William Francis Allen Correspondence and Biography

William Francis Allen was an American classical scholar and an editor of the first book of American slave songs; pioneer in the teaching of history by a topical system of study and reading the original sources. He graduated Harvard College (1851) and later he traveled and studied in Europe. A Unitarian, he considered the ministry before deciding to pursue a literary and scholarly career. In 1856, he became assistant principal at the English and Classical School in West Newton, Mass. During the Civil War (1863-1864) he and his wife, Mary Lambert Allen, ran a school for newly emancipated slaves on the Sea Islands of South Carolina. Later worked (1864-1865) as a sanitary agent among black war refugees in Ark. After the Civil War, he taught at Antioch College, and in 1867 became professor of ancient languages and history (afterwards Latin language and Roman history) at the University of Wisconsin (Madison). He died in December 1889.