taking mary and emily edmondson to north carolina to sell them as concubines, as fancy girls and paul edmondson makes his way to brooklyn and said how would you feel if they were your daughters that someone was bragging about selling as sex slaves. the edmondson sisters are redeemed, they're purchased and given their freedom, which is really a concept that i think we all should stop and think about what that meant, right, to be given your freedom as opposed to simply being able to possess yourself and possess your freedom. and the accounts of this convention in upstate new york describe how beautifully and powerfully the edmondson sisters spoke to the crowd and how it was their speeches and their songs that really moved the crowd to tears in their instances. we thought it was important to include them to really highlight the role of every day people and particularly every day black women in that fight against slavery. the bulk of our study looked at the civil war and that moment of emancipation and then the legacies of emancipation. so i will go quickly through some of these images which i'm su

they were captured, their father paul edmondson made his way from washington to brooklyn to meet with the reverend henry ward beecher to plead with him and say if these were your daughters and the slave trading firm price and birch was bragging about taking them to north carolina to sell as concubines, right? and as fancy girls, and paul edmondson makes his way to brooklyn and said how would you feel if they were your daughters that someone was bragging about selling as sex slaves. the edmondson sisters are redeemed, they're purchased and given their freedom, which is really a concept that i think we all should stop and think about what that meant, right, to be given your freedom as opposed to simply being able to possess yourself and possess your freedom. and the accounts of this convention in upstate new york describe how beautifully and powerfully the edmondson sisters spoke to the crowd and how it was their speeches and their songs that really moved the crowd to tears in their many instances, and we thought it was important to include them to really highlight the role of every day