Background
Bibb was born to an enslaved woman, Milldred Jackson, on a Cantalonia, Kentucky, plantation on May 10, 1815.
Bibb was born to an enslaved woman, Milldred Jackson, on a Cantalonia, Kentucky, plantation on May 10, 1815.
After escaping from slavery to Canada, he founded an abolitionist newspaper, The Voice of the Fugitive. He returned to the United States and lectured against slavery. As he was growing up, Bibb saw each of his six younger siblings, all boys, sold away to other slaveholders.
In 1833, Bibb married another mulatto slave, Malinda, who lived in Oldham County, Kentucky.
They had a daughter, Mary Frances. After finding out that Malinda had been sold as a mistress to a white planter, Bibb focused on his career as an abolitionist.
He traveled and lectured throughout the United States. In 1849-1850 he published his autobiography Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, An American Slave, Written by Himself, which became one of the best known slave narratives of the antebellum years.
lieutenant required Northerners to cooperate in the capture of escaped slaves.
To ensure their safety, the Bibbs migrated to Canada and settled in Sandwich, Upper Canada now Windsor, Ontario. In 1851, he set up the first black newspaper in Canada, The Voice of the Fugitive. The paper helped develop a more sympathetic climate for blacks in Canada as well as helped new arrivals to adjust.
In 1852 he published their accounts in his newspaper.
He died young, at the age of 39.