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After the opening of the Ohio and Erie Canal, Cleveland, known by the secret code name “Hope,” became a destination for fugitive slaves, as well as those who sought to apprehend them. Before the Civil War, those escaping slavery moved along Ohio’s Underground Railroad network, which extended 250 miles from Ripley to Cleveland. Freedom seekers making their way north to Canada were often aided by abolitionists living in what is now Cleveland’s University Circle area. To celebrate Cleveland's antislavery history, the courageous people who sought freedom and the station operators who helped them, the Cozad-Bates House was saved through the advocacy efforts of the Cleveland Restoration Society, Restore Cleveland Hope Inc. and University Circle Inc. Donated by University Hospitals in 2006, the home is reflective of Cleveland's antislavery era and legacy of abolition.

The Cozad-Bates House is one of the oldest remaining structures in Cleveland's University Circle area. The original section, built circa 1853, is the only pre-Civil War residential structure left in the neighborhood. Built by Andrew Cozad for his son Justus, the first section used locally made brick to form a simple two-story, one-room-deep house. The Cozad family owned a large portion of the land that is now occupied by University Circle. As with many early settlers of Cleveland, the Cozads were strong opponents of slavery. Although the Cozad-Bates House, which Justus Cozad later expanded into a grand home in beautiful Italianate style, is not a documented Underground Railroad stop, the home was opened in fall of 2021 as an interpretive center highlighting the stories of Black and white Cleveland-area abolitionists.

The home of Horatio and Martha Cozad Ford once stood near what is now the busy corner of Adelbert Road and Euclid Avenue in Cleveland’s University Circle. According to interviews conducted in the 1890s, the home had been a stop on the Underground Railroad. In the 1840s, Horatio, his brothers and their father, Cyrus, regularly helped move fugitives to the docks in Cleveland. There, a free Black barber named John Brown arranged their passage across Lake Erie to freedom in Canada. After Western Reserve College moved to Cleveland in the 1880s, the Ford home and surrounding farmlands would eventually become part of Western Reserve University and two legacies in the struggle against slavery would come together.

Called “Station Hope” by many on the Underground Railroad, St. John’s Episcopal Church served as one of freedom seekers’ final stops. Though aiding freedom seekers was a crime and often could not be described in public documents, Sheila T. Hatch, a historian of Cuyahoga County and a member of St. John’s for her entire life, noted that “in the tower of St. John’s Church were often secreted runaway slaves until such time as they could be shipped to Canada.” From the tower, the fugitives and their helpers watched for lantern signals from small boats that would take them to Whiskey Island. There, they would board larger boats that sailed to Canada in search of freedom.

Among the founders and early members of St. John’s were several prominent opponents of slavery. Josiah Barber was mayor of Ohio City and vice president of the Cuyahoga County Colonization Society, which held that slaves should be purchased by the federal government and resettled in Africa. John Beverlin, a subsequent mayor of Ohio City, was a member of the executive committee of the Free Soil Club, which stood for “free soil, free speech, free labor, free men.” Josiah Harris, mayor of Cleveland and owner of the Cleveland Herald and Gazette, refused to print notices for the return of runaway slaves.

The Underground Railroad was neither underground nor a railroad, but a system of loosely connected safe havens where those escaping the brutal conditions of slavery were sheltered, fed, clothed, nursed, concealed, disguised and instructed during their journey to freedom. Although this movement was one of America's greatest social, moral and humanitarian endeavors, the details about it were often cloaked in secrecy to protect those involved from the retribution of civil law and slave catchers. Ohio's history has been permanently shaped by the thousands of runaway slaves passing through or finding permanent residence in this state.

The Cuyahoga County Courthouse was the site of two pivotal cases in the Underground Railroad movement. One was the 1859 trial of two men charged with helping a teenager named John Price escape capture as part of the Oberlin-Wellington Rescue. The other was the 1861 trial of Sara Lucy Bagby, one of the last freedom seekers returned to bondage under the Fugitive Slave Law. The Civil War began a few short months after her forced return made Cleveland a flashpoint for those who vehemently opposed slavery and those who sought to avoid war. We share with you now a poem titled “To the Union Savers of Cleveland” by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, one of the first Black female writers published in the United States. Her poem appeared in The Anti-Slavery Bugle on February 23, 1861.

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper was known as the “Bronze Muse” for her exceptional skill as writer and lecturer. She penned the poem “The Slave Mother, a Tale of the Ohio” in 1857, based on the case of fugitive slave Margaret Garner, who would rather see her child dead than enslaved. Here we offer you a reading of that poem:

Many early settlers of Cuyahoga County brought strong views about slavery and rights for all with them. For example, in 1845, Baldwin Institute, one of the first schools in the area open to all students regardless of gender, race or creed, was chartered. John Baldwin used the wealth generated by Berea’s sandstone and grindstone industries to establish the school, which was rechartered as Baldwin University in 1855. That same year, seven staunch abolitionists organized the First Congregational Church of Berea, publicly articulating their opposition to slavery and their desire for a church with full local autonomy.

The Universalist religious movement spread across Ohio as the state was settled in the 1800s. Universalists proclaimed a loving God and universal salvation. Believers were sometimes scorned as “no-Hell-ers.” Olmsted’s First Universalist Society was founded in 1834. Universalists opposed slavery and promoted equality for all. Church legend asserts that slaves escaping to freedom on the Underground Railroad hid in the belfry.

The Pomeroy House, built in the late 1840s, was the home of Alanson Pomeroy and his wife, Kezia. They continued the tradition, known as "Pomeroy Hospitality," that began when Alanson's parents established a tavern in Strongsville. Prominent in the community, Alanson served as township trustee and Justice of the Peace in Strongsville Township, and was a leader in the Congregational Church. Oral tradition holds that the Pomeroy House served as a stop on the Underground Railroad. Runaway slaves were brought from Oberlin, often concealed under bales of hay in wagons, and hidden in the cellar of the house until they could be safely taken to Rocky River. From there, the fugitives boarded ships headed to Canada.

According to interviews conducted in the 1890s, the home of Horatio Cyrus and Martha Cozad Ford was a stop on the Underground Railroad. Of New England background, Horatio brought a set of ideals that made him and his family active participants in the antislavery movement. In the 1840s, they regularly helped move fugitives to the docks in Cleveland where a free African American, John Brown, arranged passage across the lake to freedom in Canada. After Western Reserve College moved to Cleveland in the 1880s, the Ford home and surrounding farmlands would eventually become part of Western Reserve University and two legacies in the struggle against slavery would come together.

Horace Ford, one of Horatio's brothers, was perhaps the most likely of the Ford brothers to make the journey transporting secret cargo from the family homestead to John Brown's barebershop near what is now Public Square. Horace Ford was interviewed about his family's Underground Railroad operations by Ohio State Univerity professor Wilbur Siebert. The Siebert Underground Railroad Collection at the Ohio History Connection also contains Horatio Ford's diary of antislavery activities. Here we offer an excerpt written by Horace Ford for the East End Signal, a publication of the Euclid Avenue Congregational Church. It is read by Horace Ford's great-great-great grandson Eliot Mook.

