The Life and Adventures of a Haunted Convict, or the Inmate of a Gloomy Prison, With the Mysteries and Miseries of the New York House of Reffuge [sic] and Auburn Prison Unmasked is the title of a c.1858 book-length manuscript by Austin Reed, an African American who served several terms as a prisoner in the Auburn State Prison in Auburn, New York. The manuscript relates his early life in Rochester, New York, his apprenticeship to a local farmer and arrest for arson, his stay at the New York House of Refuge, a juvenile detention facility in Manhattan, and his imprisonment at Auburn.
Now in the possession of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library of Yale University,[1] the manuscript is reportedly the earliest prison memoir by an African American.[2] An edition of the manuscript, prepared by Caleb Smith, was published in February 2016.[3][4]
