The end of slavery and the triumph of black freedom constitutes an extraordinary historical upheaval, one which remains in progress. Slavery had seismic consequences for Africa while leading to the transformation of the Americas and to the material enrichment of the West, yet in its final days, it collapsed quickly. While some histories simplify the issue by suggesting that Abraham Lincoln and the abolitionist movement were solely responsible for the overturning of slavery, James Walvin surveys here the crucial resistance of the enslaved themselves, from sabotage and absconding to full-blown uprisings. As Walvin powerfully argues here, slaves—in fields and manor houses, factories and ships—found ways to thwart their captors and undermine the institution that held them in chains.