ANTHONY BENEZET
Benezet was a Huguenot whose family had been persecuted in France. He identified with the cause of Blacks, Indians and Acadians. He was also one of the first leaders of the American Peace Movement.
Benezet was a Huguenot whose family had been persecuted in France. He identified with the cause of Blacks, Indians and Acadians. He was also one of the first leaders of the American Peace Movement.
Anthony Benezet, born Antoine Bénézet, was a French-American abolitionist and educator who was active in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. One of the early American abolitionists, Benezet founded one of the world's first anti-slavery societies, the Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage (after his death it was revived as the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery); the first public school for girls in North America; and the Negro School at Philadelphia, which operated into the nineteenth century. He was a vegetarian and advocated for the kind treatment of animals, integrating this in his teachings.
