The Underground Railroad was an informal network of secret routes and safe houses used by 19th-century black slaves in the United States to escape to free states and Canada with the aid of abolitionists and allies who were sympathetic to their cause. The term is also applied to the abolitionists, both black and white, free and enslaved, who aided the fugitives. Other various routes led to Mexico or overseas. Created in the early 19th century, the Underground Railroad was at its height between 1850 and 1860. One estimate suggests that by 1850, 100,000 slaves had escaped via the "Railroad". British North America, where slavery was prohibited, was a popular destination, as its long border gave many points of access. More than 30,000 people were said to have escaped there via the network at its peak, although U.S. Census figures account for only 6,000. The Underground Railroad fugitives' stories are documented in the Underground Railroad Records.

Political background

Even at the height of the Underground Railroad, fewer than 1,000 slaves from all slave-holding states were able to escape each year (just over 5,000 court cases for escaped slaves recorded), a quantity much smaller than the natural annual increase of the enslaved population. Although the economic impact was small, the psychological impact on slaveholders of an informal network to assist escaped slaves was immense. Under the original Fugitive Slave Law of 1793, the responsibility for catching runaway slaves fell on officials of the states from which the slaves came, and the Underground Railroad thrived.

With heavy political lobbying, the Compromise of 1850, passed by Congress after the Mexican-American War, stipulated a more stringent Fugitive Slave Law. Ostensibly, the compromise redressed all regional problems. However, it coerced officials of free states to assist slave catchers if there were runaway slaves in the area, and granted slave catchers national immunity when in free states to do their job. Additionally, free blacks of the North could easily be forced into slavery, whether they had been freed earlier or had never been slaves. Suspected slaves were unable to defend themselves in court, and it was difficult to prove a free status. In a de facto bribe, judges were paid more ($10) for a decision that forced a suspected slave back into slavery than for a decision that the suspected slave was in fact free ($5). Thus, many Northerners who would have otherwise been able and content to ignore far-away regional slavery, chafed under nationally-sanctioned slavery. This led to one of the primary grievances of the Union cause in the Civil War.

Structure

The escape network was not literally underground nor a railroad. It was figuratively "underground" in the sense of being an underground resistance. It was known as a "railroad" by way of the use of rail terminology in the code. The Underground Railroad consisted of meeting points, secret routes, transportation, and safe houses, and assistance provided by abolitionist sympathizers. Individuals were often organized in small, independent groups; this helped to maintain secrecy because individuals knew some connecting "stations" along the route but knew few details of their immediate area. Escaped slaves would move north along the route from one way station to the next. "Conductors" on the railroad came from various backgrounds and included free-born blacks, white abolitionists, former slaves (either escaped or manumitted), and Native Americans. Churches also often played a role, especially the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), Congregationalists, Wesleyans, and Reformed Presbyterians as well as certain sects of mainstream denominations such as branches of the Methodist church and American Baptists.

Route

To reduce the risk of infiltration, many people associated with the Underground Railroad knew only their part of the operation and not of the whole scheme. There were the "conductors" who ultimately moved the runaways from station to station. The "conductor" would sometimes pretend to be a slave to enter a plantation. Once a part of a plantation, the "conductor" would direct the runaways to the North. Slaves would travel at night, about 10–20 miles (15–30 km) to each station. They would stop at the so-called "stations" or "depots" during the day and rest. The stations were out of the way places like barns. While resting at one station, a message was sent to the next station to let the station master know the runaways were on their way.

The resting spots where the runaways could sleep and eat were given the code names "stations" and "depots" which were held by “station masters”. There were also those known as “stockholders” who gave money or supplies for assistance.

Traveling conditions

thumb|Eastman Johnson, "A Ride for Liberty – The Fugitive Slaves", oil on paperboard, 22 x 26.25 inches, circa 1862, Brooklyn Museum Although the fugitives sometimes traveled on boat or train, they usually traveled on foot or by wagon.

Routes were often purposely indirect to confuse pursuers. Most escapes were by individuals or small groups; occasionally, there were mass escapes, such as with the Pearl incident. The journey was often considered too difficult and dangerous for women or children.

Due to the risk of discovery, information about routes and safe havens was passed along by word of mouth. Southern newspapers of the day were often filled with pages of notices soliciting information about escaped slaves and offering sizable rewards for their capture and return. Federal marshals and professional bounty hunters known as slave catchers pursued fugitives as far as the Canadian border.

