Excerpt from The Freedmen's Book By Lydia Maria Francis Child Published 1866

James Forten, the Hero


Being near the water he had opportunities at twelve different times to save people from drowning, which he sometimes did at the risk of his own life. The Humane Society of Philadelphia presented him with an engraving to which was appended a certificate of the number of people he had saved, and the thanks of the Society for his services. He had it framed and hung in his parlor, and when I visited him in 1835 he pointed it out to me and told me he would not take a thousand dollars for it.