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Crispus Attucks
American leader
Quick Facts
- Born:
- 1723?
- Died:
- March 5, 1770, Boston, Mass. [U.S.]
Crispus Attucks (born 1723?—died March 5, 1770, Boston, Mass. [U.S.]) was an American hero, martyr of the Boston Massacre. Attucks’s life prior to the day of his death is still shrouded in mystery. Although nothing is known definitively about his ancestry, his father is thought to be Prince Yonger, a slave who was brought to America, while his mother is thought to be Nancy Attucks, a Natick Indian. In the Boston Gazette on Oct. 2, 1750, William Brown, a resident of Framingham, Mass., advertised for the recovery of a runaway slave named “Crispas”—usually thought to be the Crispus in question. ...(100 of 278 words)