No activist of the Underground Railroad served longer or with more distinction than Levi Coffin. Coffin was raised in the Quaker enclave in Guilford County North Carolina, where in 1819-1820 he helped to organized the only documentable UGRR operation beyond the upper South. From then until about 1850, Quakers with the assistance of local African Americans, including at least one slave “Hamilton’s Saul” — who chose to remain enslaved in order to help others to freedom — dispatched fugitives overland with Quaker emigrants to Indiana. Coffin himself moved to Indiana in the 1820s, where he organized another efficient underground organization, which funneled “passengers” north toward Detroit. In the 1840s, Coffin moved again, to Ohio, where he built an effective UGRR in Cincinnati. In all, Coffin, who at the end of his life chronicled his is experiences in a book, his “Reminiscences”, estimated that he had assisted as many as 1,000 escaped slaves to freedom.

Another major Underground figure is David Ruggles, who was born free in Connecticut, and in the 1830s created the UGRR in New York City. Ruggles was a remarkably bold and confrontational man, who repeatedly challenged the authorities in a city where collaboration among slave hunters, police and the courts was tragically rife. Indeed, New York then was far from progressive in its politics, which generally were aligned with the slave-holding South, since the city’s economy depended significantly on Southern trade. The city was a slave hunter’s paradise, where recaptures were tragically common. Ruggles was himself targeted by slave hunters on at least one occasion, and barely escaped. He also received in his home the fugitive Frederick Bailey, whom he sheltered and dispatched to safety in New Bedford, MA: There Bailey changed his name and became the man we know as Frederick Douglass.

George de Baptiste, like Ruggles, embodied the bold personality and deft political skills that characterized many AFRICAN-American leaders of the UGRR. Born free in Virginia, trained as a valet and barber, he was also a successful member of the black middle class of his time. He eventually settled in Madison, IN, where in the 1840s he helped organize an all black UGRR operation which reached into Kentucky, and assisted fugitives northward until it was penetrated and destroyed by pro-slavery agents in the late 1840s. de Baptiste escaped to Detroit, where he helped create the mosty efficient UGRR operation west of the Appalachians.

The three characters I would teach – given very limited time – would be, of course, Harriet Tubman, William Still, and Thomas Garrett. These three people were incredible forces on the UGRR as individuals and as accomplices and colleagues. Harriet Tubman tapped into Thomas Garrett’s and William Still’s extensive and sophisticated UGRR network that encompassed not only Garrett’s home state of Delaware, but Tubman’s Maryland stomping ground, as well as Virginia and North Carolina. Garrett is credited with aiding in the escape of approximately 2700 fugitives over a forty year period to the Civil War. Tubman, 70 or so friends and family from the Eastern Shore of Maryland between 1850 and 1860; and William Still, as Secretary of the Philadelphia Vigilance Committee during the 1850s, assisted at least 2000 runaways. Their powerful networks of agents, conductors, and station masters extended all the way from slave territory to Pennsylvania, New York, New England and Canada. There are so many personal stories you can share with your students that involve these three historical figures and the people they helped and interacted with. They also represent a core of an important theme of the UGRR movement – biracial cooperation and mutual support. So discover Thomas Garrett, a Wilmington, DE Quaker, William Still, a free born African American business man and notoriously underrated UGRR in Philadelphia, and of course, Harriet Tubman, formerly enslaved woman whose love of her family and friends moved her to conduct dangerous missions back into slave territory to bring away her loved ones, and who used her great intelligence and skills to perfect and utilize this UGRR network to her great advantage.

Though the use of spirituals as coded ‘road maps’ for the Underground Railroad is contentious, it can be fruitful to use these ‘documents’ in the classroom as a key to understanding how songs were important in the lives of slaves.

One site that examines the different purposes and meanings of these historical records is Sweet Chariot: The Story of the Spirituals.

The site explores the history of spirituals, reincarnations of these songs in the 20th century Civil Rights movement and includes sound files of the many spirituals.

The ‘Freedom & Equality’ section highlights the use of spirituals as: expressions of protest, sources of inspiration and motivation… both of which are useful in thinking about the psychological aspects of slaves deciding to take the risk of pursuing their own freedom.

Ella Forbes, former professor of African American studies at Temple University and author of “But We Have No Country: The 1851 Christiana, Pennsylvania Resistance,” has written an article on the use of violence at the Christiana Resistance. Forbes argues that the use of violence at Christiana is “…an indication of the alienation blacks felt in a nation which showed its hostility so openly towards them, a nation unwilling to protect them from white violence, a nation whose very laws promoted their disenfranchisement.” Forbes’ article in the Journal of Negro History makes its point clearly, and illustrates in great detail social and political alienation experienced by both enslaved and freed African Americans living in the antebellum United States. The article is worth reading for its insight alone, though the article presents an important teaching moment: Use and analysis source documents and materials. Forbes cites heavily William Parker’s narrative in support of her argument. But there is question as to the authorship of the narrative, as this website from Millersville University explains. Parker, the only individual involved in the Christiana Resistance to have published an account, received help in compiling his memoir from an editor identified by only the initials “E. K.” Since it is not known who this individual was, it is difficult to gauge the editor’s mark on the work. Is Parker’s narrative a reliable, factual work or did it suffer alteration by “E.K.” for his own propagandistic purposes? Provides a great springboard for discussion about primary source materials, bias, and analysis of Forbes’ article. The full bibliographic citation for Forbes’ article is below.

