Photo: Benjamin F. Powelson Collection of the National Museum of African American History and Culture shared with the Library of Congress, 2017.30.4
Born Araminta Harriet Ross, known as the âMoses of her people,â Harriet Tubman was enslaved, escaped, and helped others gain their freedom as a âconductor" of the Underground Railroad.Â
The Underground Railroad was a network of individuals and safe houses to help fugitive slaves on their journeys north. Native American tribes often provided protection. The network was operated by âconductors,â or guides who risked their own lives by returning to the South many times to help others escape. The ârailroadâ is thought to have helped as many as 70,000 individuals (though estimations vary from 40,000 to 100,000) escape from slavery in the years between 1800 and 1865. Even with help, the journey was grueling. Small groups of runaways would travel at night, sometimes a distance of 16 to 32 km from station to station,Â
At age twelve Harriet intervened to keep her master from beating an enslaved man who tried to escape. She was hit in the head with a two-pound weight, leaving her with a lifetime of severe headaches and narcolepsy.
She also experienced intense dream states, which she classified as religious experiences.
Although slaves were not legally allowed to marry, Tubman entered a marital union with John Tubman, a free black man, in 1844.Â
Harriet decided to run away, but her husband refused to join her, risking his free status if caught, and by 1851 he had married a free black woman. Tubman managed to escape on her own and in the coming years she returned to the South several times and helped dozens of people escape. Her success led slaveowners to post a $40,000 (a lot of money) reward for her capture or death.
The dynamics of escaping slavery changed in 1850, with the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law. This law stated that escaped slaves could be captured in the North and returned to slavery, leading to the abduction of former slaves and free Black people living in Free States. Canada became the only truly safe destination for fugitive slaves.
Harriet continued her role as conductor despite the distance between Canada and the Southern states, where a one-way journey could be as far as 8-900 km where they were being hunted.
Tubman was never caught and never lost a âpassenger.âÂ
Tubman remained active during the Civil War. She guided the Combahee River Raid, which liberated more than 700 slaves in South Carolina.
She is considered the first African American woman to serve in the military.Â
In 1903, she donated a parcel of her land to the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church in Auburn. The Harriet Tubman Home for the Aged opened on this site in 1908.
Tubman died of pneumonia on March 10, 1913, surrounded by friends and family, at around the age of 93.
https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/harriet-tubman
https://www.britannica.com/topic/fugitive-slave#ref1222392
https://www.biography.com/activist/harriet-tubman
https://www.nps.gov/hatu/learn/tubmantalks.html