Antonio López de Santa Anna was the president of Mexico whose centralizing policies threatened slavery and propelled proslavery Anglo-American settlers in Texas to declare independence in 1836.
ESSAYS: Baumgartner
ROLES: Antislavery Politician
Category: Uncategorized
Gerrit Smith (1797-1874) was an abolitionist who ran three times as the Liberty Party’s presidential nominee and served a single term as a New York congressman.
ESSAYS: Sinha
ROLES: Antislavery Politician
Sydney (later Charity) Still escaped from slavery in Maryland and resettled in New Jersey with her husband Levin. Sydney brought her two daughters with her, but her slaveholder sold her two sons, Peter and Levin, Jr., to Kentucky. In New Jersey, she gave birth to fourteen children, including abolitionist William Still in 1821.
ESSAYS: Larson
ROLES: Freedom Seeker
Joseph Story (1779-1845) was a US Supreme Court justice who argued in an influential opinion in Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842) that the federal government, rather than Northern states, was responsible for enforcing the 1793 Fugitive Slave Act.
ESSAYS: Finkelman
ROLES:
Edward Towers was a slaveholder. When freedom seekers escaped from his farm, Towers hired slave catchers who created mayhem in the town of Redoak, Ohio as they searched for the freedom seekers. Tower’s son was shot and killed in the clash.
ESSAYS: Churchill
ROLES: Slaveholder / Slave catcher
Harriet Tubman (1820-1913) was a pivotal figure in the Underground Railroad, beginning with her own escape from slavery on the Eastern Shore of Maryland in 1849. Tubman returned multiple times to lead others to freedom, while becoming active in antislavery circles and collaborating with vigilance leaders like William Still in Philadelphia to assist freedom seekers. During the Civil War, Tubman served as a guide for US forces in South Carolina. Her legendary reputation as “Moses” grew even as Tubman lived much of the rest of her life in poverty.
ESSAYS: Barker // Blackett // Bordewich // Cohen // Crew // Foner // Larson // Newby-Alexander // Pinsker
ROLES: Abolitionist // UGRR Operative
Harriet Tubman (House Divided Project)
Anna Maria Weems was an enslaved woman who escaped from Washington, DC with help from abolitionist Dr. Ellwood Harvey from Washington, DC by disguising herself as a chauffeur.
ROLES: Freedom Seeker