Sojourner Truth
Black feminist activist and figurehead (1797 - 1883) United States

Born a slave as Isabella Baumfree, at the age of nine she was auctioned off along with a flock of sheep and later resold up to three times to different owners near New York. At 18, Truth fell in love with another slave, Robert. One day, when he went to secretly visit her, he was caught by his owner, who beat him to death. This episode deeply marked Truth's life. Years later, already married to another slave and with five children, Truth ran away with her young daughter (still a baby), leaving her other children behind. A year later, after the Emancipation Act was passed in New York, Truth learned that her five-year-old son had been illegally sold. She took the case to court and recovered her son, who had been abused by his new owner, becoming the first Black woman to sue a white man and win the case. Truth was a renowned speaker advocating for abolitionism and women's rights. Her famous speech, "Ain't I a Woman?", delivered at the Ohio Women's Rights Convention in 1851, is considered one of the first Afrofeminist speeches and defines the spirit of Black feminism to this day.