The Emancipator

Introduction by Ella P. Buchanan and John F. Nash
Elihu Embree—industrialist, publisher, scholar, and idealist—lived in East Tennessee at the turn of the nineteenth century. He and his family were Quakers, committed to the cause of abolishing slavery in the American South. Over a few short years, he raised the public consciousness in East Tennessee and achieved wide recognition with the publication of The Emancipator, the first periodical in the United States devoted solely to the abolitionist cause. The seven issues of the monthly publication are reproduced here, together with a brief history of Elihu and the Embree family’s migration from France to Washington County, Tennessee.
Embree’s crusade was cut short in 1820 by his early death at age thirty-eight, and the abolitionist movement soon languished in the region. By the 1840s free debate on the abolition issue was no longer tolerated anywhere in the country, opinions hardened, and a growing hostility led to that dark period in this nation’s history marked by the War Between the States and its aftermath. Nevertheless, Embree’s contribution was not to be forgotten, and his work stands as a legacy to the quest for human freedom.
Published 1995 / 142 pages / 6" ¥ 9"
ISBN: 0-932807-85-2 / Trade Paper / $9.95