Lucy Stanton was likely the first Black woman in the United States to complete four years of college. Lucy Stanton was the stepdaughter of John Brown, a Black barber and documented Underground Railroad conductor in Cleveland, and she later married William Howard Day, editor of the Aliened American, Cleveland's first Black newspaper. In 1850, two weeks before enactment of the Fugitive Slave Law, Lucy Stanton made a “Plea for the Oppressed” during her commencement address at Oberlin Collegiate Institute.

“The antislavery pulse beats faintly. The right of suffrage is denied. The colored man is still crushed by the weight of oppression. He may possess talents of the highest order, yet for him is no path of fame or distinction opened. He can never hope to attain those privileges while his brethren remain enslaved. Since, therefore, the freedom of the slave and the gaining of our rights--social and political-- are inseparably connected, let all the friends of humanity plead for those who may not plead their own cause.”

Here we offer you an excerpt of her passionate antislavery appeal:

Butterworth Station was the southernmost station on the Underground Railroad in Warren County. Built in 1820, it was the home of Benjamin and Rachael Moorman Butterworth. As Quakers, the Butterworths had opposed slavery in their home state of Virginia. In 1812, the Butterworths moved to 1,500 acres they had purchased along the Little Miami River in southwestern Ohio. Until nearly 1850, at great personal risk, the family fed and sheltered large numbers of runaway slaves before transporting them to the next station. When the Little Miami Railroad was built in the 1840s, Henry Thomas Butterworth donated land and water and assisted with the construction. In appreciation, the railroad created a stop here called Butterworth Station and gave his family lifetime passes.

Levi Coffin had been born into a Quaker family in North Carolina. His work to feed and shelter escaping slaves began early in life, first supporting the efforts of his family and later establishing operations in Indiana and Ohio. He is credited with helping some 2,000 freedom seekers in his 20 years in Indiana, leading some to dub him the unofficial “President of the Underground Railroad.” In 1847, Coffin and his wife, Catherine, moved to Cincinnati, where they continued their efforts to assist those escaping slavery. Coffin operated the Western Free Produce Association, a store selling only goods produced by free labor. Here, we present an excerpt from Coffin’s Reminiscences, in which he describes some of his activities in Cincinnati.

The Ohio River served as a line of demarcation between states where slavery was permitted and states where it was prohibited by law. It is estimated that some 40 percent of the enslaved people who made it to freedom traveled through Ohio. Although Ohio was a free state, tensions were often high In Cincinnat, where many residents supported maintaining the institution and the city's economic activities were often intertwined with businesses across the river that relied on slave labor. Cincinnati was home to many people working to help free the enslaved and bring an end to the nation's system of slavery, including Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of the incendiary antislavery novel Uncle Tom's Cabin.

Harriet Beecher Stowe was born in Litchfield, Connecticut, in 1811 but moved to Cincinnati in 1832 when her father, prominent Congregational minister Lyman Beecher, became the pastor of the city's Second Presbyterian Church and president of Lane Theological Seminary. She married Calvin E. Stowe in 1836 and bore six of seven children while living in Cincinnati. Life in the city provided Stowe with firsthand account of the evils of slavery. Already a published writer, she drew on these experiences and the death of her infant son Charley in 1849 to write Uncle Tom's Cabin. Published in book form in 1852, Uncle Tom's Cabin made Stowe famous and remains an icon of the American antislavery movement. Harriet Beecher Stowe died in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1896.

Built by Clark Williams, this early brick Federal style building was owned by the Dayton Leather & Collar Company in the late 1800s. In the early 1900s it was owned by Napoleon Johnson, a former slave who was freed in Virginia in 1847 when his master, James Epps, freed all forty of his slaves at once. Johnson settled in Springboro the following year. In 1849 he married Celia Anderson and they had three children. Only their daughter Maria survived childhood and lived in Springboro all her life. Johnson served in the Union Army during the Civil War. As a successful plasterer, in later life he was able to purchase several properties in town.

At Keifer Croco’s station, the Croco House, slaves stayed in the attic of the home, which had a concealed trapdoor. At his brother John’s farm, slaves could stay in a hidden cellar in a barn. There are several legends surrounding the Croco House and the two brothers. One recalls a daring escape. The Crocos were said to have been harboring escaped slaves when they received word that slave hunters were on their way to the Croco House. The Crocos had just laid out a large breakfast for their secret guests, but immediately spirited the freedom seekers away toward the next safe haven and put away the extra breakfast tables. When the slave hunters arrived at the Croco House, they were invited to stay for breakfast. As legend has it, one of the Croco brothers chose Psalm 119 as the breakfast prayer on account of its long length, giving the runaways more time to escape.

A unique combination of strong-principled religious communities, free black settlements and tightly knit extended families fostered a widespread attitude of willful defiance that made Delaware one of Ohio's strongest anti-slavery counties in the early 19th century.

Among the Delaware County congregations participating in the Underground Railroad were Berlin United Presbyterian, Wesleyan Methodist, Alum Creek, Friends and Otterbein's United Brethren.

Manumitted slaves who settled the hamlet of Africa, at the intersection of present-day Polaris Parkway and Africa Road in southeastern Delaware County, and some early white settlers, such as John McClure and Benjamin Bartholomew, had a fierce hatred of bondage. They helped escaping slaves whenever possible. Bartholomew and his son, Major Bartholomew, operated an Underground Railroad station near the Olentangy River in southern Liberty Township.

Northern Delaware County resident William Cratty epitomized local attitudes by publicly denouncing the unjust Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. He vowed to continue to “run slaves,” and he did not care who knew it. Aided by his brother, John, and sister, Peggy, Cratty claimed to have assisted 3,000 fugitives to Canada. The bounty on Cratty's head was $3,000, dead or alive.

Other local Delaware stations were Halfway House, George Gooding's tavern on State Route 23, and Seven Oaks on William Street.

Abolitionist John Brown lived in Hudson until 1826. A frequent visitor to Hudson in the ensuing years, Brown attended services at the Free Congregational Church, which was a local rallying point for the abolitionist cause.

In August 1835, Hudson Congregational Church members unanimously adopted a resolution declaring that slavery is "a direct violation of the law of Almighty God." At a November 1837 prayer meeting, John Brown made his first public vow to destroy slavery.

Hudson had a long tradition of being an anti-slavery town. By 1826, records show that the town's founder, David Hudson, was hiding runaway slaves at his home. Early settler Owen Brown and his family helped organize the Underground Railroad in town. Owen’s son, John, who spent more than 20 years of his life in Hudson, grabbed national attention with his raid on the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry on October 16, 1859, and his execution on December 2, 1859.

At first, Hudson's citizens supported the colonization movement, which advocated purchasing and freeing the enslaved and transporting them, as well as free-born Black Americans, to the west coast of Africa. But in the 1830s, many became abolitionists. The anti-slavery community became divided, a struggle that cast both Hudson and its Western Reserve College into the national spotlight.

With the help of town founder David Hudson, Western Reserve College and its Academy was established in the heart of Hudson in 1826. Often called "the Yale of the West," nearly all of its professors and college presidents were Yale College graduates. Under its first president, Charles Backus Storrs, Western Reserve College became involved with the Underground Railroad and a hotbed for anti-slavery sentiment. A notation in a diary of David Hudson tells of Western Reserve College students raising money to assist a fugitive slave family. In 1854, Frederick Douglass was invited to deliver the college's commencement address.

