Joshua Freeman

In 1860, a young slave named Joshua swims across the Missouri River to the "free state" of Kansas. There he encounters two slave hunters and outwits them to secure his own freedom. With the help of an itinerant preacher, he joins a wagon train heading west, intending to earn money to buy his siblings' freedom and avenge his mother's death. The journey is difficult, but he meets three people who become very important to him: Ben, an older former slave, Ben's "half-breed" daughter, Morning Star, and Jeremiah Casey, a white man.
Their destination is a silver mining camp of the Comstock Lode in Virginia City (in what is now Nevada)where Joshua and Jeremiah become business partners. Having earned the money he needs, Joshua returns "back east" to buy his brother and sister out of slavery, a task made considerably more difficult when he learns that that a war is being waged between the states.
Joshua Freeman, is the first book of a trilogy. The story is a mixture of "Old West" philosophy, lots of action, and a good measure of humor. Above all, it's an uplifting tale of a young African American man's perseverance and adherence to core values.