The Colored Patriots of the American Revolution, with sketches of several Distinguished Colored Persons: to Which is Added a Brief Survey of the Condition and Prospects of Colored Americans. Title Page and Frontispiece

Journalist, abolitionist, and activist William Cooper Nell’s The Colored Patriots of the American Revolution was the first published military history by an African American. In it, Nell recovered and documented the important role of black civilians and soldiers in the American Revolution such as Crispus Attucks, first to fall at the Boston Massacre, and Peter Salem, credited with killing British Major Pitcairn at the Battle of Bunker Hill.