By the time of Douglass’ address, however, the struggle over the issue of slavery had already forever changed Western Reserve. After Storrs’ death in 1833, the college’s second president sought to distance the school from the national politics of slavery.

Owen Brown removed his financial support from the college in 1835 and, along with several Western Reserve College faculty, staff and students, helped form multiracial Oberlin Collegiate Institute as an alternative. Less than a decade later, in 1842, Owen Brown also split from the First Congregational Church of Hudson over racial issues. He formed the Free Congregational Church, which supported pure abolitionism. An oath against slavery was required for admission.

The Western Reserve College moved to Cleveland in 1882 and eventually became Case Western Reserve University while the Academy remained in Hudson. Today, the Western Reserve Academy is one of the nation's oldest independent college preparatory schools.

Many of Hudson’s early settlers helped to shelter and transport freedom seekers. A complete list of Underground Railroad sites in Hudson is available at the Hudson Library and Historical Society.

Born in Torrington, Connecticut, John Brown moved with his family to Hudson, Ohio, in 1805 and lived many years in Portage and Summit Counties. His expert knowledge of sheep and wool led to a business partnership with Colonel Simon Perkins from 1844 to 1854. The partnership drew Brown's family to a home in Akron, across from Perkins' estate on Mutton Hill. Brown considered the then two-room house with loft, rented from Perkins, "the most comfortable and most favourable arrangement of my worldly concerns that I ever had."

While in Akron, Brown transported freedom seekers on the Underground Railroad, which he called the "Subterranean Pass Way.” Arriving in "Bleeding Kansas” in 1855, he fought proslavery forces and gained a fearsome reputation as "Osawatomie Brown.” In October 1859, he led a failed raid on the federal arsenal of Harpers Ferry, in what is now West Virginia, in an effort to seize weapons, arm the enslaved and end slavery in the United States. He was convicted of conspiracy to incite a slave insurrection, treason, and murder. He was hanged on December 2, 1859. This event played a significant role in the onset of the American Civil War.

As a young man, Richard Elson, co-founder of the Stark County village of Magnolia, built flatboats, loaded them with merchandise to sell and traveled down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. He did this seven times, walking the 1,000 miles back to Magnolia. He wrote to his mother, telling of the poor treatment of some of the people of the South. He was extremely critical of the owning of slaves and provided a safe house for their escape through Ohio.

In what is now northeast Massillon, the Spring Hill Historic Home, part of the National Park Service’s Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, continues to share the story of the region’s anti-slavery activities. Quakers Thomas and Charity Rotch came to the area from New England in 1811. The Rotches were abolitionists and used their home as a station on the Underground Railroad for decades. The Rotches also helped establish libraries and schools and served as members of the Quaker Indian Affairs Committee.

The son of an enslaved father and free Black mother, Martin Robison Delany became one of the most prominent Black leaders in 19th-century America. Of direct African lineage, the “Father of Black Nationalism” promoted Black pride and self-determination.

Delany was born May 6, 1812, in Charles Town, in present-day West Virginia. Because it was illegal for Blacks to be educated there, his mother moved the family to Pennsylvania. Delany studied medicine, founded a newspaper, The Mystery, and advocated rights for African Americans and women. He co-edited The North Star with abolitionist Frederick Douglass.

Delany risked his life as a leader in the Underground Railroad, which was established to assist the enslaved on their flight to freedom. In 1859, Delany traveled to Africa in an attempt to secure a homeland for Black Americans. As the United States moved toward Civil War, Delany believed a Union victory would end slavery. He recruited Black troops and met with President Lincoln to propose a strategy for winning the war with Black officers leading Black soldiers.

Delany was commissioned a major, the highest-ranking Black field officer in the Union Army. He later served in the Freedmen’s Bureau to protect the rights of the formerly enslaved. He moved to Wilberforce, Ohio, in 1864 to provide his children a quality education. As an abolitionist, physician, leader in Prince Hall Freemasonry, politician, judge, and writer, Delany fought to achieve justice and equality for all Americans of African descent.

Delany died of tuberculosis in Wilberforce on January 24, 1885. He is interred in a family plot at Massies Creek Cemetery in Cedarville, Ohio, next to his wife, Catherine. For more than 120 years, his family plot was only marked with a small government-issued tombstone on which his name was misspelled. In 2006, after years of fundraising, the National Afro-American Museum and Cultural Center was able to raise $18,000 to have a monument built and placed at the gravesite of Delany and his family.

In the early 1800s, William and Eleanor Kendall owned land in southwestern Ohio known for its natural springs, beauty, and farmland. In 1850, Elias Drake, a lawyer and former speaker in the Ohio General Assembly, purchased the property and named it Tawawa, or Xenia, Springs. He developed a health resort hotel surrounded by summer cottages, all of which were completed the following year. “Tawawa” is believed to be Shawnee for “clear or gold water,” alluding to the clear, mineral-rich springs. From its beginnings, the resort did not fare well, as it was popular among southern planters who, much to the consternation of nearby antislavery sentiment, brought slave entourages whenever they came. In October 1855, negotiations for its sale opened with the Cincinnati Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, which purchased Tawawa Springs, including 54 acres, the hotel and cottages, for $13,000 to establish a university for African Americans.

Wilberforce University, the nation’s oldest private historically African American institution of higher education, was founded at Tawawa Springs in 1856. Tawawa House, the resort's hotel, was remodeled for recitation rooms and other school activities, and the cottages were utilized as dormitories. Several reasons have been suggested for choosing Tawawa Springs as the site for Wilberforce University. Foremost, perhaps, is the large number of African Americans that settled in Greene County as the result of the migration patterns of freed slaves before the Civil War and the Underground Railroad, which passed through the area. It is also suggested that Tawawa's natural beauty and readily available structures enhanced the selection. With the Civil War causing a decline in student enrollment, the first university failed in 1862. The following year Bishop Daniel A. Payne purchased the property on behalf of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Payne became the first president of Wilberforce and the first African American to lead a university.

Inspirations for Wilberforce University included an acknowledgment of the contribution of the British abolitionist and member of Parliament William Wilberforce, and belief in the potential of all women and men to learn and prosper. Wilberforce University embraces education as a tool of personal and community empowerment. Today, Wilberforce is affiliated with the African Methodist Episcopal Church and educates diverse students from across the nation and around the world. Wilberforce continues to serve as a beacon for learning and research.

In 1862, the Rev. Moncure D. Conway, who years earlier had served as minister for the First Congregationalist Church in Cincinnati, established a colony in Yellow Springs, Ohio, for former slaves from his family's plantation in Falmouth, Virginia. Conway’s father had been a wealthy slaveholder and prominent state legislator and county court justice official, but his mother, who opposed slavery, had introduced her son to abolitionism. Conway graduated from Dickinson College in Pennsylvania in 1849 and from Harvard Divinity School in 1854. Despite his southern aristocratic background, Conway, influenced by his mentor and friend Ralph Waldo Emerson, strongly opposed slavery.

