The Emancipation Proclamation was made effective in 1863, but it could not be implemented in places still under Confederate control. As a result, in the westernmost Confederate state of Texas, enslaved people would not be free until much later. Freedom finally came on June 19, 1865, when some 2,000 Union troops arrived in Galveston Bay, Texas and announced that the more than 250,000 enslaved black people in the state were free by executive decree. This day came to be known as Juneteenth, our country’s second independence day. You can learn more about Juneteenth through the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture. Since Juneteenth is only one week away, we have compiled this reading list of books for all age ranges about the legacy of slavery in America, emancipation, and Juneteenth as one of the ways we are celebrating Juneteenth at the Peabody Institute Library of Danvers.
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