索杰纳·特鲁思

索杰纳·特鲁思（英语：Sojourner Truth，1797年—1883年11月26日），本名伊莎贝拉·“贝尔”·鲍姆弗里（Isabella "Bell" Baumfree），美国著名早期妇女权益运动、废奴主义人物。1843年，她因认为自己被上帝鼓励去宣讲废奴主义而改名，Sojourner的意思是“栖身者”，Truth即“真理”。

纪念

特鲁思与伊丽莎白·卡迪·斯坦顿、艾蜜莉亚·布卢默和哈莉特·塔布曼一同被记在美国圣公会的圣人历中的7月20日，供后人纪念。

相关作品

《Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Northern Slave》

Sojourner Truth (born Isabella Bomefree; c. 1797 – November 26, 1883) was an American abolitionist and activist for African-American civil rights, women's rights, and alcohol temperance. Truth was born into slavery in Swartekill, New York, but escaped with her infant daughter to freedom in 1826. After going to court to recover her son in 1828, she became the first Black woman to win such a case against a white man.

Bomefree gave herself the name Sojourner Truth in 1843 after she became convinced that God had called her to leave the city and go into the countryside "testifying to the hope that was in her." Her best-known speech was delivered extemporaneously, in 1851, at the Ohio Women's Convention in Akron, Ohio. The speech became widely known during the Civil War by the title "Ain't I a Woman?", a variation of the original speech that was published in 1863 as being spoken in a stereotypical Black dialect, then more commonly spoken in the South. Sojourner Truth, however, grew up speaking Dutch as her first language.

During the Civil War, Truth helped recruit Black men into the Union army; after the war, she tried unsuccessfully to secure land grants from the federal government for formerly enslaved people (summarized as the promise of "forty acres and a mule"). She continued to fight on behalf of women and African Americans until her death. As her biographer Nell Irvin Painter wrote, "At a time when most Americans thought of slaves as male and women as white, Truth embodied a fact that still bears repeating: Among the blacks are women; among the women, there are blacks."

A memorial bust of Truth was unveiled in 2009 in Emancipation Hall in the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center. She is the first African American woman to have a statue in the Capitol building. In 2014, Truth was included in Smithsonian magazine's list of the "100 Most Significant Americans of All Time".

Early years

Sojourner Truth once estimated that she was born between 1797 and 1800. Truth was one of the 10 or 12 children born to James and Elizabeth Bomefree (later also given as Baumfree). Her father was a slave captured from what became Ghana, while her mother – nicknamed "Mau-Mau Bet" – was the daughter of slaves captured from the area of Guinea. Her father was nicknamed "Bomefree" (which, according to Truth, was Dutch for "tree"; compare boom boom, "tree") due to his tall stature. Colonel Hardenbergh bought James and Elizabeth Bomefree from slave traders and kept their family at his estate in a big hilly area called by the Dutch name Swartekill (just north of modern Rifton), in the town of Esopus, New York, 95 miles (153 km) north of New York City. When she was an infant, her five year old brother and three year old sister were sold to a different estate. Her family would recount memories of the children sold into slavery, and her mother taught the children to pray. Her first language was Dutch, and she continued to speak with a Dutch accent for the rest of her life. Charles Hardenbergh inherited his father's estate and continued to own slaves as a part of that estate's property.

When Charles Hardenbergh died in 1806, nine-year-old Truth (known as Belle), was sold at an auction with a flock of sheep for $100 (~$2,059 in 2025) to John Neely, near Kingston, New York. Until that time, Truth spoke only Dutch, and after learning English, she spoke with a Dutch accent and not a stereotypical dialect. She later described Neely as cruel and harsh, relating how he beat her daily and once even with a bundle of rods. In 1808 Neely sold her for $105 (~$2,116 in 2025) to tavern keeper Martinus Schryver of Port Ewen, New York, who owned her for 18 months. Schryver then sold Truth in 1810 to John Dumont of West Park, New York.