Transcript You are a slave. Your body, your time, your very breath

Follow the Drinking Gourd:
The Role of the
Underground Railroad in the
Abolitionist Movement
“When the sun comes back
and the first quail calls,
Follow the drinking gourd.
For the old man is awaiting
for to carry you to freedom,
If you follow the
drinking gourd.”
…song of slavery, 1840s
“Follow the Drinking Gourd" was a
song passed from slave to slave
that gave the route for an
escape from
Alabama and Mississippi.
Of all the routes out of the
Deep South,
this is the only one for which the
details survive.
The Big Dipper consists of seven bright
stars, forming a dipper,
a small pot with a long handle.
Fugitive slaves before the
Civil War knew it as
"the drinking gourd", because it
reminded them of the ladle used for
drinking water, made from gourds.
It was used by
runaway slaves a
signpost in the sky
pointing the way
north to safety
where slavery
was outlawed.
They used the North Star,
or Polaris, which could be found by
locating the Big Dipper
(the “drinking gourd” in the sky).
Following Polaris, almost directly north
in the sky, would lead them to
free states or to Canada.
Let’s take a
journey similar to
one braved by
thousands of
runaway slaves
prior to the
Civil War…
You are a
slave.
Your body,
your time,
your very
breath belong
to a farmer
in 1850s
Maryland.
Six long days a week
you tend his fields.
You have never tasted
freedom.
You never
expect to.
And yet . . . your heart
lights up when you hear
whispers of attempted
escape.
Freedom means a hard,
dangerous trek.
Do you dare try it?
It was a journey along the
“Underground Railroad.”
You leave
in the middle
of the night…
Every step
seems louder.
Twigs snap,
leaves crackle.
But you walk on,
till you see a group
of friendly faces.
You join them shyly
and meet
“General Tubman”
herself.
Even if Moses can’t fit you
into her next group,
she’ll tell you how to follow
the North Star
to freedom
in Canada.
She tells you how
to sneak across
the bridge
over the
Choptank River
and where to find
friends in a place
called Delaware.
Your head says go,
your feet say no.
Harriet Tubman told
you that a lantern
on a hitching post
means a safe house.
But can you really knock
on a white family’s door
and
trust them to help you?
A warm welcome,
hot food, and
hiding places
within the
house-that’s
what you find.
Guided by their
conscience,
the owners
break the law
by helping
runaways.
Yet terror still haunts you.
As you fall asleep you hear
bloodhounds not far away.
They are looking for
fugitives, looking for you.
Freedom is still
a long way off.
But now you know the plantation is far
away. Your host, a Quaker businessman
named Thomas Garrett, smiles gently
and promises you’ll reach Canada.
A good friend of Tubman’s,
Garrett has worked on
The Underground Railroad
for almost
40 years.
A few years ago he was
arrested and fined.
It didn’t stop him
for a minute.
You’ve reached a
free state, Pennsylvania,
but United States law
still sees you as your
master’s property, and bounty
hunters are everywhere.
You must get ready ready for
another long stretch of travel.
Weeks of trudging,
including a
grueling passage of
almost 250 miles
through mountains,
have brought you to
Rochester, New York.
Eliza comes to tell Uncle
Tom that she is sold, and
that she is running away to
save her child.
Antislavery friends give you warm
clothing for the hard Canadian climate
and make sure you’re taken safely
to Lake Erie.
Across Lake Erie lies Canada—and
freedom. A few weeks earlier you might
have coaxed an easy ride from the
ferry captain.
But as winter takes hold, chunks of
ice have begun to form…
You might find someone to row
you across, or you could try
leaping from one ice floe
to another.
Either way, you’ll be
freezing cold.
Yet staying exposes you—and your
helpers—to slave hunters. Do you
try going across?
You made it!
It took courage, luck, help,
and incredible stamina.
Here in Canada, you can finally
breathe free.
Not only won’t the government
return you to slavery, but you
can vote and even own land.
The route you traveled—
based on Harriet Tubman’s actual
journeys—
appears on the map
(next drawing).
Using modern
roads,the trip
would be 560 miles.
A strong, lucky runaway might
have made it to freedom in two
months.
For others, especially in bad
weather, the trek might have
lasted a year.
And there were many more
routes to freedom, known as the
“Underground Railroad.”
What was it like to live in a
nation that allowed slavery?
Why did so many people
want to flee?
How did the
Underground
Railroad work?
Injustices Under Slavery
The Anti-Slavery Record,
published for the American
Anti-Slavery Society,
published images dramatizing
the evils of slavery…
How did the
Underground Railroad
work?
In order to reduce the numbers
of escaping slaves owners kept
slaves illiterate and totally
ignorant of geography.
Owners even went so far as to
try to keep slaves from learning
how to tell directions.
The Underground Railroad saw an
explosion of activity
in the 1840s.
In 1842, the Supreme Court
ruled in Prigg v. Pennsylvania
that states did not have to aid in
the return of runaway slaves.
In an attempt to appease the
South, Congress passed the
Compromise of 1850, which
revised the Fugitive Slave Bill.
The law gave slaveowners
"the right to organize a posse at
any point in the United States
to aid in recapturing
runaway slaves.
