Nikki Giovanni
Underground Railroad
No man is truly free. Freedom is determined by the limitation of what one defines as being free. the underground railroad was led by Sojourner Truth. The slaves would escape slavery by going house to house. In some cases, there were underground tunnels where the slaves to escape. Sometimes the slaves would escape slavery by water as illegal aliens during the Revolutionary War and Civil War. It was a means to allow royalty into America and no one would suspect that the slaves were in the boats. Sometimes escaped slaves would look for the north star to travel north to New York a free slave state.

There are many different ways that the slave became free in America. Some slaves were educated, some in the military, some were astute in society before coming to America. Some slaves spoke and read English well and held good jobs. Some slaves were pardoned freedom for working a certain amount of time. Some slaves escaped. Some slaves moved to free states.

My ancestors were slaves. My great-grandfather saw his mom sold on an auction block in Georgia.
The slave trade was not only led by free slaves but by Caucasian’s of religious faith who did not support slavery. or the slave trade. Like the Quakers who were involved. The slaves had help to getting free.

The free slave trade is when Africans were taken into bondage exported from Africa to America to work for free labor. The Underground Railroad is when the slaves escaped to become free from slavery. It was called a safe house where the slaves would rest during their route to the North or Canada. The people who helped the slaves escape to freedom were called conductors. The slaves used the old Indian trails that led their path and traveled through water so the dogs could not trace their scent. Harriet Tubman helped many slaves escape but there were others who helped the slaves escape as well. Names like John Brown, Henry Caltrain, John Henry, John Coleman led the way unto the Civil War. Places like New York, Philadelphia, Kansas, Kentucky, Rhode Island, Delaware, Massachusetts were states free from slavery. Then there were the carpet baggers who fled from the south up north to find work.


While there were many ways that enslaved people of African descent obtained their freedom, our program is just concerned with those who resisted enslavement through escape and flight, which includes more than those who ran from house to house, as there is evidence that many were unaided in their escapes.

While there is some evidence that Sojourner Truth participated in UGRR, the UGRR was not led by her. How the UGRR functioned was both a matter of time and place. It existed from the time people were first enslaved in this country till the end of the Civil War. It ran not only north, but south to places like Spanish Florida, Mexico, and the Caribbean.

The slave trade was not only led by free slaves but by Caucasian’s of religious faith who did not support slavery. or the slave trade. Like the Quakers who were involved. The slaves had help to getting free.

The free slave trade is when Africans were taken into bondage exported from Africa to America to work for free labor. The Underground Railroad is when the slaves escaped to become free from slavery. It was called a safe house where the slaves would rest during their route to the North or Canada. The people who helped the slaves escape to freedom were called conductors. The slaves used the old Indian trails that led their path and traveled through water so the dogs could not trace their scent. Harriet Tubman helped many slaves escape but there were others who helped the slaves escape as well. Names like John Brown, Henry Caltrain, John Henry, John Coleman led the way unto the Civil War. Places like New York, Philadelphia, Kansas, Kentucky, Rhode Island, Delaware, Massachusetts were states free from slavery. Then there were the carpet baggers who fled from the south up north to find work
The underground railroad was spiritual. Harriet Tubman escaped slavery to seek freedom and at the other end, she was threatened. She went back to save specific people not only her family. The quilts may have had patterns that were used as symbols to tell stories about family traditions and how to escape slavery, but the patterns were designed to tell slave owners symbols about what took place too. History has secrets too. You can find it in your research to find more than what is written in history.