Sojourner Truth (born Isabella Baumfree), changed her name in 1843 when she became convinced that God had called her to leave the city and go into the countryside "testifying the hope that was in her."
She was an American abolitionist of New York Dutch heritage and a women's rights activist. Truth was born into slavery in Swartekill, New York, but escaped with her infant daughter to freedom in 1826. After going to court to recover her son in 1828, she became the first black woman to win such a case against a white man.
Her best-known speech was delivered extemporaneously, in 1851, at the Ohio Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio. The speech became widely known during the Civil War by the title "Ain't I a Woman?", a variation of the original speech re-written by someone else using a stereotypical Southern dialect, whereas Sojourner Truth was from New York and grew up speaking Dutch as her first language.
You can read more about Sojourner Truth here: https://www.nps.gov/articles/sojourner-truth.htm#
