1619
Slavery is introduced to North America at the British colony in Jamestown, Virginia.

1783
Great Britain grants independence to its thirteen American colonies, but slavery remains in place; by 1804, however, slavery is outlawed in all states north of the MasonDixon Line.

1789
Olaudah Equiano, a former slave and an abolitionist active in the movement to outlaw international slave trading, publishes The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, the first slave narrative written by a former slave.

1808
The U.S. Congress outlaws the importation of slaves; slave trading remains legal within the United States.

1829
David Walker, a black abolitionist freeman, publishes David Walker's Appeal, in Four Articles, an abolitionist tract.

1831
William Lloyd Garrison, a white abolitionist from Boston, begins publication of The Liberator, an antislavery newspaper; Nat Turner begins a slave rebellion in Southampton County, Virginia; the rebellion is broken after a single day of violence; Turner is eventually...