Bibliographic Citation: Forbes, Ella. “‘By My Own Right Arm’: Redemptive Violence and the 1851 Christiana, Pennsylvania Resistance.” Journal of Negro History 83, no. 3 (1998): 159-167.

History Now, an online journal of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, provides essays studying a variety of issues and events throughout history. Abolition of slavery is one among them. In the September 2005 issue of History Now, abolition is the topic. Robert Abzug, a professor of History at the University of Texas at Austin writes about the religious inspirations for abolition both in America and Britain. Abzug discusses how the republican goals and ideals of the American Revolution melded with the values of American Protestantism. He writes of the effort to address slavery as a spiritual issue, and cites abolitionists such as William Lloyd Garrison and the very interesting case of Presbyterian minister George Bourne. This issue of History Now contains a number of other interesting articles on the topic of abolition. Worth reading.

A House Divided has a great clip on the Video Channel of Kate Clifford Larson and her book Bound for the Promised Land.  In this clip, Larson explains one of the many myths that surrounds the story of Harriet Tubman.

Abolition in the United States, like in Great Britain, had religious inspirations. Some of the first and most outspoken abolitionists were members of the religious Society of Friends, or Quakers. Benjamin Lay addressed the Yearly meeting of Quakers on the subject of abolishing slavery as early as 1738. Quakers continued their support for abolition throughout the nineteenth century, an example found prominently in Thomas Garrett, a Quaker merchant who helped countless escaped slaves to freedom as a “stationmaster” on the Underground Railroad. In Great Britain, evangelical Anglicans John Newton, Thomas Clarkson among others pressured Parliament for the abandonment of the slave trade. Abolitionism on both sides of the Atlantic carried a religious dimension that should not be ignored in any study of the movement.

In his blog, “Underground Railroad: Myth & Reality,” Fergus Bordewich explores the religious roots of the antislavery movement. Bordewich points to the Great Awakening as a main catalyst for growth of antislavery sentiment.

The National Humanities Center presents an essay on the topic of religion and antislavery movements as well. The essay by Bertram Wyatt-Brown goes into greater detail than Bordewich’s blog post, includes a classroom discussion guide, and a brief bibliography. Wyatt-Brown writes with a teacher audience in mind. The essay serves as much to introduce and explore the connection between abolition and religion as to provoke discussion and provide teacher resources. Certainly a worthwhile resource.

Wyatt-Brown’s essay is part of a larger TeacherServe webpage provided by the National Humanities Center. Additional essays on religion in America are provided, along with essays and materials exploring the environment in American history, and teaching African American history.

In the summer of 1863, the town of Carlisle, PA became the one of the northern-most posts of the Confederate Army.  An account of the occupation of Carlisle during the Battle of Gettysburg by Richard Edling appears on civilwaralbum.com.  145 years ago this week, Dickinson College became host to General Ewell’s troops.  Edling provides modern day pictures of the Civil War sites in Carlisle.  Check out House Divided for images of Dickinson College from the Civil War.

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates is a topic often written about and discussed, certainly in this blog, and certainly among teachers, historians, and political scientists. The Debates are always relevant in telling the story of the nation, especially of those steps into civil war. This year in particular, much has been said about the Debates, whether by students of the Debates or by politicians wishing to replicate them for a modern election. Allen Guelzo, Henry R. Luce Professor of the Civil War Era at Gettysburg College, recently published a new book exploring the Lincoln-Douglas Debates. According to a Gettysburg College News Detail on the event of an interview given by Guelzo, the book “…dramatizes and underscores the historical significance of the 1858 campaign for the U.S. Senate in Illinois….” Professor Guelzo gave two recent interviews regarding the debates and his book, one with Jon Stewart of the Daily Show, and another with WHYY, an NPR affiliate serving southeastern Pennsylvania, Delaware, and southern New Jersey.

Guelzo’s Daily Show interview is perhaps one of the more serious conducted on the show, and serves to give basic context for the debates, while advertising the book.

The WHYY interview provides much more context for the debates, and proves a good resource for introduction to the debates, or good context for wide discussion about antebellum politics and the events leading up to civil war.

History Net is an online collection of history magazines that has daily posts of the latest articles from history magazine.  The site also features images, videos, and daily quizzes from all periods of modern history.  Under features for today there was an article about Confederate discontent following their defeat at Gettysburg.  The History Net also provides an RSS feed so you can be notified when updates occur.