Fighting between Union and Confederate forces near the plantation had displaced the Conway family’s slaves, but a large group of them assembled in Washington, D.C., to join Conway for the arduous journey to Ohio. Conway believed that the colony would be accepted in Yellow Springs, a village known for its progressive ways, due partly to the influence of Horace Mann, the president of Antioch College for its first six years.

“As to debts, thank God I owe no man anything but love.” – Godfrey Brown

Godfrey Brown was born a slave in Brunswick County, Virginia, in 1768. Although accounts vary, Brown was said to have been set free on March 7, 1820. He then worked many long hours to save $5,600 to buy his family out of slavery.

In March 1822, Brown purchased 254 acres of land in Caesar Creek Township, here in Greene County, Ohio. He and his sons cleared the land and built log houses. Thus began the Brown Settlement, one of the earliest African-American settlements in the nation. Brown and his sons also established a school and organized the first Negro Baptist church in Ohio. The church was named Middle Run because of its location between two streams. Brown served as minister of Middle Run for 20 years. At that time, the church served as a station on the Underground Railroad.

Brown died on January 31, 1843, and was buried in the Brown Cemetery. At the time of his death, he owned 654 acres of land in Van Wert, Shelby, and Greene counties.

At one time, more than 100 families lived in the Brown Settlement, but the cemetery is all that now remains of the community. The church moved seven miles north, to Xenia, in 1889.

William and Abigail Cutter Woodward founded Woodward High School in Cincinnati on October 24, 1831. It was the first public high school west of the Allegheny Mountains. Concerned that the poor of Cincinnati had no avenues for education, the Woodwards donated land, time, funding and expertise to this venture that brought the arts and sciences to "those who have not the means of procuring such advantages themselves." Notables include Professor William McGuffey, author of the well-known readers and spellers, and William Howard Taft, Class of 1874, who became the 27th president of the United States. From 1856 to 1863, the home of Levi and Catherine Coffin was also located on this site. Both were legendary abolitionists who helped enslaved people escape to freedom in Canada. Levi Coffin was often referred to as the "president of the Underground Railroad," credited with helping more than 3,000 fugitives escape slavery.

Salmon Portland Chase was born in Cornish, New Hampshire, on January 13, 1808. He chose to make Cincinnati his home in 1830, after he was admitted to the bar. Chase gained national recognition as an antislavery attorney and politician, including aiding in the organization of the Liberty, Free Soil, and Republican parties. Chase served as a Cincinnati city councilman before being elected as U.S. senator from Ohio in 1849. He served as the first Republican governor of Ohio from 1856 to 1860.

Chase was re-elected to the U.S. Senate in 1860 but resigned in March 1861 when President Abraham Lincoln appointed him Secretary of the Treasury. Responsible for financing the Civil War, he created the national banking system used until 1913 and introduced the nation's first federal paper currency and the first federal income tax. Chase established the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and the Bureau of Internal Revenue (later renamed the Internal Revenue Service). He also opened the U.S. bond market to the general public. Chase resigned from office in June 1864. He then served as chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1864 to 1873 and presided over the impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson in 1868. He died in New York City on May 7, 1873.

The first African-American artist to achieve international acclaim was painter Robert S. Duncanson. Duncanson was born in New York in 1821 and settled in Cincinnati in 1840. Although he pursued his artistic career during a time of tremendous racial prejudice, Duncanson was acknowledged as the "best landscape painter in the West." Arts patron Nicholas Longworth commissioned murals from Duncanson around 1850 for his home, Belmont, now the site of the Taft Museum of Art. These paintings are regarded as among the finest pre-Civil War domestic decoration schemes in the United States. Sponsored by antislavery groups, Duncanson traveled widely during the 1860s in Europe. Duncanson rose above oppression to create expressions of African-American cultural identity, leading the way for other people of color to pursue careers in the arts. Duncanson died in Detroit, Michigan, in 1872.

For years, abolitionist John Van Zandt’s house overlooking the Miami and Erie Canal was known as one of the most active "stations” on the Underground Railroad. In 1842, two bounty hunters from Sharonville caught Van Zandt helping eight runaway slaves who had escaped from owner Wharton Jones of Kentucky. Van Zandt was defended in court by Salmon P. Chase, who two decades later would become chief justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Van Zandt was convicted and fined, but Chase appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, where he tested the constitutionality of the Fugitive Slave Law of 1793.

When writing her novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe was said to have modeled the abolitionist character John Van Trompe on Van Zandt. Van Zandt's house, which stood on what is now Oak Road in Glendale, became associated with the book and known as “The Eliza House,” named for one of the novel's main characters. Eliza had risked her life crossing a frozen Ohio River with her young child to escape bondage and prevent her only surviving child from being taken from her.

The Underground Railroad was neither underground nor a railroad, but a system of loosely connected safe havens where those escaping the brutal conditions of slavery were sheltered, fed, clothed, nursed, concealed, disguised and instructed during their journey to freedom. Although this movement was one of America’s greatest social, moral and humanitarian endeavors, the details about it were often cloaked in secrecy to protect those involved from the retribution of civil law and slave catchers.

One such safe haven was in what is now the city of Whitehall. In the 1800s, several free Blacks settled in Truro Township, in Franklin County, and began assisting runaway slaves to freedom. One of these men was John T. Ward, who was born a free black man in 1820 in Richmond, Virginia. Ward and his wife came to Ohio in 1836 and built their home on a 16-acre tract of land in 1838.

In addition to farming and serving as an Underground Railroad conductor, John T. Ward worked as a clerk in a downtown Columbus hardware store. During the Civil War, Ward had contracts with the federal government to haul supplies to Camp Chase, the U.S. Army camp and Confederate prison located along the National Road, four miles west of Columbus.

Ward’s son, William S. Ward, learned the hauling business and founded the Ward Transfer Line in 1881. Many of John T. Ward’s activities were documented in his diary and recounted by his great-grandson, Eldon Ward, the first black chairman of the Columbus Foundation and owner of the family’s moving company before his death.

Today, the E. E. Ward Transfer and Storage Company continues to maintain its proud heritage by treasuring its roots of once “hauling people to freedom by night and transporting goods by day.”

Second Baptist Church received its independence as a mission church from the First Baptist Church on January 7, 1836. In 1843, the Palladium of Liberty newspaper began through meetings at the church. The short-lived Palladium rallied its readers to demand their rights as citizens and demonstrate against Ohio’s Black laws. Many members of the church worked to end slavery and actively participated in the covert operations of the Underground Railroad. However, in 1847, when a Black family who joined the church after moving from Virginia was found to have formerly owned slaves, 40 members broke away to form the Anti-Slavery Baptist Church, led by the Rev. James Preston Poindexter.

The Rev. Poindexter became pastor of Second Baptist Church in 1858 after Second Baptist and the Anti-Slavery church reunited. The Rev. Poindexter had joined the Underground Railroad shortly after arriving in Columbus with his wife, Adella, in 1838. He helped to drive “passengers,” along with other prominent conductors of the Underground Railroad. A barber by trade, he was an articulate speaker and prolific writer, speaking out against slavery and discrimination in many speeches. He became a member of the Columbus City Council, the Columbus Board of Education, the State Forestry Board of Directors, the Columbus Pastor's Union, an Ohio School for the Blind and Wilberforce University trustee, and a contributor to the Ohio State Journal. Poindexter received many honorary degrees and served Second Baptist Church for 40 years.

