The Underground Railroad
now be recalled. This man was in ill health, and after a time he and his
wife started northward, bringing Rache with them. On the voyage the
master grew worse, and one night when he was about to die, a fearful
storm arose, which Rache devoutly believed was sent from Heaven. In
describing this scene, she impersonated her surroundings with wonderful
vividness and marvellous power. At one moment she was the howling wind;
at another the tumultuous sea--then the lurching ship--the bellowing cow
frightened by the storm--the devil, who came to carry away her master's
soul, and finally the weak, dying man, as he passed to eternity.
They proceeded on their voyage and landed at their place of destination.
Rache sees the cow snuffing the land breeze and darting off through the
crowd. The captain of the vessel points to the cow and motions her to
follow its example. She needs nothing more. Again she is acting--she is
now the cow; but human caution, shrewdness, purpose, are lent to animal
instinct. She looks around her with wary eye--scents the air--a flash,
and she is hidden from the crowd which you see around her--she is free!
Making her way northward, she finally arrived at the house of Emmer
Kimber, Kimberton, Chester county, Pa., and proving a remarkably capable
woman, she remained a considerable time in his family, as a cook. She
finally married, and settled in West Chester, where the pair prospered
and were soon surrounded by the comforts of a neat home. After several
years of peaceful life there, she was one day alarmed, not by the heirs
of her dead master, but by the loathed "Mort Cunningham," who, without
the shadow of legal right, had come to carry her back to Slavery. Fear
lent her wings. She darted into a hatter's shop and out through the back
buildings, springing over a dye kettle in her way, and cleared a board
fence at a bound. On her way to a place of safety she looked back to
see, with keen enjoyment, "Mort Cunningham" falling backward from the
fence she had leaped. Secure in a garret, she looked down into the
streets below, to see his vacant, dazed look as he sought, unable to
find her. Her rendering of the expression of his face at this time, was
irresistibly ludicrous, as was that of his whole bearing while searching
for her. "Mort Cunningham" did not get her, but whether or not she ever
returned to the enjoyment of her happy home, in West Chester, we never
knew, as this sudden flight was the last we ever heard of her. She was
one of the most wide-awake of human beings, and the world certainly lost
in the uneducated slave, an actor of great dramatic power.
FRANCES ELLEN WATKINS HARPER.
The narratives and labors of eminent colored men such as Banneker,
Douglass, Brown, Garnet, and others, have been written and sketched very
fully for the public, and doubtless with advantage to the cause of
freedom. But there is not to be found in any written work portraying the
Anti-Slavery struggle, (except in the form of narratives,) as we are
aware of, a sketch of the labors of any eminent colored woman. We feel,
therefore, not only glad of the opportunity to present a sketch not
merely of the leading colored poet in the United States, but also of one
of the most liberal contributors, as well as one of the ablest advocates
of the Underground Rail Road and of the slave.
No extravagant praise of any kind,--only simple facts are needed to
portray the noble deeds of this faithful worker.
The want of space forbids more than a brief reference to her early life.
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (Watkins being her maiden name) was born in
the City of Baltimore in 1825, not of slave parentage, but subjected of
course to the oppressive influence which bond and free alike endured
under slave laws. Since reaching her majority, in looking back, the
following sentences from her own pen express the loneliness of her
childhood days. "Have I yearned for a mother's love? The grave was my
robber. Before three years had scattered their blight around my path,
death had won my mother from me. Would the strong arm of a brother have
been welcome? I was my mother's only child." Thus she fell into the
hands of an aunt, who watched over her during these early helpless
years. Rev. William Watkins, an uncle, taught a school in Baltimore for
free colored children, to which she was sent until she was about
thirteen years of age. After this period, she was put out to work to
earn her own living. She had many trials to endure which she would fain
forget; but in the midst of them all she had an ardent thirst for
knowledge and a remarkable talent for composition, as she evinced at the
age of fourteen in an article which attracted the attention of the lady
in whose family she was employed, and others. In this situation she was
taught sewing, took care of the children, &c.; and at the same time,
through the kindness of her employer, her greed for books was satisfied
so far as was possible from occasional half-hours of leisure. She was
noted for her industry, rarely trifling away time as most girls are wont
to do in similar circumstances. Scarcely had she reached her majority
ere she had written a number of prose and poetic pieces which were
deemed of sufficient merit to publish in a small volume called "Forest
Leaves." Some of her productions found their way into newspapers and
attracted attention. The ability exhibited in some of her productions
was so remarkable that some doubted and others denied their originality.
Of this character we here copy an extract from one of her early prose
productions:
CHRISTIANITY.
"Christianity is a system claiming God for its author, and the
welfare of man for its object. It is a system so uniform,
exalted and pure, that the loftiest intellects have acknowledged
its influence, and acquiesced in the justness of its claims.
