Jeffrey Brace

Jeffrey Brace (born Boyrereau Brinch; c. 1742 – April 20, 1827) was a formerly enslaved person who was taken from West Africa around 1750 and a veteran of the American Revolutionary War. He became the first African-American citizen of Poultney, Vermont. Brace became blind in his later years. Benjamin Prentiss published his life story as The Blind African Slave or the Memoirs of Boyrereau Brinch Nicknamed Jeffrey Brace.

Biography
Brace was born in West Africa circa 1742 with the birth name Boyrereau Brinch. In his memoir, Brace describes growing up in the Christian kingdom of "Bow-Woo" before being kidnapped by slave traders at a young age and taken to the Caribbean. As an enslaved sailor, he served in the privateer ship of Captain Isaac Mills, his enslaver, during the French and Indian War. Afterward, he was brought to New England, where he was eventually bought by the Stiles family of Woodbury, Connecticut. He served under Return Meigs during the American Revolutionary War. After the war, he obtained his freedom from the Stiles family and settled in Poultney, Vermont. In Vermont, he met and married a widow, Susannah Dublin, and had children with her. Jeffrey Brace died on January 31, 1827, in Georgia, Vermont.

Legacy
Brace gave an oral account of his life to an abolitionist publisher, Benjamin Prentiss, who transcribed and published it as The Blind African Slave or the Memoirs of Boyrereau Brinch Nicknamed Jeffrey Brace. The Blind African Slave is part of the slave narrative genre.

The faculty union at the University of Vermont now offers a $500 book award in his name "to students who exemplify academic excellence and an active commitment to achieving social and economic justice."

A historical marker honoring Brace was erected in 2008 in Poultney.