The story of Abijah and Lucy Prince, freed slaves who became landowners, was part of the legends of Vermont. Gretchen Holbrook Gerzina saw little hope of filling in the many gaps in their story, but decided to try. Joined by her husband, Anthony, she prowled through libraries, archives, and courthouse records to find the facts of their lives. They were able to piece together an astonishing amount of information, and found the received story to be both right and wrong.

The result is fascinating and surprising. The story begins when slavery was legal throughout the thirteen colonies. The experience of the largely urban slaves of New England was quite different from the more familiar history of Southern slaves. Abijah, Lucy, and their children were literate and they were able to use the court system to defend their rights. The pair lived through both the French and Indian Wars and the Revolutionary War. Abijah saw service in the first, two sons participated in the Revolutionary War.

Along the way, Gerzina tells the story of the couple's search, a rather heroic effort of poring over any possible source of information, sometimes coming up dry, and other times finding unexpected gems of information in unlikely sources.

The emotional attachment of the Gerzina's may give the reader some cause to wonder about their interpretations. They tell us what the Princes were thinking when they obviously are only guessing. It is a long-standing argument whether or not an author needs to preface speculation with "I think." Some argue that it is not necessary, since obviously what an author writes is his/her opinion. I generally disagree; usually authors are interspersing objective facts with opinions, and it is necessary to differentiate. In this case, I think it is clear from the sources when the Gerzina's are speculating. The question of whether they are imposing 21st century values on 18th century people remains, but is somewhat unavoidable.

A fascinating account both of history, and the writing of history. ( )