Genius has bent from his erratic course to gather fire from her
altars, and pathos from the agony of Gethsemane and the
sufferings of Calvary. Philosophy and science have paused amid
their speculative researches and wondrous revelations to gain
wisdom from her teachings and knowledge from her precepts.
Poetry has culled her fairest flowers and wreathed her softest
to bind her Author's 'bleeding brow.' Music has strung her
sweetest lyres and breathed her noblest strains to celebrate his
fame; whilst Learning has bent from her lofty heights to bow at
the lowly cross. The constant friend of man, she has stood by
him in his hour of greatest need. She has cheered the prisoner
in his cell, and strengthened the martyr at the stake. She has
nerved the frail and shrinking heart of woman for high and holy
deeds. The worn and weary have rested their fainting heads upon
her bosom, and gathered strength from her words and courage from
her counsels. She has been the staff of decrepit age and the joy
of manhood in its strength. She has bent over the form of lovely
childhood, and suffered it to have a place in the Redeemer's
arms. She has stood by the bed of the dying, and unveiled the
glories of eternal life, gilding the darkness of the tomb with
the glory of the resurrection."
Her mind being of a strictly religious caste, the effusions from her pen
all savor of a highly moral and elevating tone.
About the year 1851 she left Baltimore to seek a home in a Free State,
and for a short time resided in Ohio, where she was engaged in teaching.
Contrary to her expectations, her adopted home and calling not proving
satisfactory, she left that State and came to Pennsylvania as a last
resort, and again engaged in teaching at Little York. Here she not only
had to encounter the trouble of dealing with unruly children, she was
sorely oppressed with the thought of the condition of her people in
Maryland. Not unfrequently she gave utterance to such expressions as the
following: "Not that we have not a right to breathe the air as freely as
anybody else here (in Baltimore), but we are treated worse than aliens
among a people whose language we speak, whose religion we profess, and
whose blood flows and mingles in our veins.... Homeless in the land of
our birth and worse off than strangers in the home of our nativity."
During her stay in York she had frequent opportunities of seeing
passengers on the Underground Rail Road. In one of her letters she thus
alluded to a traveler: "I saw a passenger _per_ the Underground Rail
Road yesterday; did he arrive safely? Notwithstanding that abomination
of the nineteenth century--the Fugitive Slave Law--men still determine
to be free. Notwithstanding all the darkness in which they keep the
slaves, it seems that somehow light is dawning upon their minds....
These poor fugitives are a property that can walk. Just to think that
from the rainbow-crowned Niagara to the swollen waters of the Mexican
Gulf, from the restless murmur of the Atlantic to the ceaseless roar of
the Pacific, the poor, half-starved, flying fugitive has no
resting-place for the sole of his foot!"
Whilst hesitating whether or not it would be best to continue teaching,
she wrote to a friend for advice as follows: "What would you do if you
were in my place? Would you give up and go back and work at your trade
(dress-making)? There are no people that need all the benefits resulting
from a well-directed education more than we do. The condition of our
people, the wants of our children, and the welfare of our race demand
the aid of every helping hand, the God-speed of every Christian heart.
It is a work of time, a labor of patience, to become an effective school
teacher; and it should be a work of love in which they who engage should
not abate heart or hope until it is done. And after all, it is one of
woman's most sacred rights to have the privilege of forming the symmetry
and rightly adjusting the mental balance of an immortal mind." "I have
written a lecture on education, and I am also writing a small book."
Thus, whilst filling her vocation as a teacher in Little York, was she
deeply engrossed in thought as to how she could best promote the welfare
of her race. But as she was devoted to the work in hand, she soon found
that fifty-three untrained little urchins overtaxed her naturally
delicate physical powers; it also happened just about this time that she
was further moved to enter the Anti-Slavery field as a lecturer
substantially by the following circumstance: About the year 1853,
Maryland, her native State, had enacted a law forbidding free people of
color from the North from coming into the State on pain of being
imprisoned and sold into slavery. A free man, who had unwittingly
violated this infamous statute, had recently been sold to Georgia, and
had escaped thence by secreting himself behind the wheel-house of a boat
bound northward; but before he reached the desired haven, he was
discovered and remanded to slavery. It was reported that he died soon
after from the effects of exposure and suffering. In a letter to a
friend referring to this outrage, Mrs. Harper thus wrote: "Upon that
grave I pledged myself to the Anti-Slavery cause."
Having thus decided, she wrote in a subsequent letter, "It may be that
God himself has written upon both my heart and brain a commission to use
time, talent and energy in the cause of freedom." In this abiding faith
she came to Philadelphia, hoping that the way would open for usefulness,
and to publish her little book (above referred to). She visited the
Anti-Slavery Office and read Anti-Slavery documents with great avidity;
in the mean time making her home at the station of the Underground Rail
Road, where she frequently saw passengers and heard their melting tales
of suffering and wrong, which intensely increased her sympathy in their