Description: 1832 travelogue by Benjamin Lundy detailing his journey throughout southwestern Louisiana, eastern Texas, and up the Mississippi River to Louisville, Kentucky. Lundy's account spans an entire summer, from June 22nd (at the mouth of the Red River) to the 5th of August in Louisville. Lundy's entries are largely devoted to detailed description of the topography and natural world -- including plant species, water flows, river banks, and soil types -- but he also has a keen eye for local culture and enterprise, and his account includes lively descriptions of Nachitoches, Louisiana, and Nagodoches, Texas, amongst other towns. Lundy concludes his trip by steamboat, and his detailed accounting of the trials and tribulations of travel by steamboat up the Mississippi in the 1830s is especially vivid. Throughout, Lundy travels by foot, horse and wagon caravan, in addition to traveling by boat. Although this travelogue does not explicitly engage Lundy's abolitionist cause, he is likewise especially attentive to issues of race, ethnicity, prejudice and ethnic diversity and social harmony throughout his travels in Texas and Louisiana. Lundy's rough itinerary, for this travelogue, carries him from Alexandria, Louisiana, in June to Cloutierville, Lousiana; Nachitoches, Louisiana; Fort Jessup, Louisiana; Nacogdoches, Texas; Nachitoches again; Cloutierville, Louisiana; Alexandria, Louisiana; and then aboard the steamboat "Planet" along the Mississippi River through Baton Rogue, Vicksburg, Memphis, and finally, Louisville. Benjamin Lundy (1789-1839) was a prominent Quaker abolitionist best known for his development of abolitionist periodicals. His Genius of Universal Emancipation was first published in 1821 from his home in Mt. Pleasant, Ohio, and enjoyed a wide circulation across the antebellum United States. In the 1820s, the young William Lloyd Garrison came to work for The Genius. Benjamin Lundy traveled widely seeking subscriptions to The Genius, giving talks about the anti-slavery movement, and observing and documenting the conditions of enslaved people across the Americas. He was also involved in the establishment of freed slave colonies in Mexico. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: TraveloguebyBenjaminLundy
Subjects: Abolitionists; Travelogues; Quakers; Society of Friends; Lundy, Benjamin, 1789-1839
Places: Louisiana; Texas; Mississippi River; Nachitoches (Louisiana); Nacogdoches (Texas); Alexandria (Louisiana); Cloutierville (Louisiana); Louisville (Kentucky)