To the Right Honourable William, Earl of Dartmouth (1772)¶

Author: Phillis Wheatley
Type: Poetry · Ode / public letter in verse
Published: Written 1772; published 1773 in Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral
Copyright: Public domain
Era/Period: WH Era 3 — the American Revolution; the Atlantic slave trade
ELA Standards: 9-10.R.8 · 9-10.R.9
WH Standards: WH.6_12.2 · WH.6_12.4
Studio: WH-04 · One Idea, 130 Years of War — pairs with Common Sense (Paine)

Studio 2 (WH-02) · The Rights We Wrote Down

Pairs with: Common Sense (Paine) (1776) · Level: Maverick

When people write down their rights, what changes — and what doesn't? — Colonists demanded liberty while an enslaved teenager wrote this poem. Whose rights did the Revolution's documents actually include?

See the WH-02 Literature Lens.

What This Poem Is About¶

Phillis Wheatley was kidnapped from West Africa as a child and enslaved in Boston. In 1772 she wrote this poem to the Earl of Dartmouth, newly appointed British Secretary for the American colonies. It begins by celebrating "Fair Freedom" for New England — then turns: if the Earl wonders where her love of freedom comes from, it is because she was "snatch'd from Afric's fancy'd happy seat" and knows what tyranny really is.

Read It¶

Public domain — full text, as published in 1773.

HAIL, happy day, when, smiling like the morn,
Fair Freedom rose New-England to adorn:
The northern clime beneath her genial ray,
Dartmouth, congratulates thy blissful sway:
Elate with hope her race no longer mourns,
Each soul expands, each grateful bosom burns,
While in thine hand with pleasure we behold
The silken reins, and Freedom's charms unfold.
Long lost to realms beneath the northern skies
She shines supreme, while hated faction dies:
Soon as appear'd the Goddess long desir'd,
Sick at the view, she languish'd and expir'd;
Thus from the splendors of the morning light
The owl in sadness seeks the caves of night.
No more, America, in mournful strain
Of wrongs, and grievance unredress'd complain,
No longer shalt thou dread the iron chain,
Which wanton Tyranny with lawless hand
Had made, and with it meant t' enslave the land.
Should you, my lord, while you peruse my song,
Wonder from whence my love of Freedom sprung,
Whence flow these wishes for the common good,
By feeling hearts alone best understood,
I, young in life, by seeming cruel fate
Was snatch'd from Afric's fancy'd happy seat:
What pangs excruciating must molest,
What sorrows labour in my parent's breast?
Steel'd was that soul and by no misery mov'd
That from a father seiz'd his babe belov'd:
Such, such my case. And can I then but pray
Others may never feel tyrannic sway?
For favours past, great Sir, our thanks are due,
And thee we ask thy favours to renew,
Since in thy pow'r, as in thy will before,
To sooth the griefs, which thou did'st once deplore.
May heav'nly grace the sacred sanction give
To all thy works, and thou for ever live
Not only on the wings of fleeting Fame,
Though praise immortal crowns the patriot's name,
But to conduct to heav'ns refulgent fane,
May fiery coursers sweep th' ethereal plain,
And bear thee upwards to that blest abode,
Where, like the prophet, thou shalt find thy God.

— Phillis Wheatley, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, 1773

Why It Matters¶

Wheatley was the first African American woman to publish a book of poetry. Her book was so unexpected to white readers that it was printed with a signed statement from eighteen prominent Boston men confirming she wrote it. In the same years that colonists complained of being "enslaved" by British taxes, Wheatley — actually enslaved — used their own language of liberty to point at the slavery they ignored.

The Essential Question — Can one document change the world — and if so, how?¶

The Revolution's documents said liberty belonged to everyone. Wheatley's poem tests that claim from the inside. Ask: can one poem by an enslaved teenager change how readers hear the word "freedom"? Compare her lines with Common Sense — who gets to claim freedom in each?

ELA Standards Connection¶

Standard	Connection
9-10.R.8	The turn at line 20 ("Should you, my lord..."): how does the poem shift from public praise to personal testimony?
9-10.R.9	Audience and purpose: Wheatley writes to a powerful British official. How does she make a dangerous argument while staying polite?

WH.6_12.2 + Era 3 — Ideology: the Revolution's language of natural rights and liberty — and its limits.

WH.6_12.4 + Era 3 — The Atlantic slave trade and how it shaped individual lives.

Key Vocabulary¶

Tyrannic sway — rule by a tyrant
Faction — a group fighting for its own interests
Afric — Africa (poetic spelling)
Fancy'd — imagined; dreamed-of
Excruciating — extremely painful

Studio Ideas¶

The turn — Where exactly does the poem change direction, and why does Wheatley wait until then?
Two kinds of slavery — Colonists called British taxes "slavery." Use Wheatley to argue whether that comparison was fair.
Proof of authorship — Research the attestation printed in her book. What does it reveal about what readers believed?