Harriet Tubman

1. The Underground Railroad was

A. A secret underground tunnel that the
slaves travelled through to get to
freedom.
B. A train that took the slaves to freedom.
C. An undercover network of safe houses
and secret routes slaves used to get to
freedom.

2. A conductor on the Underground

Railroad (which is the best answer?)
A. someone who was in charge of a train
B. a person who conducts (a leader, guide,
director, or manager)
C. A free person who helped slaves escape
by providing safe passageway to
freedom.

Connection: Why was Harriet Tubman called the

Moses of her people?

Your textbook says, Go down, Moses, way down to Egypt Land, was a
line from a well-known African-American folk song about Moses leading
the enslaved Israelites out of Egypt. (pg. 758)

Fugitive Slave Law of 1850

(replaces fugitive slave law of 1793)
Now, escaped slaves could be captured in the
North and returned to slavery. This led to the
capture of former slaves and free blacks living in
Free States.
Now, law enforcement officials in the North had
to help capture slaves, regardless of their
personal beliefs.
Someone could make you help find the alleged
runaway slave, otherwise you would be be
breaking the law. If you knew where an
alleged runaway slave was, and you did
not turn him in, you could be arrested and
forced to pay $1,000 (about $28,000 in
present-day value).
Anyone helping a runaway slave (providing food
or shelter) was breaking the law and subject to
$1,000 fine.
Now, Harriet re-routed the Underground Railroad
to Canada. Canada was against slavery.

(Read page 759)

She had led groups to freedom before. Why

was this trip to Canada so dangerous?

She had never been to Canada

before
Moses was not going with her
The slaves could not walk at night
She had never led a group this large
before

Who was Harriet Tubman?

One of 9 children. Three of her
sisters were sold to distant
plantations.
She was only 5 foot tall.
She had a disability called Epilepsy.
She had seizures and severe
headaches.
She escaped slavery in 1849,
fleeing to Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania.
She could have remained in the
safety in the North, but instead
went back south and rescued her
family and others living in slavery!

As a child living in Maryland, Tubman was beaten by masters to whom she

was hired out.
Early in her life, she suffered a severe head wound when hit by a heavy
metal weight. The injury caused disabling epileptic seizures and headaches.
One day, the adolescent Tubman was sent to a dry-goods store for supplies.
There, she encountered a slave owned by another family, who had left the
fields without permission. His overseer, furious, demanded that she help
restrain him. She refused, and as he ran away, the overseer threw a twopound weight at him. He struck her instead, which she said "broke my skull.
Bleeding and unconscious, she was returned to her owner's house and laid
on the seat of a loom, where she remained without medical care for two
days.
She was sent back into the fields, "with blood and sweat rolling down my
face until I couldn't see. Her boss said she was "not worth a sixpence" and
returned her to Brodess, who tried unsuccessfully to sell her. She began
having seizures and would seemingly fall unconscious, although she claimed

The extraordinary Harriett

Tubman

Thomas Garrett worked as a

stationmaster on the the
Underground Railroad in
Wilmington, Delaware.
Garret gave the runaway
slaves shoes.
He sometimes provided horsedrawn carriages to help
runaway slaves.

Thomas Garrett
A quaker was a member of a
religious group known as the

Thomas Garretts house in Wilmington,

Delaware
(safehouse)