The risk was not limited solely to actual fugitives. Because strong, healthy blacks in their prime working and reproductive years were seen and treated as highly valuable commodities, it was not unusual for free blacks—both freedmen (former slaves) and those who had never been slaves—to be kidnapped and sold into slavery. "Certificates of freedom"—signed, notarized statements attesting to the free status of individual blacks—could easily be destroyed and thus afforded their holders little protection. Under the terms of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, when suspected fugitives were seized and brought to a special magistrate known as a commissioner, they had no right to a jury trial and could not testify in their own behalf. Technically, they were guilty of no crime. The marshal or private slave-catcher needed only to swear an oath to acquire a writ of ''replevin'' for the return of property.

Congress, dominated by the numbers of southern Congressmen elected because slaves were counted into total population, had passed the fugitive slave law because of public sympathy for the fugitives and the lack of cooperation by the police, courts, and public outside the Deep South. In some parts of the North, slave-catchers needed police protection to exercise their federal authority. Despite their resistance to pro-slavery laws, several states made free blacks unwelcome. Indiana, whose area along the Ohio River was settled by Southerners, passed a constitutional amendment that barred blacks from settling in that state.

Terminology

Members of The Underground Railroad often used specific jargon, based on the metaphor of the railway. For example:

People who helped slaves find the railroad were "agents" (or "shepherds")

Guides were known as "conductors"

Hiding places were "stations"

"Station masters" hid slaves in their homes

Escaped slaves were referred to as "passengers" or "cargo"

Slaves would obtain a "ticket"

Similar to common gospel lore, the "wheels would keep on turning"

Financial benefactors of the Railroad were known as "stockholders".

The Big Dipper asterism (whose "bowl" points to the North Star) was known as the drinkin' gourd. The Railroad itself was often known as the "freedom train" or "Gospel train", which headed towards "Heaven" or "the Promised Land", i.e., Canada.

William Still, often called "The Father of the Underground Railroad", helped hundreds of slaves to escape (as many as 60 a month), sometimes hiding them in his Philadelphia home. He kept careful records, including short biographies of the people, that contained frequent railway metaphors. He maintained correspondence with many of them, often acting as a middleman in communications between escaped slaves and those left behind. He published these accounts in the book ''The Underground Railroad'' in 1872.

According to Still, messages were often encoded so that messages could be understood only by those active in the railroad. For example, the following message, "I have sent via at two o'clock four large hams and two small hams", indicated that four adults and two children were sent by train from Harrisburg to Philadelphia. The additional word ''via'' indicated that the "passengers" were not sent on the usual train, but rather via Reading, Pennsylvania. In this case, the authorities were tricked into going to the regular train station in an attempt to intercept the runaways, while Still was able to meet them at the correct station and guide them to safety, where they eventually escaped either to the North or to British North America, where slavery had been abolished during the 1830s.

Folklore

Since the 1980s, claims have arisen that quilt designs were used to signal and direct slaves to escape routes and assistance. According to advocates of the quilt theory, there were ten quilt patterns that were used to direct slaves to take particular actions. The quilts were placed one at a time on a fence as a means of nonverbal communication to alert escaping slaves. The code had a dual meaning: first to signal slaves to prepare to escape and second to give clues and indicate directions on the journey. The quilt design theory is disputed. The first published work documenting an oral history source was in 1999 and the first publishing is believed to be a 1980 children's book, so it is difficult to evaluate the veracity of these claims, which are not accepted by quilt historians or scholars of pre-Civil-War America. There is no contemporary evidence of any sort of quilt code, and quilt historians such as Pat Cummings and Barbara Brackman have raised serious questions about the idea. In addition, Underground Railroad historian Giles Wright has published a pamphlet debunking the quilt code.

Many popular, nonacademic sources claim that spirituals and other songs, such as "Steal Away" or "Follow the Drinking Gourd", contained coded information and helped individuals navigate the railroad, but these sources offer very little evidence to support their claims. Scholars who have examined these claims tend to believe that while the slave songs may certainly have expressed hope for deliverance from the sorrows of this world, these songs did not present literal help for runaway slaves.

Yet, the Underground Railroad did spur cultural works. For example, a song written in 1860 about a man fleeing slavery in Tennessee by escaping to Canada, entitled ''Song of the Free'', was composed to the tune of Oh! Susanna. Every stanza ends with a reference to Canada as the land "where colored men are free". Slavery in Canada had been in rapid decline after an 1803 court ruling, and abolished outright in 1834.

Legal and political

When frictions between North and South culminated in the American Civil War, many blacks, slave and free, fought with the Union Army. Following passage of the Thirteenth Amendment, in some cases the Underground Railroad operated in reverse as fugitives returned to the United States.

