Credit: Courtesy of the Boston Public Library, Print Department
The independently wealthy son of an English cotton broker and free black mother from South Carolina, Robert Purvis helped organize the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1833, then served as president of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society from 1845-1850, and as chairman of the Philadelphia Vigilance Committee from 1852-1857. By his own account Purvis helped a slave a day reach freedom for close to thirty years.
