The Underground Railroad Read online

  For David, my history buff! —B.B.

  For Rachel Dunn,

  my mother’s great-grandmother,

  born into slavery in 1807,

  and her daughter, Hannah,

  my mother’s grandmother,

  my “Addy,” born into slavery in 1850.

  She died free.

  Your strength inspires me today. —C.P.

  America’s past is filled with all kinds of stories. Stories of courage, adventure, tragedy, and hope. The Real Stories From My Time series pairs American Girl’s beloved historical characters with true stories of pivotal events in American history. As you travel back in time to discover America’s past, these characters go with you to share their own incredible tales.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1: Not Really a Railroad

  Chapter 2: Slavery in America

  Chapter 3: Abolitionists

  Chapter 4: The Passengers

  Chapter 5: Slave Catchers

  Chapter 6: Conductors

  Chapter 7: Station Houses

  Chapter 8: Abolished!

  A Note About Addy’s Dialect

  Glossary

  Map

  Timeline

  Source Notes

  About the Author

  Sneak Peek: Read Chapter 1 of Real Stories From My Time: Titanic

  Copyright

  Thousands of slaves took the risk of escaping on the Underground Railroad. Each one of them has a story.

  In 1830, a slave named Josiah Henson decided to follow the North Star from Maryland to Canada, where he could live as a free man. But Josiah could not flee alone. He had a wife and four children. Josiah’s wife was overcome with terror at the idea of escaping. She was afraid that they would be hunted down by dogs, brought back to their master, and whipped to death. Josiah insisted, but his wife resisted. She cried; Josiah argued. At last, his wife agreed.

  On a moonless night in September, Josiah strapped his two youngest children in a knapsack and the family quietly boarded a small boat to cross a river. When they reached the shore, Josiah prayed that their journey would be safe.

  For weeks, the family walked miles and miles at night. Whenever they heard a sound—a wagon’s wheels, a dog baying at the moon—they hid. Soon, their food was all eaten. The children cried with hunger. Josiah bravely knocked on doors and asked for food. But the answer was always the same: No. Still, the family pressed on.

  Josiah and his family hiked through the forest over fallen logs and branches, up and down steep ravines, and across fast-moving streams. At times they heard wolves howling nearby, but they remained brave. Once, a kind person gave the family a ride in a wagon. Another gave them passage on a boat.

  At last, Josiah’s family reached Canada. Josiah threw himself on the ground and kissed the sand. “I’m free!” he shouted. But this wouldn’t be Josiah’s last dangerous journey. Over his lifetime, Josiah helped approximately two hundred slaves find their way to freedom on the Underground Railroad.

  The Underground Railroad did not run under the ground. It wasn’t even a real railroad, with train cars and tracks, although there were passengers. The Underground Railroad was a series of routes and hiding places that slaves took to reach freedom.

  The white lines and arrows on this map show the routes people took to escape from slavery in the South to freedom in the North

  No one really knows where the name “Underground Railroad” came from. One story was about a slave named Tice Davids, who escaped from Kentucky and swam across the Ohio River to freedom in Ohio. When Davids’s owner discovered he was gone, he said that his slave “must have gone off on an underground railroad.” Another story says that slave hunters in Pennsylvania came up with the name. And yet another story tells about a slave who claimed he was making his way north, where “the railroad ran underground all the way to Boston.”

  Slaves desperately sought freedom and they would try to escape their harsh lives any way they could. Some walked hundreds and hundreds of miles. Others traveled by boat. Some were smuggled in a train or wagon. Most traveled at night so as not to be seen and caught.

  The road to freedom was dangerous. If slaves were caught, they would be sent back to their master and punished. The punishments were horrible. But to many slaves it was worth the risk, for at the end of the road was a light—a light called freedom.

  The fictional story of Addy Walker started in 1864, when Addy was nine years old. Addy; her older brother, Sam; her baby sister, Esther; and her parents were enslaved on a plantation in North Carolina. The Walkers lived in a tiny windowless cabin. They had hard lives in slavery. But they were together, and their love for each other gave them strength. Then the worst happened—Addy’s family was torn apart, as enslaved families often were, when Sam and Poppa were sold to a different owner. Addy’s family was divided, just as the nation was divided, North against South, by the Civil War.

  Although Addy is a fictional character, her story will help you imagine what it was like to escape slavery on the Underground Railroad.

  “The night is real hot and I’m sweating. On my pallet, I try hard not to move—I don’t want to bother my brother, Sam, who’s sleeping at my feet, or baby Esther at my side. Flies buzz in my ears. I can hear more buzzing—a different kind. Momma and Poppa whispering. I want to hear what they’re sayin’, but I know I best keep still and pretend I’m asleep.

  “Poppa get up and walk ’cross the dirt floor. He tell Momma we need to run away from Master Stevens’s plantation. Poppa say the time is right to take our freedom. He wants us to run to the North. But Momma don’t want to go.

  “Then Poppa say Uncle Solomon tell him of railroad tracks near ten miles up the road. Uncle Solomon say we should follow them north till they cross another set of tracks. Where they cross, look for a house with red shutters. That’s a safe house. An old white woman live there, name Miss Caroline, and she gonna help us.

