The Underground Railroad
effective co-operation with other friends of Temperance, in preventing
the licensing of a liquor-selling tavern in the neighborhood. On one
occasion, when, within a week, they had passed on to freedom no less
than forty fugitives, eleven of whom had been in the house at once, they
were amused at hearing a remark by some of their pro-slavery neighbors,
to the effect that "there used to be a pretty brisk trade of running off
niggers, but there was not much of it done now."
Though parties of four, five or six sometimes arrived in open day, they
seldom sent any away till about nightfall or later, and, whenever the
danger was greater than usual, the coming was also at night. The
fugitives, in attempting to capture whom, Gorsuch was killed, near
Christiana, were brought to them at midnight, by Dr. Fussell; and in
this case such caution was observed, that not even the hired girl knew
of the presence of persons not of the family.
For one reason or another,--perhaps to let a hot pursuit go by; perhaps
to allow opportunity for recovering from fatigue and recruiting
exhausted strength, or for earning means to pursue the journey by the
common railroads,--it was often thought advisable that passengers should
remain with them for a considerable period; and numbers of these were,
at different times, employed as laborers in some capacity. Grace Anna
testifies that some of the best assistants they ever had in the house or
on the farm, were these escaped slaves; that in general they were
thrifty and economical, one man, for instance, who spent several years
with them, having accumulated five hundred dollars before he went on to
Canada; and another, enough to furnish an old coat with a full set of
buttons, each of which was a golden half-eagle, covered with cloth, and
firmly sewed on, besides an ample supply of good clothing for himself
and his wife; and that, almost without exception, they were honest and
loyal to their benefactors, and only too happy to find opportunities of
showing their gratitude. One man sent back to the sisters a letter of
thanks, through a gentleman in England, whither he had gone. And once,
when Grace Anna was passing an elegant mansion in Philadelphia, a
colored woman rushed out upon her with such an impetuous demonstration
of affection, joy, and thankfulness--all thought of fitness of time and
place swept away by the swell of strong emotion--as might well have
amused, or slightly astonished, the passers in the street, who knew not
that in her arms the woman's child had died. But it is no marvel that to
her the memory of that poor runaway slave-woman's true affection is more
than could have been the warmest welcome from her educated and refined
mistress.
One case, of which the sisters for a time had charge, seems worthy of a
somewhat more extended mention. In the fall of 1855 a slave named
Johnson, who, in fleeing from bondage, had come as far as Wilmington,
thinking he saw his master on the train by which he was journeying
northward, sprang from the car and hurt his foot severely. The Kennett
abolitionists having taken him in hand, and fearing that suspicious eyes
were on him in their region, felt it necessary to send him onward
without waiting for his wound to heal. He was therefore taken to the
Lewises, suffering very much in his removal, and arriving in a condition
which required the most assiduous care. For more than four months he
remained with them, patient and gentle in his helplessness and
suffering, and very thankful for the ministrations of kindness he
received. He was nursed as tenderly as if his own sisters had attended
him, instead of strangers, and was so carefully concealed that the
nearest neighbors knew not of his being with them. Their cousin, Morris
Fussell, who lived near, being a physician, they had not to depend for
even medical advice upon the outside world.
As the sufferer's wound, in natural course, became offensive, the care
of it could not but have been disagreeable as well as toilsome; and the
feeble health of one of the sisters at that time must have made heavier
the burden to be borne. But it was borne with a cheerful constancy. In a
letter which Grace Anna wrote after she had attended for some time in
person to the patient, with the care and sympathy which his condition
demanded, and begun to feel her strength unequal to the task, in
addition to her household duties, she asked a friend in Philadelphia to
procure for her a trusty colored woman fit to be a helper in the work,
offering higher wages than were common in that region for the services
required, and adding that, indeed, they could not stand upon the amount
of pay, but must have help, if it could be obtained, though not in a
condition to bear undue expenditure. But, she said, the man "is unable
to be removed; and if he were not, I know of no place where the charge
would not be equally severe." So, in perfect keeping with her character,
she just quietly regarded it as a matter of course that it should still
continue where it was. And there it did continue until spring, when the
man, now able to bear removal, was conveyed to the writer, and, after a
time, went thence to Boston. There his foot, pronounced incurable, was
amputated, and the abolitionists supplied him with a wooden limb. He
then returned and spent another winter with the Lewises, assisting in
the household work, and rendering services invaluable at a time when it
was almost impossible to obtain female help. The next spring, hoping
vainly to recover in a warmer climate from the disease induced by the
drain his wounded foot had made upon his system, he went to Hayti, and
there died; happy, we may well believe, to have escaped from slavery,
though only to have won scarely two years of freedom as an invalid and a
cripple.
