| This certificate grants British citizenship to Mary Ann Shadd Cary (1823-1893), a free Black woman born in the state of Delaware. She arrived in Canada West when the 1850 American bill on runaway slaves was being debated in Congress. It threatened to return free Blacks and runaway slaves to bondage. In 1852, she published Notes from Canada West, a handbook for American Blacks contemplating immigration to Canada. In 1853, in Canada, she established the Provincial Freeman, a weekly paper which covered the lives of Blacks in Canada and promoted the cause of Black refugees from the United States. After her husband's death in 1860, she returned to the United States and continued her struggle for the rights of Blacks and women. MG 24 K 22 |