When Fernando Cortez and Sophia Stone Kelton built their home in Columbus in 1852, it was the last residence on East Town Street and was surrounded by pastureland. Ardent abolitionists, the Keltons were members of the local anti-slavery society. Family tradition states that runaways were hidden in the barn at the back of the house, in the 300-barrel cistern just east of the house, or sometimes in the servant quarters. No one knows for certain how many fugitive slaves passed through the house on their way to freedom. One documented story is that of a 10-year-old runaway named Martha Hartway.

Born a slave in September 1854 in Powhattan County, Virginia, Martha, along with her sister Pearl, fled the plantation. Kelton family tradition states that Mrs. Kelton found the girls under a shrub next to the house. Too ill to move, Martha was taken in by the Keltons and remained for 10 years. Pearl continued north to Wisconsin because she felt that Ohio wasn't safe. In 1874, Martha married Thomas Lawrence in the front parlor of the Kelton home. The son of free Black parents, Thomas was employed by the Keltons as a cabinetmaker. The Kelton House was restored and is maintained by the Junior League of Columbus.

On the Ohio River in Ripley, Ohio, the Reverend John Rankin, a white stationmaster, and John Parker, an African-American stationmaster and former slave, directed escapees from slavery toward the Scioto River. In Columbus, the Scioto forked, with the east fork named the Olentangy River. The escapees were instructed to travel north along the banks of the Olentangy to a stream, Neil Run. During the 19th century, Neil Run ran easterly through a landscape that is now the campus of The Ohio State University but at the time was the Neil Farm, owned by William and Hannah Neil. Their farmhouse, which burned down in 1864, stood about where the William Oxley Thompson Library now stands.

After 1856, escapees on the Freedom Train followed Neil Run past the Neil Farm and through the swampy hollow that is now Mirror Lake. The stream forked, with the northeastern branch emerging from the marshy land where the Ohio Union now stands, at the home of Robert Neil, son of William and Hannah. It still stands on the corner of Indianola Avenue and 15th Avenue, the current home of the fraternity Kappa Sigma. From this spot, escapees were directed toward Lake Erie, the last stop before freedom and safety.

Joseph Sullivant, a member of the first Board of Trustees of Ohio State University, was known as a “friend of the colored race.” He grew up in Kentucky but developed a distaste for slavery after witnessing a slave auction. Another Ohio State board member with similar beliefs was Norton Strange Townshend. Townshend served twice as a delegate to the World's Anti-slavery Convention. As a member of the Ohio General Assembly, he also helped repeal Ohio's “Black Laws,” which were regulations that greatly restricted the lives of African-Americans. Ohio State University’s Sullivant and Townshend Halls were named for these illustrious leaders.

Along Lake Erie, Toledo, Sandusky, Cleveland, Fairport Harbor, and Ashtabula Harbor were major routes from slavery to freedom in Canada. Even though African-Americans lived throughout the state, Ohio itself was not really safe. Slavery was sanctioned across the United States. Escapees and free African-Americans alike were constantly threatened by recapture or kidnapping. Ohio also had “Black Laws,” often used to prevent long-term settlement. Frequently, the goal of the Freedom Train was to help escapees through Ohio rather than to Ohio. Nevertheless, stationmasters aided thousands of escapees—a record about which Ohio can be proud.

Dr. Wilbur Henry Siebert organized one of the most extensive historical collections on the Underground Railroad in the United States. Siebert served as a professor of history at the Ohio State University from 1893 to 1935. His collection on the Underground Railroad, housed in the Archives of the Ohio Historical Society in Columbus, contains diaries, books, letters and newspaper accounts of the day, as well as reminiscences from the dwindling population of abolitionists and their families throughout the northern states. The collection also includes Siebert's own manuscripts, images, notes and correspondence relating to his research. In 1898, Siebert published The Underground Railroad from Slavery to Freedom, followed by numerous other books on the Underground Railroad in Ohio and elsewhere. His extensive research earned him recognition as the world's foremost authority on the Underground Railroad.

The Fugitive Slave Law of 1793 required the return of escaped slaves. A loose-knit, secret, “Underground Railroad” was created to help runaway slaves from slave-holding states escape into “free” states or Canada. These anti-slavery underground railroaders risked heavy fines, jail sentences, even death to help the slaves escape to freedom. “Stations” were clustered in a community, with several safe hiding places always ready. Fugitives were transported to the next station, usually a night’s journey away. The most active period of the Underground Railroad was the mid-1800s.

Alexander W. Livingston, founder of the edible tomato, was the “mastermind” of the Underground Railroad in Reynoldsburg. Livingston owned the “Arc,” a long, covered wagon with seats along the sides in which Benjamin Patterson, who was an employee of Livingston’s, drove and transported fugitive slaves northward to underground stations from Granville to Mt. Vernon.

In 1856, Benjamin Hanby published his first song, “Darling Nellie Gray,” a tale of fugitive slave Joe Selby, who was enroute to Canada. Selby had died in the Hanby’s Rushville house in 1842. Selby had hoped to buy the freedom of his love, Nelly, who had been sold to a plantation “down river.” While attending Otterbein University, Benjamin travelled to Kentucky, where he witnessed a slave auction. This experience inspired him to complete the song telling the story of Joe and Nelly. An anthem of its time, “Darling Nelly Gray” became a theme of anti-slavery sermons. Abolitionists labeled it “the Uncle Tom’s Cabin of song.” Union soldiers sang the song around campfires.

Benjamin became an ordained minister of the United Brethren Church after graduating in the second class of Otterbein University in 1858. In 1864, he left preaching to operate a singing school in New Paris, Ohio, where he wrote the Christmas song “Santa Claus,” which is today known as “Up on the Housetop.” By the time Hanby died of tuberculosis in 1867, he had composed more than 80 songs.

The Stoner House, built around 1862 on a natural spring thought to have medicinal properties, served as an inn, tavern, spa—and hiding place for runaway slaves. George Stoner, owner and operator, drove the stagecoach from Columbus to Westerville, transporting passengers who then spent the night at his inn. Runaway slaves were brought to this location in the luggage compartment of Stoner’s stagecoach and were hidden in the cellar until they could be transported further north on their journey to Canada and freedom.

John McDannald’s home in Gahanna, built in 1856, served as a station on the Underground Railroad. He was the son of Samuel and Bell Craig McDannald, who came from Virginia in 1813. The McDannalds were prominent in the development of Blendon Township, The Central College of Ohio, and The Central College Presbyterian Church.

Whether as part of the Northwest Territory or after statehood, Ohio was always free soil. Early legislators may not have wanted slavery in Ohio, but nor did they want Blacks to settle here. Declaring people of color a menace, they passed harsh Black Laws, which denied Black residents the ability to vote, testify against whites or hold office and required Black people settling in Ohio to post a bond of $500. Outside the Statehouse, Blacks went unnoticed. The turnover of Black waiters and porters at the Buckeye House aroused no suspicion. White customers overlooked barbers James Poindexter and Andrew Redmond. No one saw John T. Ward, then a clerk at Zettler’s. These men were invisible to all but the desperate faces secreted in attics, barns, smokehouses, and in wagons traveling northward at night to Clintonville. Teamsters Louis Washington and his son Thomas were drivers. “The Underground Railroad was actually going on here in Columbus when I came in 1828,” recounted James Poindexter. Conductors David Jenkins, NB Ferguson, and John Bookel were all members of Poindexter’s Antislavery Baptist Church.

