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Phyliss Wheatley: A Lasting Legacy
Phyliss Wheatley Peters was born on May.08.1753 in Gambia Africa and died on December.05.1784 in Boston. She was born in West Africa, kidnapped and sold into slavery at the age of seven or eight. After being transported to North America she was bought by the Wheatley Family of Boston. After she was taught to read and write, (something rarely encouraged and often published by slave owned) they saw she had a gift and encouraged her to pursue poetry.
In 1773 she went to London with the son of those who had enslaved her, Wheatley met with Prominent people who became her Patrons. When her collection of poetry was published in London, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral on September 1, 1773, brought her fame both in England and the American colonies. Figures such as George Washington praised her work. A few years later, African-American poet Jupiter Hammon praised her work in a poem of his own.
Shortly after her book was published The Wheatley’s emancipated Phyllis, she would marry John Peters, a poor grocer. They would have three children none of whom lived past early childhood, and the impoverished Wheatley would die at the age of thirty one in December of 1784, due to complications during childbirth. She would die in poverty, but through her poetry she left a lasting legacy.
