6/15 Sojourner Truth Original Documents at the Ulster County Courthouse
Decades before she took her fabled name, famed abolitionist and women's rights activist Sojourner Truth was born into slavery here in Ulster County under the name Isabella. It was as Isabella that the young Truth took action to secure the return of her 5-year son, Peter, who had been illegally sold to in plantation in Alabama. With the help of local attorneys, Isabella filed a Habeas Corpus Petition in the Ulster County Courthouse in March of 1828. And it was this Isabella that prevailed on that Petition for her son’s freedom, marking the first ti