“MOSES.”
For eight or ten years previous to the breaking out of the Rebellion, all who frequented anti-slavery conventions, lectures, picnics, and fairs, could not fail to have seen a black woman of medium size, upper front teeth gone, smiling countenance, attired in coarse, but neat apparel, with an old-fashioned reticule, or bag, suspended by her side, and who, on taking her seat, would at once drop off into a sound sleep. This woman was Harriet Tubman, better known as “Moses.”
She first came to Boston in 1854, and was soon a welcome visitor to the homes of the leading Abolitionists, who were always attentive listeners to her strange and eventful stories. Her plantation life, where she was born a slave at the South, was cruelly interesting. Her back and shoulders, marked with the biting lash, told how inhuman was the institution from which she had fled. A blow upon the head had caused partial deafness, and inflicted an injury which made her fall asleep the moment she was seated. Moses had no education, yet the most refined person would listen for hours while she related the intensely interesting incidents of her life, told in the simplest manner, but always seasoned with good sense.
During her sojourn in Boston, Moses made several visits to the South, and it was these that gave her the cognomen of “Moses.” Men from Canada, who had made their escape years before, and whose families were still in the prison-house of slavery, would seek out Moses, and get her to go and bring their dear ones away. How strange! This woman,—one of the most ordinary looking of her race; unlettered; no idea of geography; asleep half of the time,—would penetrate the interior slave states, hide in the woods during the day, feed on the bondsman’s homely fare at night, bring off whole families of slaves, and pilot them to Canada, after running the gauntlet of the most difficult parts of the Southern country. No fugitive was ever captured who had Moses for a leader.
While in Canada, in 1860, we met several whom this woman had brought from the land of bondage, and they all believed that she had supernatural power. Of one man we inquired, “Were you not afraid of being caught?”
“O, no,” said he, “Moses is got de charm.”
“What do you mean?” we asked.
He replied, “De whites can’t catch Moses, kase you see she’s born wid de charm. De Lord has given Moses de power.”
Yes, and the woman herself felt that she had the charm, and this feeling, no doubt, nerved her up, gave her courage, and made all who followed her feel safe in her hands.
When the war broke out, instinct called Moses into active service, and she at once left for the South. Long before Butler’s “Contraband of War” doctrine was recognized by the government, Moses was hanging upon the outskirts of the Union army, and doing good service for those of her race who sought protection in our lines. When the Negro put on the “blue,” Moses was in her glory, and travelled from camp to camp, being always treated in the most respectful manner. These black men would have died for this woman, for they believed that she had a charmed life.
It is said that General Burnside, on one occasion, sent Moses into the enemy’s camp, and that she returned in due time, with most valuable information. During the last year of the Rebellion, she had in her possession a paper, the presentation of which always gained for her a prompt passage through any part of the Union lines.
Moses followed Sherman in his march “From Atlanta to the Sea,” and witnessed the attack on Petersburg. The great deference shown her by the Union officers, who never failed to tip their caps when meeting her, and the strange stories told of her pioneer adventures, and the substantial aid given by her to her own race, has left with them a lasting impression that Moses still holds “the charm.”