"On the evening of the 26th of May, we went down to Faneuil Hall to hear Wendell Phillips. He counselled waiting until morning before any attempt to rescue Burns should be made, but the excited audience silenced him with shouts of 'No, no! to-night! to-night!'
"Mr. Phillips saw that it was useless to try to go on, so he sat down and Mr. Theodore Parker began speaking. At first he advocated the same plan, but at last, as he found the crowd growing more and more eager and uproarious, he said, 'Well, if you will, let us go!' and led the way out of the hall. The people followed, and my friend and I were among the first to reach the court-house. There we found prepared for us long beams and boxes of axes. Five or six men seized one of these beams, and before its pressure the large door of the court-house crushed like glass. Mr. Higginson first stepped in, but just then a pistol shot was heard, and the mob fell back. Mr. Higginson looked around, and entreated them not to desert him, but the favorable moment was gone. The people should have lost no time in filling the house, for the marines had been ordered from the Navy Yard, and when they appeared nothing further could be done."[199] In this riot James Batchelder, one of the Marshal's guards, was killed.
At the trial, though Burns was ably defended by Mr. R. H. Dana and others, it was of no avail. His identity was unfortunately established from the first. He had recognized and addressed his master, and also a Mr. Brant, who had once hired him. The order for his rendition was therefore at once given.[200]
Guarded by a large military force he was conducted through the streets, filled with an indignant multitude, to the United States cutter Morris, which had been ordered by the President to take him back.[201] Many buildings on the route were hung with black, and so great was the popular excitement, that Rev. J. F. Clarke, an eyewitness of the affair, has said: "It was evident that a very trifling incident might have brought on a collision, and flooded the streets with blood."
The difficulty of enforcing the act was shown in the precautionary measures immediately adopted by the government. The city police, the militia, the marines, and some regular troops, were ordered out to the task of guarding one poor fugitive. It cost the country one hundred thousand dollars to send this single slave back to his master.[202]
Not long after Burns's return, a sum of money, to which Charles Devens, United States Marshal at his trial, contributed largely, was raised in Boston and the vicinity for his purchase; but it was found impossible to effect it.[203]
Mr. Higginson, Wendell Phillips, and Theodore Parker, with others, were indicted for riot, but the indictment was quashed by Judge Curtis on technical grounds, and they were discharged.[204]
Garner and Shadrach.
§ 56. Garner case (1856).—Of all the cases of rendition, the saddest, and next to the Burns case probably the best known at the time, was that of Margaret Garner. In accounts of the Underground Railroad we are told that winter was the favorite season for flight in the section of the country south of the Ohio, since ice then covered the river, and the difficulty of crossing by boat did not arise. It was at this season that Simeon Garner, his son Robert, and their families, fled from Kentucky and crossed the frozen stream to the house of a colored man in Cincinnati. They were soon traced thither, and after a desperate hand to hand struggle the house was entered. There the pursuers found that Margaret Garner, preferring for her children death to slavery, had striven to take their lives, and one lay dead. The case was immediately brought into court, where, despite the efforts made to save them, rendition was decided upon. On the way back, Margaret, in despair, attempted to drown herself and her child in the river; but even the deliverance of death was denied her, for she was recovered and sold, to be carried yet farther south.[205]
§ 57. Shadrach case (1851).—In the three typical cases just described, neither the law's delay, violent interference, nor the desperation of the slave, availed to prevent the return of the fugitive to the oppressor. Let us turn from this group, and take up those more important cases wherein the law was not allowed to complete its course, but rescues were accomplished, either by free negroes or antislavery people. First in time and importance comes the case of Shadrach, which occurred in Boston in February, 1851.