BROWN, WILLIAM WELLS

Sketches of Places and People Abroad. Engraved portrait frontispiece. 8vo, cloth; ownership signature. Boston, 1855 FIRST EDITION. Subtitled The American Fugitive in Europe. Brown, born a slave, was the author of the first novel by an African-American, "Clotel, or the President's Daughter". In 1849 while still a fugitive slave, Brown went abroad to lecture and represent the American Peace Society. He was about to return in 1850 when the Fugitive Slave Act was passed. As a result he remained in Great Britain until 1854. Work, page 476; Sabin 8586.