The Glasgow Citizen, in its review, remarked,—“W. Wells Brown is no ordinary man, or he could not have so remarkably surmounted the many difficulties and impediments of his training as a slave. By dint of resolution, self-culture, and force of character, he has rendered himself a popular lecturer to a British audience, and a vigorous expositor of the evils and atrocities of that system whose chains he has shaken off so triumphantly and forever. We may safely pronounce William Wells Brown a remarkable man, and a full refutation of the doctrine of the inferiority of the negro.”
The Glasgow Examiner said,—“This is a thrilling book, independent of adventitious circumstances, which will enhance its popularity. The author of it is not a man, in America, but a chattel,—a thing to be bought, and sold, and whipped; but in Europe, he is an author, and a successful one, too. He gives in this book an interesting and graphic description of a three years’ residence in Europe. The book will no doubt obtain, as it well deserves, a rapid and wide popularity.”
In the spring of 1853, the fugitive brought out his work, “Clotelle; or, the President’s Daughter,” a book of nearly three hundred pages, being a narrative of slave life in the Southern States. This work called forth new criticisms on the “Negro Author” and his literary efforts. The London Daily News pronounced it a book that would make a deep impression; while The Leader, edited by the son of Leigh Hunt, thought many parts of it “equal to anything which had appeared on the slavery question.”
The above are only a few of the many encomiums bestowed upon our author. Besides writing his books, Mr. Brown was also a regular contributor to the columns of The London Daily News, The Liberator, Frederick Douglass’ Paper, and The National Anti-slavery Standard. When we add, that in addition to his literary labors, Mr. Brown was busily engaged in the study of the medical profession, it will be admitted that he is one of the most industrious of men. After remaining abroad nearly six years, and travelling extensively through Great Britain and on the continent, he returned to the United States in 1854, landing at Philadelphia, where he was welcomed in a large public meeting presided over by Robert Purvis, Esq.
On reaching Boston, a welcome meeting was held in Tremont Temple, with Francis Jackson, Esq., in the chair, and at which Wendell Phillips said,—“I rejoice that our friend Brown went abroad; I rejoice still more that he has returned. The years any thoughtful man spends abroad must enlarge his mind and store it richly. But such a visit is to a colored man more than merely intellectual education. He lives for the first time free from the blighting chill of prejudice. He sees no society, no institution, no place of resort or means of comfort from which his color debars him.
“We have to thank our friend for the fidelity with which he has, amid many temptations, stood by those whose good name religious prejudice is trying to undermine in Great Britain. That land is not all Paradise to the colored man. Too many of them allow themselves to be made tools of the most subtle of their race. We recognize, to-night, the clear-sightedness and fidelity of Mr. Brown’s course abroad, not only to thank him, but to assure our friends there that this is what the Abolitionists of Boston endorse.”
Mr. Phillips proceeded:—“I still more rejoice that Mr. Brown has returned. Returned to what? Not to what he can call his ‘country.’ The white man comes ‘home.’ When Milton heard, in Italy, the sound of arms from England, he hastened back—young, enthusiastic, and bathed in beautiful art as he was in Florence. ‘I would not be away,’ he said, ‘when a blow was struck for liberty.’ He came to a country where his manhood was recognized, to fight on equal footing.
“The black man comes home to no liberty but the liberty of suffering—to struggle in fetters for the welfare of his race. It is a magnanimous sympathy with his blood that brings such a man back. I honor it. We meet to do it honor. Franklin’s motto was, Ubi Libertas, ibi patria—Where liberty is, there is my country. Had our friend adopted that for his rule, he would have stayed in Europe. Liberty for him is there. The colored man who returns, like our friend, to labor, crushed and despised, for his race, sails under a higher flag. His motto is,—‘Where my country is, there will I bring liberty!’”
Although Dr. Brown could have entered upon the practice of his profession, for which he was so well qualified, he nevertheless, with his accustomed zeal, continued with renewed vigor in the cause of the freedom of his race.