Born circa 1760 to enslaved parents in South Carolina, at sixteen Boston King began an apprenticeship to a carpenter who subjected the young man to frequent beatings. King seized an opportunity to escape to nearby Charles Town (later renamed Charleston) during the American Revolution in the hopes of volunteering his services to the British. He instead contracted smallpox shortly after arriving and enduring detention with several other fugitives from slavery, but he survived and continued to pursue emancipation. Following an escape from a British deserter, King found himself captured once again while serving on board a pilot boat that an American whaling boat captured. The following excerpt from King’s memoirs, published in the early 1790s, details his successful flight from his captors after being taken to the outskirts of New York City, which was the only remaining port still held by the British at the war’s close.