A GROUP OF REFUGEE SETTLERS, OF WINDSOR, ONTARIO.
MRS. ANNE MARY JANE HUNT, MANSFIELD SMITH, MRS. LUCINDA SEYMOUR,
HENRY STEVENSON, BUSH JOHNSON.
(From a recent photograph.)
The seaboard provinces were but little infected by slavery. Nova Scotia, to which probably more than to any other of these, refugees from Southern bondage fled, had by reason of natural causes, lost nearly, if not quite all traces of slavery by the beginning of our century. The experience of the eighteenth century had been sufficient to reform public opinion in Canada on the question of slavery, and to show that the climate of the provinces was a permanent barrier to the profitable employment of slave labor.
During the period in which Canada was thus freeing herself from the last vestiges of the evil, slaves who had escaped from Southern masters were beginning to appeal for protection to anti-slavery people in the Northern states.[554] The arrests of refugees from bondage, and the cases of kidnapping of free negroes, which were not infrequent in the North, strengthened the appeals of the hunted suppliants. Under these circumstances, it was natural that there should have arisen early in the present century the beginnings of a movement on the northern border of the United States for the purpose of helping fugitives to Canadian soil.[555]
Upon the questions how and when this system arose, we have both unofficial and official testimony. Dr. Samuel G. Howe learned upon careful investigation, in 1863, that the early abolition of slavery in Canada did not affect slavery in the United States for several years. "Now and then a slave was intelligent and bold enough," he states, "to cross the vast forest between the Ohio and the Lakes, and find a refuge beyond them. Such cases were at first very rare, and knowledge of them was confined to few; but they increased early in this century; and the rumor gradually spread among the slaves of the Southern states, that there was, far away under the north star, a land where the flag of the Union did not float; where the law declared all men free and equal; where the people respected the law, and the government, if need be, enforced it.... Some, not content with personal freedom and happiness, went secretly back to their old homes, and brought away their wives and children at much peril and cost. The rumor widened; the fugitives so increased, that a secret pathway, since called the Underground Railroad, was soon formed, which ran by the huts of the blacks in the slave states, and the houses of good Samaritans in the free states.... Hundreds trod this path every year, but they did not attract much public notice."[556] Before the year 1817 it is said that a single little group of abolitionists in southern Ohio had forwarded to Canada by this secret path more than a thousand fugitive slaves.[557] The truth of this account is confirmed by the diplomatic negotiations of 1826 relating to this subject. Mr. Clay, then Secretary of State, declared the escape of slaves to British territory to be a "growing evil"; and in 1828 he again described it as still "growing," and added that it was well calculated to disturb the peaceful relations existing between the United States and the adjacent British provinces. England, however, steadfastly refused to accept Mr. Clay's proposed stipulation for extradition, on the ground that the British government could not, "with respect to the British possessions where slavery is not admitted, depart from the principle recognized by the British courts that every man is free who reaches British ground."[558]
During the decade between 1828 and 1838 many persons throughout the Northern states, as far west as Iowa, had coöperated in forming new lines of Underground Railroad with termini at various points along the Canadian frontier. A resolution submitted to Congress in December, 1838, was aimed at these persons, by calling for a bill providing for the punishment, in the courts of the United States, of all persons guilty of aiding fugitive slaves to escape, or of enticing them from their owners.[559] Though this resolution came to nought, the need of it may have been demonstrated to the minds of Southern men by the fact that several companies of runaway slaves were organized, and took part in the Patriot War of this year in defence of Canadian territory against the attack of two or three hundred armed men from the State of New York.[560]
Each succeeding year witnessed the influx into Canada of a larger number of colored emigrants from the South. At length, in 1850, the Fugitive Slave Law called forth such opposition in the North that the Underground Railroad became more efficient than ever. The secretary of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society wrote in 1851 that, "notwithstanding the stringent provisions of the Fugitive Bill, and the confidence which was felt in it as a certain cure for escape, we are happy to know that the evasion of slaves was never greater than at this moment. All abolitionists, at any of the prominent points of the country, know that applications for assistance were never more frequent."[561] This statement is substantiated by the testimony of many persons who did underground service in the North.
From the other end of the line, the Canadian terminus, we have abundant evidence of the lively traffic both before and after the new act. Besides the later investigations of Dr. Howe we have the statement of a contemporary, still living. Anthony Bingey, of Windsor, Ontario, aided the Rev. Hiram Wilson and the Rev. Isaac J. Rice, two graduates of Hamilton College, in the conduct of a mission for refugees. Mr. Bingey first settled at Amherstburg, at the mouth of the Detroit River, where he kept a receiving station for fugitives, was in an excellent place for observation, and was allied with trained men, who gave themselves, in the missionary spirit, to the cause of the fugitive slave in Canada. When Mr. Bingey first went to Amherstburg, in 1845, it was a rare occurrence to see as many as fifteen fugitives arrive in a single company. In the course of time runaways began to disembark from the ferries and lake boats in larger numbers, a day's tale often running as high as thirty. Through the period of the Mexican War, and down to the beginning of Fillmore's administration, many of the fugitives from the South had settled in the States, but after 1850 many, fearing recapture, journeyed in haste to Canada, greatly increasing the number daily arriving there.[562] That there was no tendency towards a decline in the movement is suggested by two items appearing in the Independent during the year 1855. According to the first of these (quoted from the Intelligencer of St. Louis, Missouri): "The evil (of running off slaves) has got to be an immense one, and is daily becoming more aggravated. It threatens to subvert the institution of slavery in this state entirely, and unless effectually checked it will certainly do so. There is no doubt that ten slaves are now stolen from Missouri to every one that was 'spirited' off before the Douglas bill."[563] It is significant that the ardent abolitionists of Iowa and northwestern Illinois were vigorously engaged in Underground Railroad work at this time. The other item declared that the number of fugitives transported by the "Ohio Underground Line" was twenty-five per cent greater than in any previous year; "indeed, many masters have brought their hands from the Kanawha (West Virginia), not being willing to risk them there."[564]
That portion of Canada most easily reached by fugitives was the lake-bound region lying between New York on the east and Michigan on the west, and presenting a long and inviting coast-line to northern Ohio, northwestern Pennsylvania and western New York. Lower Canada was often reached through the New England states and by way of the coast-line routes. The fugitive slaves entering Canada were principally from the border slave states, Missouri, Kentucky, Virginia, Maryland and Delaware. Some, however, favored by rare good fortune and possessed of more than ordinary sagacity or aided by some venturesome friend, had made their way from the far South, from the Carolinas, Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee, even from Louisiana.