In this remarkable book, Graham Hodges presents a comprehensive history
of African Americans in New York City and its rural environs from the
arrival of the first African--a sailor marooned on Manhattan Island in
1613--to the bloody Draft Riots of 1863. Throughout, he explores the
intertwined themes of freedom and servitude, city and countryside, and
work, religion, and resistance that shaped black life in the region
through two and a half centuries.
Hodges chronicles the lives of the first free black settlers in the
Dutch-ruled city, the gradual slide into enslavement after the British
takeover, the fierce era of slavery, and the painfully slow process of
emancipation. He pays particular attention to the black religious
experience in all its complexity and to the vibrant slave culture that
was shaped on the streets and in the taverns. Together, Hodges shows,
these two potent forces helped fuel the long and arduous pilgrimage to
liberty.