click image for close-up A rare portrait of Phillis Wheatley shows her facing forward, wearing an evening dress and jewelry. The portrait appeared in Revue des Colonies in Paris between 1834 and 1842.

Confused and not speaking the language, she was sold in 1761 to John Wheatley, a wealthy tailor to founding father John Hancock and other Boston notables. He named her after the ship she arrived on ...