MUSEUM CORNER February 2021

Travelling a Long Road toward Freedom

By Becky Buher

 February is Black History Month. Our country’s black history began in what later became the United States when the first enslaved Africans were kidnapped by Portuguese forces and brought to the English colony of Jamestown (Virginia) as early as 1609.

These Africans were forced into servitude, and African enslavement continued for over two hundred years until President Abraham Lincoln declared on Jan. 1, 1863, all enslaved people in the states currently engaged in rebellion against the Union (of the United States) shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.

The strength, perseverance, labor and talents of enslaved people helped to build America and to create the pre-Civil War economy of the South.

Secret routes and safe houses known as the Underground Railroad became opportunities for the enslaved to gain freedom. I recently read an account written by museum board member, Mike Hicks, on Underground Railroad activity in Lawrence County.

Hicks used both documented and circumstantial evidence to support assistance given by Lawrence County citizens. Records of secret missions rarely came to light unless the freedom run failed. Much of what follows comes from his article.

Evidence reveals Underground Railroad activity in Monroe and Morgan Counties. It would follow that fugitive slaves would have travelled through Lawrence County on their journey northward.

The Federal Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 made assisting a fugitive slave a federal offense that could result in incarceration and fines. With this law, “slave catchers” were able to come across the Ohio River into the free state of Indiana to take fugitives back to the South and collect rewards. These bounty hunters also kidnapped free Negroes (Portuguese for black) and took them to the South to be sold.

The State of Indiana enacted two laws that made it difficult to assist fugitive slaves. In 1851, the Exclusion Act made it legal for Negroes who lived in Indiana before the Exclusion Act to stay in Indiana, but any Negro coming into the State after the law was passed would be incarcerated. In 1852, the second law made the identification of fugitive slaves easier by passing the Negro Registry. This law stated that all Negroes must register in their local county, and those who didn’t would be subject to fines and deportation.

Hicks found in the 1850 census: 45 free Negroes lived in Marion Township (Mitchell area), 21 in Shawswick Township (Bedford area), and 17 in Perry Township (Springville area).

The major effort for fugitives to escape to freedom in the North came from the courage and fortitude of slaves themselves. Many travelled at night following the North Star or followed railroad lines or main roads. Most help came from free Negroes, and Quaker and Presbyterian Church members who often considered guiding slaves to freedom a “heaven-appointed duty.”

Quaker minister, Zacharias Dicks, encouraged families to move to states north of the Ohio River where slavery was prohibited. Dicks’ granddaughter, Rachel, married Jesse Davis, and they were early Quaker settlers at Springville. Conjecture would be that the Davis family carried on the “heaven-appointed duty.”

Goodspeed’s “1884 History of Lawrence County” recounted that African Americans David Mitchell, Kip Brown and John Barnett were arrested for “Harboring a Negro.” Mitchell, Brown and Barnett owned land near White River close to the old buffalo trace, and it could have been a route for fugitive slaves moving north. According to Rowena Cross-Najafi and Emily Engstrom’s African American research, “It cannot be stated beyond the shadow of a doubt that they ran a station on the Underground Railroad, but the arrest record suggests that they provided refuge to people of color in violation of the laws of the time.”

Another possible Underground Railroad connection involves Lawrence and Monroe Counties through the Breckenridge family. The local Breckenridge family lived north of Bedford in an area once called Breckenridge. It is now known as Dive, named for the free African American, Dive Williams. Hanna Collins Breckenridge McCaw moved from Bedford to Bloomington. Her grandson said she had been an Underground Railroad conductor.

In 1856, “The Bedford Independent” reported the New Albany and Salem Railroad was a possible conduit for escaping slaves. A scoundrel on the train had tried to grab a Negro boy, alleging he was a fugitive from labor. The train conductor stopped the scoundrel from taking the boy. The article continued that the name of Bedford was a terror to such evildoers… gangs beg to be delivered from the peaceable, order-loving, law abiding citizens of Bedford.

Mike Hicks’ complete article on the Underground Railroad activity in Lawrence County is available in the museum publication, “The Seedling Patch,” Winter 2020-21, Vol. III, No. 69.

Image Source: Underground Railroad as It was Conducted by the Anti-slavery League, Col. William M. Cockrum, page 14, online book by Yale University.