Thomas Jackson.

About Thomas Jackson

Thomas Jackson (1807–1878) was born in Britain but emigrated to the United States in 1829 and continued his trade as a rope maker operating out of Reading, Pennsylvania. While on a visit to Richmond, he stumbled upon a slave market; this experience led to him becoming an outspoken critic of slavery and racial inequality in the years leading up to the Civil War. His editorials criticizing slavery and its supporters appeared in provincial American and English periodicals. These original handwritten primary sources are now housed at the Library of Congress, where they will be curated for posterity. Since Thomas Jackson's collection of writings was rediscovered in 2000, researchers have also worked to make this collection more accessible to the public by transcribing the letters and uploading the digitized documents to the website, thomasjacksonletters.com. The Library of Congress recognizes that this website provides additional information to the original manuscript letters and saves versions of the developing website over time.