All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley's Sack, a Black Family Keepsake

All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake, written by Tiya Miles and published in 2021, is the story of the artifact known as Ashley’s Sack, a cloth pouch owned by three generations of enslaved women and embroidered with their story. The nonfiction narrative follows the three women: great-grandmother Rose, who packed the sack; her daughter Ashley, who received it from Rose; and Ruth, Ashley’s granddaughter, who embroidered the tale of her great-grandmother’s experiences on the sack in 1921. The text is an exploration of the history of American slavery, focusing on the experiences of women and girls. The book addresses themes such as Material Culture as Documentation, Black Women’s Resilience, and Social Responsibility for Marginalized Experience.

All That She Carried is a National Book Award winner and a New York Times bestseller; it was also named one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post, Time, NPR, and Publisher’s Weekly. Miles is a professor of history in African American, Indigenous, and women’s studies at Harvard University, and All That She Carried is her sixth book.