Originally published in 1831, The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave, was the first account of the life of a black woman to be published in the United Kingdom. Born into slavery in Bermuda, Mary Prince was the first woman to publish an account of her life as slave.

Belonging to the genre of slave narratives, this first-hand description of the brutalities of enslavement, released at a time when slavery was still legal in Bermuda and British Caribbean colonies, had a galvanising effect on the anti-slavery movement.

Prince's exacting details of the brutal treatment she experienced as a slave in Bermuda, Turks Island and Antigua lent weight to the abolitionist movement, which was at its height in England, when she arrived there in 1828.