The Underground Railroad
disclaims literary pretension; but creditable as is this to the author,
we may say that the work is in style excellent reading, and that if it
were not so, the narratives themselves are so thrilling, possess such a
heart-reaching interest, that if these were literary crudities, they
would be entirely placed in the background in the concentrated blaze of
light which the author pours upon the bloody pathway of these victims of
injustice, from 1851, when the terrors of the Fugitive Slave Law began,
to the hour when Slavery and Rebellion were washed out in blood,
together.
We have not space for a reprint of one of these interesting histories,
but we are personally acquainted with the "facts" as related by Mr.
Still, and the persons involved, and can attest the truth of the
statements made. Some of these parties we have met in their flight,
others in their temporary sojourn in the then so-called Free States;
others we knew (Harriet Tubman and Moses among them) in their latest and
safest refuge, (Canada,) under the protection of the Cross of St. George
and St. Andrew. It was due to such that this book should be written.
Their heroic deeds, in behalf of personal liberty of themselves and
others, deserve commemorating. Their deeds of daring, winning victory at
last, in the face of wily and unscrupulous men devoted to their capture,
and sustained by the voice, the law and the cannon of the Government,
ought to be written in unfading letters across the history of a people
struggling upward to enfranchisement. It will teach the coming
generations who were our fathers and our mothers; who there were in
these years of agony who braved death to secure liberty and who upheld
the noble banner of a dying race until their efforts, by God's blessing,
made the race rise and live. All thanks to Mr. Still for thus placing
this noble record of the free, and those struggling to be free, before
the world.
* * * * *
_FROM, THE BOSTON JOURNAL, BOSTON, MASS._
The present volume is a narrative, or rather a collection of narratives,
of the adventures of slaves on their way to freedom. The style is
perfectly simple and unaffected, and it is well that it is so. The facts
and incidents related are themselves so full of interest and dramatic
intenseness as to need no coloring. The narratives throughout have the
mark of truth upon them, and are based on authentic records. American
history would not be complete without some such book as this, written by
one within the circle of those devoted philanthropists who were so
fearless and unremitting in their efforts for human freedom.
* * * * *
_FROM THE PROVIDENCE PRESS, PROVIDENCE, R.I._
This large volume is full of facts. To read its pages is to bring the
past up with vividness. Many of those who fought with the worse than
Ephesus' beasts encountered by Paul, to wit, the man-hunters of the
South, we knew personally, and their narratives as given in this volume
we can vouch for, having received their accounts at the time, from their
own lips. Historically the book is valuable, because it is fact and not
fiction, although fifty years from to-day it will read like fiction to
the then living.
* * * * *
_FROM THE NEWBURYPORT HERALD, MASS._
It is not a romance, but it is a storehouse of materials which will
hereafter be used in literature, and be studied, not only by historians,
dramatists and novelists, but also by those who will seek to comprehend
and realize the fact, that there has been, in this country, a condition
of society and law which made the Underground railroad possible.
THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD,
* * * * *
BY WILLIAM STILL.
* * * * *
AN AUTHENTIC RECORD OF THE WONDERFUL HARDSHIPS, HAIRBREADTH ESCAPES, AND
DEATH STRUGGLES WHICH MARK THE TRACK FROM SLAVERY TO FREEDOM IN THE
UNITED STATES.
* * * * *
This is one of the most remarkable volumes of the century. Its
publication has only been made possible by a combination of
circumstances which seldom attend the birth of a book. Before
emancipation, and while the bane of slavery was on the country, the
thrilling facts of this volume could not have been made public. Peace
and the blessing of freedom permit their publication, free circulation
and unmolested reading.
Of all the thousands who favored freedom for the slaves, who gloried in
the odium attached to anti-slaveryism, who witnessed the frequent
efforts of the bondsmen to escape, who aided them in their quest for
liberty, few dared to take notes of what they witnessed, and fewer still
dared to preserve them, lest they should be turned into witnesses
against them.
But one man, and that the author of this book, is known to have
succeeded in preserving anything like a full account of the workings of
the UNDERGROUND RAILROAD, as it was called before emancipation. These
records grew on his hands during the years he acted as Chairman of the
Philadelphia Branch of that celebrated corporation, until they reached
the extent of the present volume. They are made up of letters received,
of interviews held, of narratives taken down at the time, of real
reminiscence and authentic biography. Nothing imaginative enters into
the composition of the volume. It is simply succinct history, always
startling, sometimes bloody. The annals of no time since the Inquisition
are so full of daring ventures for life and liberty or heroic endurance
under most trying circumstances.
As a history of the UNDERGROUND RAILROAD, the work is most curious and
valuable. It tells of an ingenuity and faithfulness on the part of the
officials of the road which seems well-nigh marvellous. As its pages
reveal the methods by which aid was given to the escaping slave, one is
compelled to wonder almost as if he were facing a revelation. The
secrets of Masonry are not more mysterious than were the ways of these
officials who clothed, fed and comforted the fugitive, while they
apparently never knew his name or whereabouts. Even those who never
believed in the existence of an UNDERGROUND RAILWAY, or who, believing,
cursed its existence, will read its history, at this time, with the
relish of astonishment and the zest of discoverers.