The Underground Railroad was not
underground. Because escaping
slaves and the people who helped
them were technically breaking
the law, they had to stay out of
sight. They went “underground” in
terms of concealing their actions.
The Underground Railroad, a
vast network of people who
helped fugitive slaves escape
to the North and to Canada,
was not run by any single
organization or person.
Rather, it consisted of many
individuals -- many whites but
predominently black.
One of the most curious
characteristics of the Underground
Railroad was its lack of formal
organization. No one knows exactly
when it started, but there were
certainly isolated cases of help given
to runaways as early as the 1700s.
Much of the early help was provided
by Quaker abolitionists in
Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
The name probably originated
from the popularity of the new
railroads; they were not
via the railroads.
The system even used terms
used in railroading…
…the homes and businesses where
fugitives would rest and eat were
called "stations" and "depots."
They were run by
"stationmasters," those who
contributed money or goods were
"stockholders," and the
"conductor" was responsible
for moving fugitives from
one station to the next.
Many clever and creative ideas
helped slaves during their
escape.
When abolitionist John Fairfield
needed to sneak 28 slaves over
the roads near Cincinnati,
he hired a hearse and
disguised the group as a
funeral procession.
Escaping slaves were well hidden for
their travels in this wagon when grain
bags were piled around the hiding area.
Famous
“Conductors”
of the
Underground Railroad
In 1849, Harriet Tubman escaped from
the Eastern Shore of Maryland and
became known as "Moses" to her people
after making
many trips to the South
to help deliver
at least 300 fellow
captives and loved
ones to liberation.
She later served as a
nurse and spy for the
Union Army during the
Civil War…
Harriet Tubman & Passengers
JOSIAH HENSON (1789-1883)
So trustworthy a slave that his owner
made him an overseer. In journeys to the
North, he aided fellow slaves in their
escape. Harriet Beecher Stowe
attributed an episode
about him in her novel.
Henson eventually
escaped to Canada,
led others to safety,
and traveled as abolitionist
and businessman.
JERMAIN LOGUEN (1813-1872)
“No day dawns for the slave,
nor is it looked for. It is all
night—night forever,” said this
fugitive, Underground agent and
ordained minister.
He helped 1,500 escapees and
started black schools in
New York State.
Born free, William Still
was a successful
merchant, leader
in the fight against
slavery, and
part of the
Underground
Railroad.
African American abolitionist
John Parker of Ripley, Ohio,
frequently ventured to Kentucky
and Virginia and helped transport
by boat hundreds of runaways
across the Ohio River.
By the beginning of the Civil War
in 1861, about 500 people a year
were traveling throughout the
South teaching routes to slaves.
Scholars estimate that 60,000 to
100,000 slaves successfully fled
to freedom.
The Abolitionists…
The Pennsylvania Abolition society,
was one of the many abolitionist
groups that assisted fugitive slaves in
their attempts to find
freedom in the Free States.
People who contributed to the cause
of emancipation or freeing of slaves
were called "abolitionists."
In addition to
published
speeches,
books, and
sermons, the
abolitionists
wrote songs
that told about
the evils of
slavery…
“Am I not a man and
brother?
Ought I not, then, to be
free?
Sell me not to one another,
Take not thus my liberty.
Christ our Saviour, Christ our
Saviour,
Died for me as well as thee.”
“Come all ye true friends of the
nation,
Attend to humanity's call;
Come aid the poor slave's
liberation,
And roll on the liberty ball-And roll on the liberty ball-Come aid the poor slave's
liberation,
And roll on the liberty ball.”
Harriet Beecher
Stowe wrote Uncle
Tom's Cabin with
the encouragement
of her
sister-in-law who
was deeply affected
by the passage of
the Fugitive Slave
Law.
“On the shores of our free states are
emerging the poor, shattered, broken
remnants of families,--men and women,
escaped, by miraculous providences,
from the surges of slavery,--feeble in
knowledge, and, in many cases, infirm in
moral constitution, from a system which
confounds and confuses every principle
of Christianity and morality.”
…Uncle Tom’s Cabin
Frederick Douglass
wrote his
autobiography, in 1841,
telling of his life as a
former slave.
He became an orator
for the
Anti-Slavery Society.
His book was probably
the best-selling of all
the fugitive slave
narratives: 5000 copies
were sold.
John Brown was an American
abolitionist, born in Connecticut and
raised in Ohio. He felt passionately and
violently that he must
personally fight to
end slavery. In 1856,
in retaliation for
the sack of Lawrence,
he led the murder of
five proslavery men on the
banks of the
Pottawatomie River.
Brown did not end there. On Oct. 16,
1859, Brown and 21 followers captured
the U.S. arsenal at Harpers Ferry.
Brown planned this takeover as the first
step in his liberation of the slaves,
but his plan was defeated the next
morning by Robert E. Lee and his troops.
Brown was hanged on Dec. 2, 1859.
Abraham Lincoln was
the sixteenth
president of the
United States. He
was our president
during the Civil War.
Preserving the Union became Lincoln's
main concern during his term
in office.
But the Union was not Lincoln's only
concern.
A year earlier, he had signed the
Emancipation Proclamation, which
legally freed the slaves in the rebel
states.
“Follow the Drinking Gourd…