Henry Box Brown is the subject of a 2012 film, Box Brown, by director Rob Underhill. His owner was John Barret, the former mayor of Richmond, Virginia. Barret was known to be atypical in how he treated slaves. Henry Box Brown was born in 1815 in Louisa County, Virginia. Eager to get his freedom, Brown shipped himself in a box to the Philadelphia Anti-Slavery Society. Henry Brown was an American inventor, perhaps best known as the inventor of a type of paper storage box. Henry Brown was born in Detroit, Michigan to Joe and Janie Brown in 1832 on a small farm up north near Canada. Henry ''Box'' Brown was an enslaved man living in Virginia in the early 1800s. Henry Brown developed a type of compartmented storage box intended to keep sheets of carbon paper separate from each other, and patented his invention (number 352,036) on November 2, 1886. When was Henry box brown's born? He spent his early years at the Hermitage, a plantation about ten miles from Yanceyville in Louisa County. Wiki User February 23, 2012 1:53AM. Henry Box Brown was born a slave on a Virginia plantation circa 1815. He lived with his parents, his four brothers, and his three sisters. As an adolescent, he was enslaved in a tobacco factory and he remained there into early adulthood. January 20, 1815. Related Questions. Henry 'Box' Brown The box was 2 feet 8 inches wide, 2 feet deep and 3 feet long. (Although records were kept of plantation slaves - which Brown was - they weren't always accurate when it came to recording births). Answer. [23] Playwright Mike Wiley wrote a one-man show about the life of Henry Box Brown entitled One Noble Journey . At 5 feet 10 inches and more than 200 pounds, Brown had very little space for movement. Henry "Box" Brown was born in the state of Virginia in either 1815 or 1816.