Hemmings could NOT have "just" left in France. The French word for slave trade: négrière --- A plea: Read. Read Harriet Jacobs' "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" Read Saidiya Hartman's "Scenes of Subjection" Read "The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass" Read Toni Morrison's "Beloved"
The intentional and systematic erasure and rewriting of the terror and atrocities of slavery in the US (though not confined to the US) is why it's so easy for modern regimes, including the latest, to reintroduce tactics meant to exploit and control people. Text below should say "A Black woman…"
👀