Liberator in History: Phillis Wheatley
Phillis Wheatley’s life began in bondage. Taken as a young girl and brought from West Africa to Boston, she was purchased by the Wheatley family as a house slave and named after the ship that brought her from Africa.
The Wheatleys, remarkably for their time, recognized her brilliance and gave her an education. By her early teens, she could read Greek and Latin, studied the Bible and the classics, and began writing poetry that astonished even the most learned men of the era.
At the age of twenty, her 1773 collection, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, made her the first African American to publish a book. Her words moved between faith, freedom, and human dignity, subtly challenging the contradictions of a society that celebrated liberty while upholding slavery.
Her work drew the attention of George Washington, Voltaire, and abolitionists across the Atlantic. Yet her genius was often met with disbelief. Boston’s leaders even demanded she prove she had written her own poems.
Wheatley’s poems gave voice to the voiceless. Through grace and intellect, she forced a nation to see what it tried to deny—that genius and humanity know no color.
She held a mirror to the hypocrisy of a nation fighting for liberty while keeping others in bondage. “In every human breast,” she wrote, “God has implanted a principle, which we call love of freedom.”
In the face of injustice and enslavement, Wheatley carved space for Black thought, art, and intellect to be recognized. Her courage came from the power of her pen—a liberation that began in language and helped shape the moral foundation for freedom itself. Her writing became a discreet act of rebellion, one that cracked open the conscience of her time.
Phillis Wheatley’s influence lives on through the many schools, libraries, and cultural organizations that carry her name. There’s the Phillis Wheatley Elementary School in New Orleans, where students are introduced to the idea that they, too, can shape the world. In Boston, the Phillis Wheatley YWCA offers community programs for youth, celebrating her story as part of its mission. Across the country, from Chicago to Washington, D.C., and in countless Black History celebrations, her poems are read, her achievements taught, and her name honored.
At a time when our nation’s freedoms are disappearing, Phillis Wheatley’s poems remind us that the struggle for liberty underpins our moral foundation, and within each of us lies a principled calling to love freedom and keep its flame alive.