In 1842, John T. Ward began assisting Shepherd Alexander to convey runaway slaves through Columbus. William Washington, William Ferguson, Jeremiah Freeland, and others were involved as well. “Someone or the other of us was with Alexander on every trip,” stated Ward.

Justice John McLean, who had settled in the Ridgeville area of Warren County in 1799, was appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1829 by President Andrew Jackson. Justice McLean was best known for his antislavery dissenting opinion in the famous Dred Scott case. Founder of the Western Star, former postmaster general, congressman, and candidate for president, Justice McLean served on the Supreme Court until his death in 1861.

Waynesville, in Warren County, was an important stop on the Underground Railroad. Its location not far north of Cincinnati, near Lebanon, Springboro and the Bullskin Trace, made it an ideal stopping point for freedom seekers crossing the state. The main line going through Waynesville followed the Little Miami River. The active Butterworth Station was about 20 miles south on the river near Maineville. Turtlecreek Quaker meeting, near Oregonia, and a few other stops lay between Waynesville and Butterworth Station.

In 1801, families from the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) began to arrive in Waynesville. They came from Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia as a protest against slavery. Quakers believed slavery was wrong and wanted to settle in the Northwest Territory because slavery had been prohibited there per the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. The Miami Monthly Meeting opened October 13, 1803, and was the only Quaker meeting north of the Ohio River and west of the Hocking River until 1807. By 1807, Waynesville had one of the largest Friends meetings in the United States. The White Brick Meeting House in Waynesville, built in 1811, is the oldest place of worship in continuous use west of the Allegheny Mountains. Miami Monthly Meeting was the first library in Waynesville, and a large part of those books are in the Library of the Friends Home Museum. Some early family histories are also housed in the Museum Library. The Museum at the Friends Home has rooms dedicated to Waynesville Quaker history, as well as an Underground Railroad room. The museum also offers an Underground Railroad walking tour in Waynesville. Visit friendshomemuseum.org for more information.

Achilles Pugh, a fervent abolitionist who printed The Philanthropist newspaper for the Ohio Anti-Slavery Society, lived in Waynesville from 1854 until 1875. He was a conductor on the Underground Railroad and helped many freedom seekers on their way north by providing food, clothing, money, a place to rest, and transportation to the next safehouse. Many other Friends in Waynesville did the same. Quaker Thomas Arnett lived in Waynesville and preached against slavery. Many homes in Waynesville and the surrounding area were built before 1864, with several of those, such as the Thomas Swift house and the Seth Silver Haines house believed to have harbored freedom seekers. Jesse and Elizabeth Harvey, in the nearby village of Harveysburg, were also conductors on the Underground Railroad. Elizabeth established the first Free Black School in Harveysburg in 1831.

Jonathan Wright and his wife, Mary Bateman Wright, moved with their five children from Pennsylvania to southwestern Ohio in 1814. Using skills acquired from his father, a surveyor who had platted the city of Columbus, Jonathan Wright platted the village of "Springborough" in what is now Warren County. He named the community for the many springs in the vicinity. The Wright family established and operated a woolen factory, two flour mills, a general store, and a 320-acre farm in the Springboro area. The Wrights were active members of the Society of Friends and, like other Quakers, strongly opposed slavery. The house was a station on the Underground Railroad, offering assistance to runaway slaves during their flight to freedom. Many members of the Wright family, including Jonathan, Mary, and four of their children, are buried in the Friends Cemetery on nearby Factory Road.

A predominantly Quaker community in its early days, Springboro served as a hospitable thoroughfare for many runaway slaves on their way north to freedom. Between 1815 and 1864, Springboro had numerous safehouses and many agents and conductors operating within the village and the surrounding township. Two factors contributed to Springboro's role as a pathway on the Underground Railroad. One was the antislavery sympathies of its residents. Secondly, situated between the Great and Little Miami rivers and just two nights run north of the Ohio River, Springboro was in the middle of two corridors of flight. Enriching the antislavery sentiments of the local community was Achilles Pugh, who for many years published a famous national abolitionist paper, The Philanthropist, in Springboro. Despite constant scrutiny and harassment from bounty hunters and law officers, no runaways were ever captured or returned while under the protection of Springboro-area residents.

Jonathan Wright’s son Mahlon, who served Springboro as a state legislator and a postmaster, made his house a refuge for freedom seekers escaping slavery in southern states. Jonathan Wright’s nephew, Warner Bateman, worked the Underground Railroad as an “agent,” providing assistance to runaway slaves on their way to freedom. As an attorney, Bateman was in the difficult position of breaking laws he was sworn to uphold. Nevertheless, Bateman later became a prominent Cincinnati attorney and U.S. district judge.

Other Springboro residents who risked their lives and property to hide escaping slaves and escort them on their flight to freedom included brothers John and Edward Potts, who both bought homes in Springboro in the 1830s. John Bateman was a local tanner who used his business as a station on the Underground Railroad. According to local history, the tannery was an excellent hiding place for runaway slaves because strong odors generated by the tanning process kept slave catchers and their dogs away.

Jonah Thomas, who operated a harness shop in Springboro, opened his home as a station on the Underground Railroad. The Thomas family also made room in their home for a 2,000-volume community library open to everyone in Springboro, making it one of the first circulating libraries in Ohio. Jeremiah and Nancy Gregg Stansel built a home in Springboro around 1840. Jeremiah's father, Henry Stansel, had been a friend of Daniel Boone. Although not a member of the Society of Friends, Jeremiah, who served Springboro as a justice of the peace and a postmaster, is thought to have also assisted runaway slaves, perhaps hiding them at his house.

Napoleon Johnson was a former slave who was freed in Virginia in 1847, when his master, James Epps, manumitted all 40 of his slaves at once. Johnson settled in the Warren County community of Springboro the following year. In 1849, he married Celia Anderson, and they had three children. Only their daughter Maria survived childhood; Maria lived in Springboro all her life. Johnson served in the Union Army during the Civil War. As a successful plasterer, he was able to purchase several properties in town later in life.

In 1875, Lydia Wood moved into a then-40-year-old-house in Springboro built by Joseph Stanton, son-in-law of local abolitionist James Stanton. Wood was the aunt of artist Grant Wood, who painted the famous “American Gothic.” Wood raised Nathaniel Hunter, a black orphan who later became the private secretary to well-known black educator Booker T. Washington.

Samuel Patterson arrived in East Orange in 1824 and, within a few years, began to hide freedom seekers in his home. He also invited anti-slavery speakers to the pulpit of the East Orange Methodist Church, which brought Patterson and his neighbors into conflict with the bishop. Following their consciences, they became Wesleyan Methodists and built a new church. A pro-slavery neighbor mocked them by calling their community Africa, and so East Orange was renamed. The village has disappeared, but several homes owned by Patterson and his neighbors still stand in this vicinity.