The sisters were so thoroughly united in their work, as well as in all
the experiences of life, that this brief sketch has not attempted what
indeed it could not have achieved--a separation of their spheres of
beneficent activity. Yet they had each her individual traits and
adaptations to their common task; "diversities of gifts, but the same
spirit." Elizabeth, although for many years shut out by feeble health
from any part requiring much bodily exertion, was ever a wise
counsellor, as well as ready with such help as her state of health would
warrant. Though weak in body, in spirit she was strong and calm and
self-reliant, with a clear, discriminating intellect, a keen sense of
right, and a certain solidity and balanced symmetry of the spiritual
nature which made her an appreciable power wherever she was known. Of
Mariann, Grace Anna says, that if a flash of inspiration was required,
it usually came from her. Taught by her love for others, and by a
sensitiveness almost preternaturally quick, "she always knew exactly the
right thing to do," and put all the poetry of a nature exquisitely fine
into her efforts to diffuse around her purity and peace and happiness.
Her constant, utterly unselfish endeavors to this end contributed in
ample measure to the blessedness of a delightful home, rich in the
virtues, charities and graces which make home blessed. Veiled by her
modest and retiring disposition, to few beyond the circle of her home
were known the beauty and beneficence of her noiseless life; but those
who did look in upon it testified her worth in terms so strong as showed
how deeply it impressed them. "Just the best woman I ever knew," said a
young man for whom she had long cared like a mother. "I cannot
remember," said another, "ever hearing from her one ungentle word;" and
it may be safely doubted whether she was ever heard to utter such. And
one who "knew her every mood" cannot recall an instance of selfishness
in her, even when a child. "The most womanly woman I ever knew,"
declared a friend long closely intimate with her, "and such as would
have been adored, if found by any man worthy of her."
The ideal element in her was chastened by sound sense and blended with a
quick sagacity; but her shrinking sensitiveness, too keen to be quite
healthy, and an extreme of self-forgetfulness, amounting possibly to a
defect in one sojourning amid this world's diverse dispositions and
experiences, rendered her, on the whole, less balanced and complete than
her younger sisters, and not well fitted for rough encounter with life's
trials. So it became Grace Anna's province, especially after their
mother's death, to stand a shelter between her and whatever would
unpleasantly affect her by its contact; to be in some sort as a brother
to her, seeing there was no brother in the house. But from this it must
not be inferred that Grace Anna is less gifted with the distinctive
qualities of her sex. For the native fineness of her spiritual texture,
her gentle dignity and feminine delicacy and grace, mark her as "every
inch" a true and noble woman. In her combine in happy union the calm
strength of soul and self-reliance of her younger, with the poetic
ideality and a just degree of the quick sensibility of her elder sister,
with better health than either, making her foremost of the three in that
executive efficiency which did so much to give their plans the uniform
success already mentioned. Kindness and warm affection, clearness of
moral vision, and purity of heart, with a lively relish for quiet
intellectual pleasures, for society and books adapted to refine, improve
and elevate, were among the characteristics common to them all.
Mariann and Elizabeth, having lived to see the triumph of the Right, in
the Presidential Proclamation of Freedom to the slaves, have gone from
their earthly labors to their heavenly rest; which, we may well believe,
is that whereof the poet speaks:
"Rest in harmonious action like the stars,
Doing the deeds which make heaven musical,
The earth a heaven, and brothers of us all."
Grace Anna still continues here, working for human welfare in such
fields as still demand the laborer's toil; and finding mental profit and
delight in the pursuit of natural science.
CUNNINGHAM'S RACHE.
BY MISS GRACE A. LEWIS.
Among the many fugitives whose stories were full of interest, was that
of a woman named Rachel. She was tall, muscular, slight, with an
extremely sensitive nervous organization, a brain of large size, and an
expression of remarkable sagacity and quickness. She was living in West
Chester, Chester county, Pa., when attempts were made to retake her to
Slavery. With wonderful swiftness and adroitness she eluded pursuit, and
was soon hurried away. Speedily reaching our house, she hid herself away
during the day, and in the evening, as a place of greater safety, she
was transferred to the house of our uncle, Dr. Fussell, then residing on
an adjoining farm. As was his wont, this kind-hearted man soon entered
into a conversation with her, and in a few minutes discovered that she
had once been a pupil of his during his residence in Maryland many years
before.
At the moment of recognition she sprang up, overwhelming him with her
manifestations of delight, crying: "You Dr. Fussell? You Dr. Fussell?
Don't you remember me? I'm Rache--Cunningham's Rache, down at Bush River
Neck." Then receding to view him better, "Lord bless de child! how he is
grown!"
Her tongue once loosened, she poured forth her whole history, expressing
in every lineament her concentrated abhorrence of her libertine master,
"Mort Cunningham." Over that story, it is needful to pass lightly,
simply saying, she endured all outraged nature could endure and survive.
For the sake of humanity we may trust there were few such fiends even
among southern masters as this monster in human shape. Cunningham
finally sold her to go further South, with a master whose name cannot