David Walker (September 28, 1796 – August 6, 1830) was an outspoken African-American abolitionist, writer and anti-slavery activist. Born of a slave father and a free mother, Walker grew up free, obtained an education, and traveled throughout the country, settling in Boston. There he became involved in the abolition movement and was a frequent contributor to Freedom’s Journal, an antislavery weekly. Sometime in the 1820s he opened a secondhand clothing store on the Boston waterfront. Through this business he could purchase clothes taken from sailors in barter for drink and then resell them to seamen about to embark. In the copious pockets of these garments, he concealed copies of his Appeal, which he reasoned would reach Southern ports and
