the Civil War, Truth captioned, marketed, copyrighted, and sold at least eleven different carte-de-visite portraits of herself at her lectures and through the mail to earn personal funds and advocate for the abolition of slavery. Her knitting probably alludes to her promotion of the handcraft as an industry for advancement for former slaves.; Title from item.; Publication information from copyright statement on verso: Entered according to act of Congress in the year 1864, by Sojourner Truth, in the Clerk's Office, of the U. S. District Court, for the Eastern District of Mich.
Subject
Cartes de visite -- 1860-1870
Portrait photographs -- 1860-1870
Truth, Sojourner, -1883 -- Portraits
African American women abolitionists
African American women civil rights workers
African American women clergy
Knitting
Women's rights