Title: List of books presented by Moses Brown, Esq., October 17, 1801.
Register Book (1753-1836), Providence Library Company.
In 1801, Moses Brown (1738-1836) donated seven books on the abolition of slavery to the Providence Library Company, the progenitor of the Athenæum whose books form our Archives Collections. A descendent of a wealthy Rhode Island merchant family involved in the slave trade, Moses was the youngest of the four Brown brothers. Raised as a Baptist, and once a slave owner himself, Moses became a Quaker and a respected supporter of the rights of all men. He was a founding member of the Providence Abolition Society in 1789, and involved in a very public dispute over slavery with his eldest brother John, a powerful defender of slave trading in Rhode Island.
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