Born free in Africa, possibly near Anomabu, in Ghana. Whipple (his birth name is unknown) was kidnapped and sold into slavery when he was ten years old along with a boy who was either his brother or a cousin.

Whipple was purchased and held in slavery by William Whipple, a New Hampshire delegate to the Continental Congress, signer of the Declaration of Independence, and brigadier general in the Continental Army. Prince went to war together with Whipple, the men taking part in battles at Saratoga and Rhode Island.

In 1779, Prince Whipple and Windsor Moffatt, who was also held in slavery by William Whipple, joined with eighteen other men enslaved by prominent Patriot families and petitioned the New Hampshire legislature to abolish slavery. The legislature ignored the powerfully worded petition and did not respond to the men.

The New Hampshire state constitution of 1783 stated that “all men are born equal,” but slavery lingered. It was finally abolished in the state in 1857 or 1865, depending on which legal interpretation you agree with.

Prince Whipple formally obtained his freedom in 1784. He and his wife, Dinah, who had been manumitted in 1781, raised their family in Portsmouth, New Hampshire where they remained active in the abolition movement and worked for equal justice for all. In 2013, the New Hampshire General Assembly posthumously emancipated the 14 of the original signers of the 1779 petition who had died before they were freed.

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