Summary Of Sharon M. Draper's Copper Sun

Between 1525 and 1866, 12.5 million Africans were brought to the New World by ship and more than two million died on the way. In the book Copper Sun by Sharon M. Draper, readers follow Amari, a captured African, as she experiences inhumane treatment towards people who share the same skin color as her. After Amari and two of her friends who worked on the plantation with her, are granted a chance to be free, they are conflicted about whether to head north or south. The three end up heading south in hopes of finding a place they had heard granted them their freedom and finally fulfilling their wish to be free. With the option of either going north or south, the south was the better choice. Although going south was a wise choice in the end, going
At Fort Mose, former slaves were given protection on top of their freedom as they had various soldiers standing guard around the base, “The people of Mose farmed the land and the men stood guard at the front or patrolled the frontier” (Fort Mose America’s Black Colonial Fortress of Freedom 3). Protection is huge as the three were runaways and their former owner, Clay Derby, was a very aggressive and hard-to-read person. You’d never know his next move, which made protection very useful. At the end of their journey, moving south was a smart choice as Amari put her faith in the belief that Fort Mose was a real place. Taking into account both the pros and cons of each direction, the south was the better way to move. South was a great choice rather than north because those who traveled to Fort Mose were granted their freedom in exchange for their service to the Spanish King and their change of religion to Catholicism, “It was a unique offer– freedom, in exchange for their conversion to Catholicism and, for men, a term of military service” (The Fort Mose Story 2). It was a small price to pay for