Mum Bett Sued For Freedom

In 1780, an enslaved woman named Elizabeth Freeman, then known as Bet or Mum Bett, reportedly heard the newly ratified Massachusetts Constitution read in Sheffield and learned that it declared "all men are born free and equal." Inspired by those words, she asked abolition-minded lawyer Theodore Sedgwick to help her sue enslaver John Ashley for her freedom. Sedgwick brought the 1781 case Brom and Bett v. Ashley alongside another enslaved man named Brom, and a Great Barrington jury ruled that Ashley did not legally own either plaintiff. The court awarded them 30 shillings in damages, and their victory helped establish legal precedents that later ended slavery in Massachusetts.

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