With a formal education and a background in the anti-slavery movement from a young age he would become a significant figure in Detroit's local black community and the city at large for over 50 years.

[4] From 1832 to 1838 while his mentor worked with the local abolitionist movement in Buffalo, Lambert would start making his own way in the world by traveling the Great Lakes region and Detroit by hiring out as a cabin boy on commercial steamers.

He had the skills and inspiration to become an organizer in those groups; with his formal education and childhood in the company of abolitionists such as his mentor Abner Francis, Henry Highland Garnet, and even Fredrick Douglas.

[1] However, the audaciousness of Lambert's tactics in aiding Cromwell and more importantly their success, would cause after shocks that contributed to the Fugitive Slave Act passing three years later in 1850.

For the last few months of Lambert's life he appeared to be suffering some form of neurodegeneration or "incipient softening of the brain" as his doctor referred to it at the time, possibly brought about by old age.

[5] In those last few months Lambert started having difficulties being aware of his surroundings, with one anecdote from the obituary noting how he had been found one morning at an old place of business having wandered from his home in the middle of the night.