<DIV><B>The unique narrative of a slave who fled to freedom and sailed aboard a whaling vessel. </B><br><BR> John Thompson was born into slavery on a Maryland plantation in 1812. Originally published in 1856, <I>The Life of John Thompson, a Fugitive Slave</I> chronicles his enslavement, his escape, and his life in the North, where he lived as a free man until fear of recapture drove him to flee once again-this time to sea aboard the <I>Milwood</I>, a whaling vessel. The only fugitive slave narrator to report a whaling voyage, Thompson crafted from his seafaring experience an allegorical sermon that caps his Life and renders it a kind of African American <I>Pilgrim's Progress</I>, as well as a narrative of struggle with, escape from, and triumph over American slavery.<BR><BR></DIV>