# Is "Clotel; or, The President's Daughter" by William Wells Brown a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Clotel; or, The President's Daughter by William Wells Brown (Partridge and Oakey, 1853) is identified by: The first edition's title page reads 'Clotel; or, The President's Daughter: A Narrative of Slave Life in the United States. Clotel could not legally be published in the United States in 1853 while Brown remained a fugitive under the Fugitive Slave Act, so the true first edition is this London imprint; no American edition of Clotel itself, as opposed to its retitled revisions, appeared in the 1850s.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- The first edition's title page reads 'Clotel; or, The President's Daughter: A Narrative of Slave Life in the United States
- By William Wells Brown, A Fugitive Slave, Author of Three Years in Europe
- With a Sketch of the Author's Life
- London: Partridge and Oakey, 1853.' Collation runs viii, 245, [12] pages, the final gathering being publisher's advertisements
- The first edition retains extensive documentary material — newspaper clippings, poems, and other extra-narrative matter woven through the story — that Brown stripped out when he substantially rewrote the book for later American reissues
- Publisher imprint reads Partridge and Oakey
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | William Wells Brown |
| Publisher | Partridge and Oakey |
| Year | 1853 |
| True first | American edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | The first edition's title page reads 'Clotel; or, The President's Daughter: A Narrative of Slave Life in the United States |
| Book-club edition exists? | — |

## Points of issue
The first edition's title page reads 'Clotel; or, The President's Daughter: A Narrative of Slave Life in the United States. By William Wells Brown, A Fugitive Slave, Author of Three Years in Europe. With a Sketch of the Author's Life. London: Partridge and Oakey, 1853.' Collation runs viii, 245, [12] pages, the final gathering being publisher's advertisements. The first edition retains extensive documentary material — newspaper clippings, poems, and other extra-narrative matter woven through the story — that Brown stripped out when he substantially rewrote the book for later American reissues.

## Is this the true first?
Clotel could not legally be published in the United States in 1853 while Brown remained a fugitive under the Fugitive Slave Act, so the true first edition is this London imprint; no American edition of Clotel itself, as opposed to its retitled revisions, appeared in the 1850s.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
Brown revised and retitled the novel repeatedly for American publication — as Miralda; or, The Beautiful Quadroon (serialized 1860-61), Clotelle: A Tale of the Southern States (1864), and Clotelle; or, The Colored Heroine (1867) — all shortened, differently titled texts, not reprints of the 1853 first edition.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Clotel; or, The President's Daughter* by William Wells Brown a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/clotel-or-the-presidents-daughter
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.