underground railway

A detailed Summary of underground railway

Slavery was a common practice in the southern states in the early 1800's. Therefore what made the Underground Railroad so successful? Supposedly the term Underground Railroad originated when an enslaved runaway, Tice Davids, fled from Kentucky. Determined to retrieve his property, his owner chased Davids but Davids suddenly disappeared, leaving his owner wondering if the slave had "gone off on some underground road" . Ironically neither an "underground" or "railroad" took part in this network of escape routes which first began in the 1500s right threw to the end of the 19th century. Many people had their fair share of opinions and arguments on the situation. There was the slave owners, which believed "slavery was lawful and slaves were property" . The law, who tried to make slaves and slave owners happy, yet failed at doing either one. The abolitionists, who thought it was morally wrong to enslave Africans and dedicated their lives to destroying it, as well as the slav!

es and the ways that conductors of the Underground Railroad and the bondsmen communicated to find ways to freedom.

By 1770, bonded labor became more and more vital to the Southern economy. There was more demand for African workers, which contributed,

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McKitrick, L. Eric. Slavery Defended: The Views of the Old South. Prentice-Hall. New Jersey. 1963

ck to south at least 15 times to help more than 300 fugitives to escape. All their hard work and devotion contributed greatly to the success of the Underground Railroad. With out these people the Underground Railroad wouldn't even exist.

The Underground Railroad secretly resisted slavery by helping runaways to freedom. An interesting feature of the Underground Railroad was its lack of formal organization. It relied on the efforts of various religions and ethnic groups that help bondsmen to escape from slavery. Most runaways were men between the ages of 16 and 35 years. Some women and children also escaped, however they were most likely to be captured. Women and men escaped for some of the same reasons; long, hard hours of fieldwork, the fear of beatings, lack of a proper diet or even the thought of being sold away and separated from their family and loved ones. Bondsmen always made a plan before running. Most escapes would take place on the weekends or holiday; this gave the runaway a two day start before authorities were notified. The runaways walked at night and rested during the daytime. The North Star directed the way. On clouded evenings tree moss, which grew on the north side of the trees serv!

The abolitionists were a special type of agitator. Their crusade erupted in the 1830's and was an American social phenomenon. The participants in the movement were simply convinced by religion, by reading, and by reflecting that slavery was evil. They were willing to pledge their lives and sacrifice their honor to destroy it. Seeing slavery in the southern states, reading editions by William Lloyd Garrison, hearing a sermon by Theodore Dwight Weld, two men that were a big part on the abolitionist movement, made the abolitionists proud of what they were fighting for and made that decision on the highest of moral and ethnical terms. A

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Category: History