Arrival in Canada

Estimates vary widely, but at least 30,000 slaves, and potentially more than 100,000, escaped to Canada via the Underground Railroad. The largest group settled in Upper Canada (called Canada West from 1841, and today Southern Ontario), where numerous Black Canadian communities developed. These were generally in the triangular region bounded by Toronto, Niagara Falls, and Windsor. Nearly 1,000 refugees settled in Toronto, and several rural villages made up mostly of ex-slaves were established in Kent County and Essex County.

Another important center of population was Nova Scotia, for example Africville and other villages near Halifax, see Black Nova Scotians. Important black settlements also developed in other parts of British North America (now parts of Canada). These included Lower Canada (present-day Quebec) and Vancouver Island, where Governor James Douglas encouraged black immigration because of his opposition to slavery and because he hoped a significant black community would form a bulwark against those who wished to unite the island with the United States.

Upon arriving at their destinations, many fugitives were disappointed. While the British colonies had no slavery after 1834, discrimination was still common. Many of the new arrivals had great difficulty finding jobs, in part because of mass European immigration at the time, and overt racism was common. For example, the charter of the city of Saint John, New Brunswick was amended in 1785 specifically to exclude blacks from practicing a trade, selling goods, fishing in the harbour, or becoming freemen; these provisions stood until 1870.

With the outbreak of the Civil War in the U. S., many black refugees enlisted in the Union Army and, while some later returned to Canada, many remained in the United States. Thousands of others returned to the American South after the war ended. The desire to reconnect with friends and family was strong, and most were hopeful about the changes emancipation and Reconstruction would bring.

See also

Fort Mose

Bilger's rocks

Notable people

Dr. Anderson Ruffin Abbott

Henry "Box" Brown

John Brown

Levi Coffin

Asa Drury

Frederick Douglass

Calvin Fairbank

Matilda Joslyn Gage

Thomas Garrett

William Lloyd Garrison

Samuel Green

Josiah Bushnell Grinnell

Josiah Henson

James Butler ("Wild Bill") Hickok

Isaac Hopper

Roger Hooker Leavitt

Rev. J.W. Loguen

Samuel J. May

John Parker

John Wesley Posey

John Rankin

Alexander Milton Ross

David Ruggles

Samuel Seawell

William Still

Sojourner Truth

Harriet Tubman

Charles Augustus Wheaton

Notable locations

List of Underground Railroad sites

Albany, New York

Bialystoker Synagogue

Boston, Massachusetts

Broderick Park

Buffalo, New York

Burkle Estate, Tennessee

Burlington, Wisconsin

Charlemont, Massachusetts

Chatham–Kent, Ontario

Chicago, Illinois

Cincinnati, Iowa

Cincinnati, Ohio

Clearfield County, Pennsylvania

Crystal Park, Pennsylvania

Cyrus Gates Farmstead

Detroit, Michigan

Dresden, Ontario

Elmira, New York

Farmington, Connecticut

Granville, Ohio

Halifax, Nova Scotia

Ironton, Ohio

Jacksonville, Illinois

Jersey City, New Jersey

Jerseyville, Illinois

Lawnside, New Jersey

Lewis, Iowa

Lewiston, New York

Mayhew Cabin

Milton, Wisconsin

Nebraska City, Nebraska

New Albany, Indiana

Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio

Oberlin, Ohio

Owen Sound, Ontario

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Portsmouth, Ohio

Ripley, Ohio

Rochester, New York

Salem, Ohio

Sandusky, Ohio

Sandy Ground – Staten Island, New York

Shanty Bay, Ontario

St. Catharines, Ontario

Springboro, Ohio

Syracuse, New York

Toronto, Ontario

Troy, New York

Union City, Michigan

Uniontown, Pennsylvania

Vandalia, Michigan

Wabaunsee County, Kansas

Westfield, Indiana

West Nyack, New York

Wilmington, Delaware

Windsor, Ontario

Pickering, Ontario

Related events

1776 Declaration of Independence 1800 Second Great Awakening 1820 Missouri Compromise 1850 Compromise of 1850 1850 Fugitive Slave Act 1851 Jerry Rescue 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act 1857 Dred Scott Decision 1858 Oberlin-Wellington Rescue 1860 Abraham Lincoln of Illinois elected the first Republican U.S. President 1861 through 1865 American Civil War 1863 Emancipation Proclamation issued by President Lincoln 1865 Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

Contemporary literature

1829 David Walker's ''Appeal to the Coloured Citizens of the World'' (a call for resistance to slavery in Georgia)

1852 ''Uncle Tom's Cabin'' by Harriet Beecher Stowe

1854 ''The Planter's Northern Bride'' by Caroline Lee Hentz

Notes

References

Blight, David W. (2001)''Passages to Freedom: The Underground Railroad in History and Memory''. Smithsonian Books. ISBN 1-58834-157-7.