In 1859, slaves from a North Carolina plantation owned by the Alston family were sent north. The plantation's mistress disapproved of slavery and had made arrangements for the slaves to travel to Ohio and freedom. These slaves moved to the community of Africa, lived in log homes, were employed by area farmers, and joined the Wesleyan Methodist Church. After the Civil War, these formerly enslaved families left Africa and settled in nearby communities of Delaware and Westerville, and in Van Wert and Paulding counties.

The Sharp family homes mark an important route through Westerville on the Underground Railroad. The family patriarch, Garrit Sharp, was an original settler of Sharp's Settlement, now Westerville, and donated land for and helped organize the first Methodist church. He is also associated with the founding of Blendon Young Men's Seminary, which was acquired by Otterbein College, an institution with enrollment open to African Americans and women from its inception in 1847. Sharp and his sons were all noted abolitionists who, along with Bishop William Hanby and Otterbein president Lewis Davis, assisted those escaping bondage on their road to freedom. From the Sharp homes, freedom seekers would have proceeded north to the house of Samuel Patterson on Africa Road and along Alum Creek to the Quaker settlement near Marengo in Morrow County.

Henry B. Curtis played an important role in developing and shaping Mount Vernon and Knox County. He was a lawyer, banker, churchman, city developer, and civic leader. He had ties to the burgeoning railroad system and later served as director of the Lake Erie Division of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.

Among his friends was Bishop Philander Chase, who came to the area seeking a suitable location for a proposed institution, later named Kenyon College. Together they rode on horseback all over the hills east of town, and with Henry’s influence, Bishop Chase was able to purchase the needed 8,000 acres.

Henry Curtis built and resided in Round Hill mansion, which is said to have had a secret underground passageway connecting it to the Curtis family vault. Curtis, an abolitionist, was said to have used the vault to conceal slaves along the Underground Railroad.

However, as with many communities throughout Ohio, friends and neighbors in Mount Vernon differed in their opinions about slavery.

Around 1850, George Gammon and his wife, Sarah Bradley, built a house on land purchased from her parents. Their house served as a station on the Underground Railroad. The Gammon and Bradley families were among the many free black Springfield citizens who actively operated the Underground Railroad in Clark County. George and Sarah had seven children—five daughters and two sons. Their eldest, Charles, enlisted in the famous 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment and was killed in action leading up to the assault on Fort Wagner, outside Charleston, South Carolina.

Jeremiah Warder and his wife, Ann, were wealthy Quakers from Philadelphia who arrived in Springfield in 1830 to claim extensive acreage inherited from Jeremiah’s late father’s estate. That same year, he purchased from the estate the village of Lagonda, which consisted of several dwellings, sawmills, a woolen mill, and a gristmill. Jeremiah Warder purchased the Western Pioneer, the local newspaper in 1831. Desiring to improve the quality of life in Springfield, Warder founded a literary club, the Springfield Lyceum, from which the community’s first library grew. Warder helped stimulate the town’s economic and industrial prosperity and helped advocate to bring the National Road through Springfield.

Ann Aston Warder, fondly known as “Mother Warder,” also contributed greatly to the community spirit by improving social affairs and providing proper educational training for local children. She opened a school in her home, as well as another in town for the purpose of educating more advanced students. Ann was an active leader in supporting the Underground Railroad in Springfield.

The Underground Railroad was a secretive organization by necessity. Punishments for escaped slaves or the people harboring them were so steep that written records were rarely kept. Ohio State University historian Wilbur H. Siebert provided evidence of the secret work in Holmes County, largely undertaken by Free Presbyterians. Siebert wrote, “It is not strange that the region in Ohio where the Free Presbyterian Church was founded was plentifully dotted with stations of the Underground Railroad. At Savannah, Ashland County, Iberia, Morrow County and a point near Millersburg, Holmes County, Ohio, the work is associated with Free Presbyterian societies once existing in those neighborhoods.”

It is estimated that between 1830 and 1860, some 40,000 slaves passed through Ohio in search of freedom. Freedom seekers would enter Holmes County in two places: near the center of the southern border with Coshocton County and at the southwest corner of Holmes County. From there family histories say they would travel to the Lukehart and Kelley farms, just a few miles south of Millersburg. At the Kelley farm, it is thought slaves hid in the basement by day, waiting for nightfall to head north. On the northward journey, escaped slaves and their conductors avoided Millersburg, instead taking a roundabout route to Holmesville and the farms of the Croco brothers: Keifer and John. Thomas L. Smith, a conductor on the Underground Railroad, wrote to historian Siebert in 1894 that “the two routes between Millersburg and Lodi in northern Ohio are explained by the statement that the most direct route, the western one, fell under suspicion for a while, and in the meantime a more circuitous path was followed through Holmesville and Seville.”

At least 20 main Underground Railroad routes may have crisscrossed Ohio, cutting northward paths toward freedom. During the height of Underground Railroad operations, more than 1,000 enslaved people a year are thought to have gained their freedom through the assistance of Ohioans.

The Underground Railroad was active in Wayne County communities, such as Fredericksburg, Millbrook, Wooster, Orrville and Smithville. Freedom seekers traversed the county along two main routes: From the south, escaping slaves were transported from Millersburg in Holmes County on to Seville or Medina further north. The route turned eastward toward Akron, and several alternative routes led to Cleveland and Lake Erie. From the west, freedom seekers came by way of Shreve and Loudonville. In Loudonville, one branch went north to Ashland and into Sandusky. The other branch went through Wooster, continued north into Lodi, toward Oberlin and points along Lake Erie.

Underground Railroad operators in Wayne County included Quakers, Covenanters, Wesleyan, Methodist, and other abolitionists. Most were highly respected citizens of the community. Under federal law, those caught assisting runaway slaves were subject to fines up to $1,000. In addition, slaveholders were known to offer rewards for the assassination of those active in helping slaves find freedom.

No one was more fiercely committed to the Underground Railroad than former slaves. They knew firsthand the darkness and despair of bondage. Abraham Depp was one such example. Known as Abram, he was born a slave on a tobacco plantation in Powhatan County, Virginia, in 1791. When he was 10, slaveholder John Depp issued an emancipation deed for Abram, Abram’s mother, Lucinda, and his siblings, awarding them 500 acres in Powhatan County upon John and wife Elizabeth’s deaths.

In 1806, Virginia law required freed slaves to leave the state or risk arrest for loitering and sale back into bondage. As he waited his emancipation, Abram became a skilled blacksmith, industrious and trustworthy. Abram’s freedom moment came in 1831 when John Depp died. Abram was 40. Thereafter, Abram’s life changed quickly. He inherited property “both land and negroes,” but some family members remained in bondage while Mrs. Depp lived. On March 19, 1832, Abram’s petition to the Virginia General Assembly was granted for the privilege of residing in the county unmolested for two years to dispose of his property and make arrangements for his departure from the commonwealth. On March 5, 1834, Abram and wife, Mary, registered their marriage. He then journeyed north to Columbus, Ohio, where he found other free blacks from Virginia—all freedom activists. He met abolitionist Joseph Sullivant, son of Lucas Sullivant, founder of Columbus.

