William Cooper Nell

William Cooper Nell was an African-American abolitionist, journalist, publisher, author, and civil servant of Boston, Massachusetts, who worked for the integration of schools and public facilities in the state. Writing for abolitionist newspapers The Liberator and The North Star, he helped publicize the anti-slavery cause. He published the North Star from 1847 to 18xx, moving temporarily to Rochester, New York.

He also helped found the New England Freedom Association in the early 1840s, and later the Committee of Vigilance, to aid refugee slaves. The Committee of Vigilance supported resistance to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which had increased penalties against even citizens in free states who aided refugee slaves.

Nell's short histories, Services of Colored Americans in the Wars of 1776 and 1812 and The Colored Patriots of the American Revolution , were the first studies published about African Americans. He is noted as the first African American to serve in the federal civil service, where he worked in the post office.

Nell was born in 1816 in Boston, Massachusetts, to Louise Cooper, from Brookline, and William Guion Nell, from Charleston, South Carolina. His father was an important figure in the abolitionist movement, having helped to create the Massachusetts General Colored Association in the 1820s. Nell encountered racial discrimination as a student. In 1829, he was passed over for an award given to excellent students upon graduation from the Abiel Smith School, apparently because of his ethnicity, and excluded from a celebratory dinner. He managed to attend as a waiter. The award was financially supported by the estate of anti-slavery advocate Benjamin Franklin. The school committee instead gave Nell The Life of Ben Franklin, an autobiography.

With the outbreak of the Civil War, Nell worked to have blacks accepted as soldiers in the Union Army. In 1861, he was hired as a postal clerk in Boston, earning the distinction of being the first African American to hold a federal civilian post. On April 14, 1869, Nell married Frances Ann Ames, the twenty-six-year-old daughter of Philip Osgood Ames, a barber from Nashua, New Hampshire, and his wife Lucy B. Ames. The Nells had two sons, William Cooper, Jr. and Frank Ames.

Nell died of a stroke in 1874 at the age of 58. His wife survived him by more than twenty years, dying in Nashua, New Hampshire, on September 13, 1895.