Arthur Cooper (1789 - 1853), ca. 1850s
ARTHUR COOPER
A fugitive from slavery in Alexandria, Virginia, Cooper arrived in Nantucket with his family in 1820. Two years later, when a bounty hunter came to the island to capture him, Nantucket Quakers came to the family’s defense, thwarting the owner’s efforts to reclaim Arthur Cooper.
Cooper worked as a shipping agent on the island and later became the first known minister of the Zion Methodist Episcopal Church, also known as the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
Courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association.