Josiah Henson (June 15, 1789 – May 5, 1883) was an author,
abolitionist, and
minister. Born into slavery in
Charles County, Maryland, he escaped to
Upper Canada (now
Ontario) in 1830, and founded a settlement and laborer's school for other
fugitive slaves at Dawn, near
Dresden in
Kent County. Henson's autobiography,
The Life of Josiah Henson, Formerly a Slave, Now an Inhabitant of Canada, as Narrated by Himself (1849), is believed to have inspired the title character of
Harriet Beecher Stowe's
Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852). Following the success of Stowe's novel, Henson issued an expanded version of his memoir in 1858,
Truth Stranger Than Fiction. Father Henson's Story of His Own Life (published Boston:
John P. Jewett & Company, 1858). Interest in his life continued, and nearly two decades later, his life story was updated and published as
Uncle Tom's Story of His Life: An Autobiography of the Rev. Josiah Henson (1876).