Bordewich, Fergus M (2005) ''Bound for Canaan: The Underground Railroad and the War for the Soul of America''. Harper Collins. ISBN 0-06-052430-8.

Chadwick, Bruce (2000) ''Traveling the Underground Railroad: A Visitor's Guide to More Than 300 Sites''. Citadel Press. ISBN 0-8065-2093-0.

Forbes, Ella (1998) ''But We Have No Country: The 1851 Christiana Pennsylvania Resistance''. Africana Homestead Legacy Publishers.

Griffler, Keith P.(2004) ''Front Line of Freedom: African Americans and the Forging of the Underground Railroad in the Ohio Valley''. University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 0-8131-2298-8.

Hagedorn, Ann (2004) ''Beyond the River: The Untold Story of the Heroes of the Underground Railroad''. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-684-87066-5.

Hendrick, George, and Willene Hendrick (2003) ''Fleeing for Freedom: Stories of the Underground Railroad As Told by Levi Coffin and William Still''. Ivan R. Dee Publisher. ISBN 1-56663-546-2.

Hudson, J. Blaine (2002) ''Fugitive Slaves and the Underground Railroad in the Kentucky Borderland''. McFarland & Company. ISBN 0-7864-1345-X.

Potter, David M. ''The Impending Crisis, 1848–1861''. (1976) ISBN 0-06-131929-5

Operating the Underground Railroad, from National Park Service.

The Underground Railroad, from PBS.

Further reading

ISBN 978-0-374-53125-6

Larson, Kate Clifford (2004). ''Bound For the Promised Land: Harriet Tubman, Portrait of an American Hero''. New York: Ballantine Books. ISBN 0-345-45627-0.

''Underground Railroad, 1872, by William Still, from Project Gutenberg'' (classic book documenting the Underground Railroad operations in Philadelphia)

''Stories of the Underground Railroad'', 1941, by Anna L. Curtis (stories about Thomas Garrett, a famous agent on the Underground Railroad)

;Folklore/Myth:

New Jersey's Underground Railroad Myth-Buster: Giles Wright is on a Mission to Fine Tune Black History

Putting it in Perspective: The Symbolism of Underground Railroad quilts

Underground Railroad Quilts & Abolitionist Fairs

Documentary Evidence is Missing on Underground Railroad Quilts

External links

Minutes of the second U.G.R.R. Convention for the State of Ohio, held in the city of Zanesville on the 6th, 7th and 8th of January, 1858.

Underground Railroad Stories from Southern Ohio, Northern KY and Northwestern VA

Africanaonline – A study of the Underground Railroad.

Tracks to Freedom: Canada and the Underground Railroad

Underground Railroad Sites in Buffalo, NY

Annual historic re-creation of Underground Railroad in Sugar Grove, Pennsylvania

Friends of the Underground Railroad

The William Still National Underground Railroad Foundation

National Underground Railroad Freedom Center

National Park Service: Aboard the Underground Railroad

The Underground Railroad: Escape from Slavery | Scholastic.com

National Geographic: Underground Railroad

Maryland's Cooling Springs Farm: The Story of a Still-Existing Underground Railroad Safe-House

Underground Railroad in Canada

Tracks to Freedom – Canada.com special on the Underground Railway in Canada

Freedom Crossing – Lewiston, New York

Ontario's Underground Railroad – Includes an interactive map, a tour, and more.

Underground Railroad in Westfield, Indiana – Includes Anti-Slavery Friends Cemetery list and more

Prospect Place mansion, Underground Railroad safehouse in Trinway, Ohio

New-York Historical Society – Run For Your Life

Underground Railroad Research Institute at Georgetown College

The Oberlin Heritage Center-Learn about Oberlin's role in the Underground Railroad, the abolition movement, and more.

Pathways to Freedom: Maryland and the Underground Railroad – educational website developed by Maryland Public Television

NPS Underground Railroad Sites

Adventure Cycling Association's Underground Railroad Bicycle Route

Underground Railroad in Wisconsin, Wisconsin Historical Society

Historica’s Heritage Minute video docudrama about the Underground Railroad. (Adobe Flash Player.)

Bresler, Joel (2007) "Cultural History of ''Follow the Drinking Gourd''"

Song, Story, or History: Resisting Claims of a Coded Message in the African American Spiritual "Follow the Drinking Gourd"

Category:Secret places

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