A Woman's Life-Work — Labors and Experiences of Laura S. HavilandHaviland, Laura S. (Laura Smith)
Religion
A Woman's Life-Work — Labors and Experiences of Laura S. Haviland
Haviland, Laura S. (Laura Smith)
Freed persons; Haviland, Laura S. (Laura Smith), 1808-1898; Underground Railroad
After their arrival in Adrian the porter again offered the ten dollars,
and Lawyer Perkins and others advised Harvey to take it and give it to
Willis, as they would protect him from all harm. But when I came I told
him not to touch it; and the porter, drawing near, heard my explanation
of the letter, and the threatening remarks of the people, who declared
that if slave-holders should attempt to take the Hamilton family or any
other escaped slave from our city or county they would see trouble. He
soon gave us the benefit of his absence, and we went home with thankful
hearts that public sentiment had made a law too strong to allow
avaricious and unprincipled men to cast our persecuted neighbors back
into the seething cauldron of American slavery.
All that day our house was thronged with visitors, eager to hear the
story which was agitating the whole community, but about midnight I
told my friends that rest was a necessity, for never in my life was I
so thoroughly exhausted from talking; but, as the next day wan-the
Sabbath, I would in the evening meet all who chose to come in the
Valley School-house (at that day the largest in the county) and tell
them the whole story, and save repeating it so many times.
When the evening came we met a larger crowd than could find
standing-room in the school-house, and report said there was a spy for
the slave-holders under a window outside.
I related the whole story, omitting nothing, and was followed by Elijah
Brownell, one of our ablest anti-slavery lecturers, with a few spirited
remarks. He suggested that a collection should be taken up to defray
our expenses to Toledo and return, and fourteen dollars was soon placed
in my hands.
From a friend of our letter-carrier, the porter of the Toledo Hotel, we
learned that the plans of the slave-holders accorded with those given
James Martin in the sick-room. After getting the Hamilton family in
their clutches they intended to gag and bind--them, and, traveling
nights, convey them from one point to another until they reached
Kentucky. This was precisely on the plan of our underground railroad,
but happily for the cause of freedom, in this case at least, not as
successful.
The citizens of Adrian appointed a meeting at the court-house, and sent
for me to again tell the story of the slaveholder who had so deeply
laid his plans to capture, not only his fugitive slave Elsie and her
four children, but also her husband, who was a free man. Other meetings
were called to take measures for securing the safety of the hunted
family from the iron grasp of the oppressor, whose arm is ever strong
and powerful in the cause of evil; and so great was public excitement
that the chivalrous sons of the South found our Northern climate too
warm for their constitutions, and betook themselves to the milder
climate of Tennessee with as great speed as their hunted slave, with
her husband, hastened away from there fifteen years before.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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