"If I know my own heart, I can truly say, that I have not a
selfish wish in placing myself under the patronage of the [American
Colonization] Society; usefulness in my day and generation, is what I
principally court."
"Sensible then, as all are of the disadvantages under which
we at present labour, can any consider it a mark of folly, for us to
cast our eyes upon some other portion of the globe where all these
inconveniences are removed where the Man of Colour freed from the
fetters and prejudice, and degradation, under which he labours in
this land, may walk forth in all the majesty of his creation--a new
born creature--a Free Man!"
--John Brown Russwurm, 1829.
John Brown Russwurm (1799-1851) is
almost completely missing from the annals of the Pan-African
movement, despite the pioneering role he played as an educator,
abolitionist, editor, government official, emigrationist and
colonizationist. Russwurm's life is one of "firsts": first
African American graduate of Maine's Bowdoin College; co-founder of
Freedom's Journal, America's first newspaper to be owned, operated,
and edited by African Americans; and, following his emigration to
Africa, first black governor of the Maryland section of Liberia.
Despite his accomplishments, Russwurm struggled internally with the
perennial Pan-Africanist dilemma of whether to go to Africa or stay
and fight in the United States, and his ordeal was the first of its
kind to be experienced and resolved before the public eye.
With this slim, accessible biography
of Russwurm, Winston James makes a major contribution to the history
of black uplift and protest in the Early American Republic and the
larger Pan-African world. James supplements the biography with a
carefully edited and annotated selection of Russwurm's writings,
which vividly demonstrate the trajectory of his political thinking
and contribution to Pan-Africanist thought and highlight the
challenges confronting the peoples of the African Diaspora. Though
enormously rich and powerfully analytical, Russwurm's writings have
never been previously anthologized.
The Struggles of John Brown
Russwurm is a unique and
unparalleled reflection on the Early American Republic, the African
Diaspora and the wider history of the times. An unblinking observer
of and commentator on the condition of African Americans as well as a
courageous fighter against white supremacy and for black
emancipation, Russwurm's life and writings provide a distinct and
articulate voice on race that is as relevant to the present as it was
to his own lifetime.