John Wallace Hutchinson finally penned his two-volume memoirs in 1896, after all his siblings and even some of his own children were gone:

“The Story of the Hutchinsons (Tribe of Jesse)” Vol. 1
& Vol. 2
(John W. Hutchinson, 1896)

While John claimed to have written the book with the aid of his own contemporary diaries, his reconstruction of events 50 years or more in the past is not always reliable.  Nonetheless, these two volumes contain invaluable documentary material, anecdotes, and insights into the lives of the Hutchinson Family Singers, one of the most famous singing families of the Antebellum era.

John’s old friend Frederick Douglass wrote the introduction.