John Punchard Jewett

John Punchard Jewett (1814-1884) was an American publisher and abolitionist active in Boston in the middle part of the 19th century. As a young man, Jewett was trained as a bookbinder in Salem, eventually becoming a partner in the firm. From the mid-1830s, Jewett became increasingly active in the abolitionist movement, publishing pamphlets and treaties denouncing slavery and joining the first Anti-Slavery Society in New England.

Around 1849, Jewett relocated to Boston, where he took on several now-famous manuscripts for publication. The most famous of these was Harriet Beecher Stowe’s classic, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, but he also published several maps, including a historically significant chart of East Kansas in 1856 (only a month after the sacking of Lawrence).