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5 By age 18, Phillis had written 28 poems, but due to
discrimination against people of African descent in the
colonies, she could not find a publisher. She published
her poems as a volume in London, when she was 20
years old, in 1773.

6 Phillis was celebrated by many important figures of
her time. She corresponded with the first president of

the United States, George Washington, and she was
also supported by the governor of Massachusetts,
John Hancock.

An Early Death—and an Eternal Voice

7 Susanna Wheatley granted Phillis her freedom at age
21, several years before Mrs. Wheatley died. Phillis

married four years later, and she continued to write until
her death at age 31. Many of her poems were not
published, and, unfortunately, she died in abject poverty.

8 Today, Phillis Wheatley’s poems still bring her voice
and message from the past into the present.

from “To the Right Honorable William, Earl of Dartmouth”
Should you, my lord, while you peruse my song,

Wonder from whence my love of Freedom sprung,
Whence flow these wishes for the common good,
By feeling hearts alone best understood,
I, young in life, by seeming cruel fate
Was snatch’d from Afric’s fancy’d happy seat:

What pangs excruciating must molest,
What sorrows labour in my parent’s breast?
Steel’d was that soul and by no misery mov’d

That from a father seiz’d his babe belov’d:
Such, such my case. And can I then but pray
Others may never feel tyrannic sway?

—Phillis Wheatley

descent A person’s descent is a person’s family background or ancestors.

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