But the book has a higher meaning and use. It is curious and hitherto
unprinted history to the white race. To the black race, and especially
that part of it once slave, it is more than a history of a time of
peril. It is for them what Exodus was to the fugitives from Egypt, a
history and an inspiration as well. They may learn from it of their
heroes and how deeply the love of liberty was implanted in their bosoms.
The Swiss never tire of the story of their Tell, nor the Welsh of that
of their Glendower. Every nation has its exemplar, whose bravery and
virtues are a perpetual lesson and source of admiration. The colored
race may now read of its real heroes, its Joshuas, Spartacuses, Tells
and Glendowers, among the list of those who silently broke their chains
and dared everything in order to breathe the sweet air of liberty. They
are not blazoned heroes, full of loud deeds and great names, but quiet
examples of what fortitude can achieve where freedom is the goal.
It is time now that the colored race should know something of the steps
which led from Egypt to Canaan, something of their own contributions to
the grand march of the tribes across and beyond the Red Sea. There are
no slaves beneath the starry flag. All may read who will, and what they
will. For the colored man no history can be more instructive and
inspiring than this, of his own making, and written by one of his own
race. The generations are growing in light. Not to know of those who
were stronger than shackles, who were pioneers in the grand advance
toward freedom; not to know of what characters the race could produce
when straightened by circumstances, nor of those small beginnings which
ended in triumphant emancipation, will, in a short time, be a reproach.
This History of the hardships and struggles of those of their own race
is more for them than for mankind at large. It furnishes the world proof
that, though slaves, they were nevertheless men. It furnishes them proof
that the heroic abounds in their race as in others, and that achievement
follows persistent effort, as well with them as with others. The volume
will be not only their admiration but constant encouragement. In its
pages one is not invited to hard, dry reading. It is narrative in style,
simple in language, and possesses the thrill and pathos of a novel. In
all its parts it is an evidence of the saying that "Truth is stranger
than fiction."
The author scarcely needs an introduction to the public. He is a
scholarly, successful business man of Philadelphia, who has long been
identified with churches, charities and every project for ameliorating
the condition of his race. His word in all things is as good as his
bond. An ardent member of the Anti-Slavery Society, and an active
officer of the Underground Railroad Company, he made his book as a
business man makes his ledger, viz.: by noting daily the transactions of
the day. How he preserved them does not matter much now, but if a
certain loft in the chapel of an old cemetery could speak, it might a
tale unfold.
The volume is quite large and commanding in appearance. It consists of
about 800 pages, clearly printed on beautiful white paper, making the
largest book ever written by a colored person in this country.
An attractive feature of the book, one which has added largely to its
cost, and one which greatly enhances its value to the reader, is its
illustrations. These are over seventy in number, and they are made to
illustrate the most striking portions of the work. They represent night
escapes and day encounters, on land and river, receptions on the soil of
freedom, characters of note among the fugitives, and many of those among
the anti-slavery people whose names have become historic. It is seldom a
volume is seen which so abounds in apt and striking illustration.
The field for the sale of this volume is immense. It will prove
desirable as a curious contribution to the literature of the times, and
will be bought in every home North and South, East and West, where
reading is cherished. It is pre-eminently the book for the colored race.
There is not a colored man or woman in the whole land who will not want
to possess it. Even if he cannot read, he will want it for his children.
It will be their history and their story for generations.
We have fixed the price at a very low figure, so as to completely answer
all pleas of poverty or hard times.
The whole book of _800 SUPER-ROYAL OCTAVO PAGES_ is filled with the
thrilling History of the Secret work of the U.G.R.R., giving an
authentic account of the wonderful Escapes and Daring Deeds, the
Endurance and Sacrifice of men and women in their efforts for freedom.
It is BEAUTIFULLY ILLUSTRATED and substantially bound, and furnished at
the following _VERY LOW PRICES:_
IN FINE ENGLISH CLOTH, PANNELLED,............... $3.00 IN BEAUTIFUL
EMBOSSED MOROCCO, GILT CENTRE, ... 4.00
Every book corresponds with above description or the subscriber is not
bound to take it.
PEOPLE'S PUBLISHING CO.,
26 SO. 7TH ST., PHILADELPHIA, PA., CINCINNATI, O.,
CHICAGO, ILL., OR, ST. LOUIS, MO.
_FROM THE "NATION," N.Y._
It is, nevertheless, a chapter in our history which connot be skipped or
obliterated, inasmuch as it marks one stage of the disease of which the
crisis was passed at Gettysburg. It is one, too, for which we ought not
to be dependent on tradition; and, all things considered, no one was so