In February 1835, Elizabeth Depp died. Within two weeks, Abram's family sold their Virginia acreage and immigrated to Ohio, while the remaining Depp slaves were sold. Abram's wife Mary died on the trip north. In June 1835, Abram paid $1,100 to Joseph Sullivant for 300 acres in Concord Township. Upon settling on his land, Abram established a Baptist church and an Underground Railroad station in a limestone cave along the Scioto River. It was said that Ethelred “Dred” Weaver and others operated between the Friend Street Station in Columbus and the Depp Station.

Abram had three children with his wife Mary, including son Aurelius, who attended Oberlin College and, in 1864, joined the 27th Ohio Colored Troops with stepbrother John. They fought in Virginia during the Civil War. Abram had six children with his second wife, China. One was Lucy Depp Whyte. It is said that the bell at Lucy Depp Park was once used as an “all clear” signal for freedom seekers making their way from Columbus to the Depp Station.

On May 29, 1851, Sojourner Truth, a former slave, gave a speech recalling the hardships she had endured. Active in both the abolitionist and women's rights movements, she electrified an audience of women and men who had come to the Universalist Stone Church in Akron for a two-day Women's Rights Convention.

Sojourner Truth’s impassioned speech that day has become encapsulated in five poignant words: “And Ain’t I a Woman?” As with much of history, particularly circumstances such as Underground Railroad activities and other largely undocumented events pieced together from oral accounts and later recollections, Sojourner Truth’s words are subject to debate. Did she actually say those now-famous words? No one questions whether she was there that day, whether she gave a moving speech or whether this former slave used her voice to lift up others. But Truth’s iconic words do not appear in the first transcript of her speech, which was published about a month after her 1851 speech. That accounting of the speech made clear Truth’s support for women’s rights but lacked the pointed question. A second version of Truth’s speech was published 12 years later. This version featured more colloquial, informal language—perhaps more reflective of how a former slave lacking in formal education might speak—and the words “and ain’t I a woman?” became a powerful refrain. Was this second version a recreation with an artfully invented turn of phrase, or did the first version represent a reporter’s recounting of Truth’s vernacular speech in more standard form? Keep in mind that Sojourner Truth was of New York Dutch heritage so not likely to use dialect associated with those enslaved in the South. Perhaps neither version precisely captures Truth's words that day, but they both convey her impassioned message. Have a listen for yourself. What do you think?

The 58 miles of Alum Creek run north to south originating in Morrow County and continuing through Delaware County into Franklin County, where it empties into the Big Walnut Creek and drains into the Scioto River. Alum Creek, along with these and other waterways, served as “liquid lines to freedom” for runaway slaves escaping a life of bondage and brutality. Wading through the waters prohibited the bounty hunters’ bloodhounds from picking up human scent, allowing freedom seekers to continue their journey to a safe haven under the veil of darkness. Sunbury Road, or the “Old Sunbury Pike,” was home to several Underground Railroad stations along the northern Alum Creek corridor, where residents gave shelter to those seeking freedom.

The Alum Creek Friends were legendary among Underground Railroad circles for their skill and success in spiriting freedom seekers to Canada. Friends involved were David Osbourne, Griffith Levering, William Taber, Miicajah Dillingham, and three generations of Benedicts— including Aaron L., who had a $1,000 bounty placed on his head by Southerners. Cyrus Benedict had founded the Alum Creek Friends Settlement in 1809. Cousins Mordecai and Livius Benedict drove wagonloads of fugitives to Joseph Morris in Marion County when they were but six years old.

In 1835, a slaveholder and two accomplices came to the Alum Creek Settlement to reclaim his slave property—a woman and her three sons. When the woman refused to leave, William Benedict sent word to the church for help, just as the Friends gathered for the Quarterly Meeting. Soon, 25 to 30 people confronted the slaveholder, including Justice-of-the-Peace Barton Whipple, who read the penalties for kidnapping—a fine up to $1,000 and 10 years in the penitentiary. At this, the two accomplices fled into the woods. One of them was said to have later remarked that he couldn’t understand how all these people appeared so suddenly, as if “the Quakers rose right up out of the ground!”

You could say the small Clermont County community of New Richmond sat on the front lines of America’s slavery divide. Located on the northern bank of the Ohio River, the barrier separating Ohio’s free soil from the slaveholding state of Kentucky, citizens of New Richmond participated actively in the abolitionist movement and the Underground Railroad. The New Richmond waterfront is, in fact, recognized by the National Park Service as a National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom site. Here are just a few reasons why:

In 1836, James G. Birney published The Philanthropist, an abolitionist newspaper, in New Richmond before moving his publication to Cincinnati. The congregation of the First Regular Baptist Church of New Richmond gave voice to the antislavery views of the community from the very beginnings of the church. In 1842, the congregation avowed “not to fellowship with those who sustained or countenanced” the institution of slavery. Dr. John G. Rogers was the first president of the Clermont County Anti-Slavery Society and a financial supporter of Birney and The Philanthropist newspaper. However, Dr. Rogers, who practiced medicine for more than 60 years, is most noted for delivering future Union General and 18th President Ulysses S. Grant on April 27, 1822, in nearby Point Pleasant.

Local tradition tells of Jim, a slave living in Kentucky who was given permission from his master to visit his parents in New Richmond. He aided his friend Joe, a fugitive slave, by packing him in a box and placing him on a riverboat headed to New Richmond. Famed Cincinnati abolitionist Levi Coffin recorded, "A few abolitionists who lived near were called in to see the fugitive and to advise in regard to his safety." Joe was taken from Jim's parents' home to Cincinnati, where Levi Coffin purchased him a train ticket to Sandusky. From there, Jim traveled on to Canada.

In 1862, slave catchers paraded a captured Leroy Lee in manacles down Front Street toward the river. A crowd of New Richmond citizens confronted the armed captors, demanding Lee’s release. Seeing they were greatly outnumbered, the slave catchers relented. Two weeks later, Lee enlisted in the Union army.

Charles "Boss" Huber served as the Underground Railroad stationmaster in the Clermont County community of Williamsburg. Huber was said to have assisted between 300 to 500 fugitives in escaping during his time as an active conductor. In addition to secreting fugitives at his home, Huber hid them in the haybarn and corn shocks at his farm on the outskirts of Williamsburg. One account recorded as many as 17 fugitives staying with Huber in just one night. Upon his death in 1854, Huber's neighbor, Dr. L. T. Pease, took over the Williamsburg operation.

Dr. Pease moved to Williamsburg in 1835, with his wife, Nancy Fee, the sister of Robert Fee, who served as stationmaster in Moscow, Ohio. Pease assisted Boss Huber in the hiding and transporting of fugitive slaves en route to Canada.

Huber had owned a tannery, where he employed Marcus Sims, a free African American from Virginia. Sims also served as "engineer," or wagon master, for Huber, carrying fugitives to Underground Railroad stations in nearby Brown, Clinton and Highland counties. Sims continued to run the wagon after Dr. Pease took over the Williamsburg station. After the Civil War broke out, Sims enlisted in the U.S. Army and was killed in service in 1864.