  “I’m scared as I listen to Poppa talk. Almost too scared to breathe. Was we really going to run away and take a train north to freedom? I never seen a train, but I want to. I’m scared, but I’m ready for my family to live free.”

  How did slavery start in America? In 1619, twenty Africans were brought to Jamestown, Virginia. The Africans were kidnapped from their homes. They did not want to come to Virginia at all. At home they were free. In Virginia they would be forced to work. They would not be paid. They would be beaten and sometimes starved. They would have no rights at all. Africans continued to arrive at the colonies, and by 1641 they were referred to as slaves.

  When slaves were stolen from their homes in Africa, they were forced aboard ships. The journey across the Atlantic Ocean was called the Middle Passage. The trip could take anywhere from four to twelve weeks. Sometimes the slaves were “loosely packed” on the ships, which gave them more space and air to breathe. Ship captains thought that with more space and air, the slaves would be healthier when they got to North America. And a healthier slave meant more money. Other times, the slaves were packed in tightly—so tightly that they could barely move or breathe. But the ship captains didn’t care. More slaves meant more money.

  The slaves had chains around their ankles and wrists. When they wanted to go to the bathroom, they had to use buckets. The ships were filthy. Lots of slaves caught diseases such as smallpox. And there was hardly any food to eat. Some slaves tried to jump overboard. Others simply stopped eating. For some, slavery was a fate worse than death.

  Those who survived the harsh journey were brought to auctions, where they were sold. Here, white people examined the slaves and decided how much money to pay for them. The slaves were prodded and poked and pinched. They were
treated like animals, not human beings.

  African slaves on the Middle Passage journey

  Once they were sold into slavery, they were forced to work without pay. Most slaves in the South worked on plantations. Some large plantations had as many as four hundred slaves. They planted, tilled, and picked the valuable crops—cotton, tobacco, and sugarcane. They worked under the hot sun, often with little food or water. Work began before sunrise and ended after sunset. Overseers, with whips in their hands, watched groups of slaves as they worked. Often, a slave was whipped or beaten if the overseer thought the slave wasn’t working hard enough. Men and women were forced to work the fields—even pregnant women. And soon after their babies were born, mothers strapped their infants to their backs and got back to work. Even children were put to work.

  Slaves picking cotton on a plantation in the South

  Field slaves lived in small cabins with dirt floors. They were given rough blankets and maybe some straw to sleep on. Sometimes families of ten people or more shared one cabin. Slave children did not go to school. Most never learned to read or write—it was against the law in most Southern states! Slaves caught trying to educate themselves, or their children, could be whipped or beaten—even the children.

  Many slave owners lived in big fancy houses. House slaves had slightly better lives than those who worked in the fields. They cleaned, cooked, served food, and took care of their master’s children. They also sewed and gardened. House slaves didn’t live with their own families. They stayed inside their master’s homes, where they were given a small room or maybe a closet to sleep in. Some house slaves learned to read and write. Still, house slaves were treated poorly and forced to work for no pay, and their lives were completely controlled by their owner.

  Slaves often feared that their families would be torn apart. A plantation master could decide to sell a slave for any reason. Strong slaves could fetch a good price, as could an excellent cook or housekeeper. At any time, family members could be sold to far-off plantations. About one out of every five slaves bought and sold was a child under the age of ten. Children were often sold away without their parents. Once separated, most slaves never saw their loved ones again.

  Slaves didn’t only live on plantations. They also lived in cities and towns and worked in shops and businesses. At one time, slaves were in every part of America. In fact, twelve United States presidents owned slaves while they were in office or at some time during their lives.

  By 1804, slavery was outlawed in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont. In 1808, it became illegal to bring slaves into the United States from different countries such as those in Africa. But slavery itself was still legal in the United States. Slaves were still forced to work without pay. Their children were born into slavery, and the number of slaves grew. Generation after generation, they lived and died without rights. The only hope for a better life was to escape.

  “On Master Stevens’s plantation, us slaves get up at dawn. We start working before the sun even up. I go out to the field with the other children to worm the tobacco. We got to peel off the big green worms crawling on the leaves so they can’t eat the plants. Today, I ain’t paying no mind to worming. The overseer comes over, whip in hand. He coming right at me, the buckles on his dusty boots clank-clank-clanking. I start to squeeze my eyes shut because I don’t want to see that whip pulled back, see its angry hot tail about to rip into me. But as he come near, he drop that whip. He grab my wrists with one hand. His other hand got the worms I missed. Big fat ones, still live and wriggling. He stuff them worms right in my mouth. He tell me to eat them, chew them up. I chomp down on them. They burst in my mouth. They bitter and I gag. He stand there and make me swallow them. My heart is full of fear, but I don’t show it. I don’t even cry. When he ride off, I go right back to work.”

  The slave population in America grew and grew. By the time the Civil War broke out in 1861, there were around four million slaves. At this time, there were nineteen free states, where slavery wasn’t allowed, and fifteen slave states, where slavery was legal. The slave states were in the South, where people had large plantations and needed lots of labor to work their crops.

