High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Juan Francisco Manzano was born a slave in Matanzas providence, Cuba, to his mother Maria del Pilar in the year 1797. He published various works such as Poesias liricas (1821) followed by Flores pasageras (1830). In 1835 he started writing his life story at the request of Domingo del Monte who bought Manzano’s freedom in 1836. Afterwards, he continued to publish for various journals. The Autobiography of a Slave portrayed the only documented account of Cuban slavery from the 19th century. The autobiography and some of his poems were published in England by British abolitionist Richard Robert Madden as Poems by a slave in the island of Cuba in 1840. He published the play Zafira, in 1842 and was falsely accused of being involved in the conspiracy of La Escalera in 1844. After his release from prison in 1845 he never wrote again. He died in poverty in 1854.