Phillis Wheatley

Hello! My name is Phillis Wheatley. My story begins a long, long time ago, around the year 1753, in a sunny place in West Africa. When I was about seven years old, in 1761, I was taken from my home and put on a big ship that sailed across the vast Atlantic Ocean. The journey was long and scary. When we arrived in Boston, Massachusetts, a man named John Wheatley bought me to be a servant for his wife, Susanna. They gave me the name Phillis, after the ship that brought me there, and their last name, Wheatley.

Life in the Wheatley house was very different from what I expected. Instead of just giving me chores, Mrs. Susanna and her children, Mary and Nathaniel, saw that I was curious about everything. They began teaching me to read and write English, which was very unusual for an enslaved person at that time. I loved learning! I read every book I could find. Soon, I was not only reading English but also learning Latin and Greek. I would stay up late at night, reading by candlelight, exploring stories of heroes and faraway places. Words became my best friends and my window to the world.

As I read more and more poetry, I started to write my own. I wrote about the things I saw, the stories I read, and the feelings in my heart. When I was about fourteen years old, in 1767, something amazing happened. A newspaper in Newport, Rhode Island, published one of my poems! It was called 'On Messrs. Hussey and Coffin.' Seeing my own words printed for others to read was one of the most exciting moments of my life. It made me dream that I could become a real poet.

I kept writing and soon had enough poems to fill a whole book. But when we tried to get it published in Boston, no one believed that an enslaved African girl could have written them. It was a discouraging time, but we didn't give up. In 1773, I traveled to London, England, with the Wheatleys' son, Nathaniel. There, people were more open-minded. A kind woman, the Countess of Huntingdon, helped me. On September 1st, 1773, my book, 'Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral,' was published. I became the first African American person to publish a book of poetry. Not long after this great success, the Wheatley family gave me my freedom.

My freedom came during a time of great change in America, the American Revolution. I wrote poems about the fight for freedom, hoping it would mean freedom for all people, including those who were enslaved. In 1775, I wrote a poem for the leader of the American army, George Washington. I admired him and sent it to him as a gift. You can imagine my surprise when he wrote back. He told me he loved the poem and, in March of 1776, he invited me to visit him at his headquarters. We sat and talked, a general and a poet, about hope for a new country.

My later life had many challenges. I married a man named John Peters in 1778 and struggled with poverty and illness. I lived to be about 31 years old, passing away on December 5th, 1784. Though my life was short, my words have lived on. People remember me today as a girl who crossed an ocean in chains but used her voice to soar. My poetry proved that talent and creativity can be found in anyone, no matter where they come from or what challenges they face. I hope my story reminds you that your voice matters, too.