  The issue of slavery had divided Americans since the days of the Founding Fathers. There were heated arguments among government officials and among regular citizens about what to do regarding slavery. Those who opposed slavery and wanted to end it were called abolitionists.

  William Lloyd Garrison

  William Lloyd Garrison, a white man, was one of the strongest leaders of the abolitionist movement. Growing up poor in Massachusetts, Garrison worked hard all his life—first as a printer, then as a writer and publisher. In 1831, he began publishing a newspaper called The Liberator that boldly called for the end of slavery. Many people did not like what they read. Garrison received death threats. The state of Georgia offered a $5,000 reward for his arrest. But this did not stop Garrison. He continued to speak out against slavery and became a cofounder of the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1833. Within five years, the organization had 1,350 chapters in different towns and cities throughout the North.

  In 1841, a twenty-three-year-old escaped slave got up to speak at an Anti-Slavery Society meeting in Nantucket, Massachusetts. Trembling, he stood at the podium. Pushing his nerves aside, he delivered a heart-wrenching speech about the horrors of slavery. Who was this young man? He was Frederick Douglass, who would go on to write and speak out against slavery for the rest of his life and become an influential abolitionist. Douglass spoke so well that some didn’t believe that he was ever a slave. Most slaves couldn’t read or write. So how could Douglass possibly do both? In 1845, Douglass published his autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave, where he described his brutal life as a slave, and his struggle to learn to read. Publishing this book was dangerous—he admitted to being a slave, which meant he could be captured and returned to slavery. Although he was forced to flee to England at one point to avoid capture, Douglass continued his fight to end slavery. Many other free blacks—black people who were free citizens and not enslaved—also worked to end slavery.

  Frederick Douglass

  Members of the Quaker church were also strong abolitionists. Quakers are a Christian group who believe that people should shake and tremble at the word of the Lord. That is how they got the name “Quakers.” They believe in equality and were against slavery.

  Many women were also active in the abolitionist movement. Sojourner Truth was one of the greatest abolitionists. Born into slavery in 1797, Sojourner was given the name Isabella Baumfree. She was not a slave in the South—she was a slave in the state of New York. Isabella was sold many times in her life. Her last master, John Dumont, promised her freedom, but he lied. So, at age twenty-nine, she took her baby daughter and escaped from slavery. While she was on the run, Isabella prayed for help. Her prayers were answered when Isaac and Maria Van Wagenen opened their doors. But John Dumont eventually caught up with her and demanded she hand over her baby. Isaac Van Wagenen paid John Dumont twenty dollars for Isabella and her baby, and Dumont returned to his plantation alone. Later, Isabella had a life-changing religious experience. She changed her name to Sojourner Truth and traveled up and down the land telling people the truth—the truth about the evils of slavery.

  Sojourner Truth

  Besides preaching against slavery, many abolitionists also helped slaves escape on the Underground Railroad. They would hide slaves in their homes, in stores, and in barns. Helping slaves escape was risky—anyone caught hiding an escaped slave could be fined, put in jail, or even beaten. But many people took that risk. Abolitionists refused to give up their belief that all people should be free.

  “Right before we make our escape to freedom, the worst thing in the world happen. Poppa and Sam is sold. Master Stevens put Sam in a wagon, in chains and shackles. He tie a rag tight round his mouth. Poppa’s on the ground, chained. I fly to h
im without wings. If I was an eagle, I would carry him and Sam away. I would fly all of us to freedom. But I am a slave just like them. I cling to Poppa. He tell me everything gonna be alright, but how can that be true? I hold on tighter—even when I hear the whip crack. It sound like a gun and hit me in the back like a lash of fire. I still hold on to Poppa, and Master Stevens say he gonna whip me again. Poppa tells me to let him go, but I can’t. I will not let go! I will never let go! Master Stevens pull me back from Poppa and I fall into Momma arms. We both crying, crying so loud that crows fly up from the fields. Poppa not crying. He’s put into the wagon with Sam. They loaded in like animals. The wagon pull away, and I worry I ain’t never gonna see Poppa or Sam again.

  “Later, I tell Momma I hate white people, but she tell me if I fill my heart with hate, there ain’t gonna be room for love. She tell me that my Poppa and brother need me to fill my heart with love for them, not hate for white people. Poppa and Sam need me—I feel it in my heart.”

  Slaves often used code words to talk about their escape. A “station” was the code for a safe house for hiding. A safe house was owned by a “station master.” A “conductor” was someone who led the slaves from station to station. And the runaway slaves were the “passengers.”

  Slaves found out about the Underground Railroad in different ways. Sometimes a runaway slave returned to the plantation in secret to help more slaves escape. Sometimes slaves learned about the Underground Railroad from other slaves. A blacksmith on a plantation might pound out a code with a hammer to tell the slaves when it was safe to take a chance on escape. And there were some white people who told slaves about safe houses.

  Slaves decided to run away for different reasons. Often it was because they couldn’t stand their harsh lives on the plantations. Slaves also decided to run away when they knew they were about to be sold and their family members would be separated.