Passenger on the Pearl

In 1848, thirteen-year-old Emily Edmonson, five of her siblings, and seventy other enslaved people boarded the Pearl under cover of night in Washington, D.C., hoping to sail north to freedom. Within a day, the schooner was captured, and the Edmonsons were sent to New Orleans to be sold into even crueler conditions. Passenger on the Pearl is the story of this thwarted escape, of the ramifications of its attempt, and of a family for whom freedom was the ultimate goal. Conkling takes readers on Emily Edmonson's journey from enslaved person to teacher at a school for African American young women. Her path crosses those of Frederick Douglass and Harriet Beecher Stowe, inspiring the character of Emmeline in Uncle Tom's Cabin. She also illuminates a turbulent time in American history, showing the daily lives of enslaved people, the often-changing laws affecting them, the high cost of a failed escape, and the stories of slave traders and abolitionists.