Underground Railroad :: essays research papers

One Way Trip to FreedomOne zealous day in 1850, a man named Jeb staggered out of the woods, looked about him to give rise his bearings, and plunged down a lane toward the river. He only had a a couple of(prenominal) mo workforcets of freedom before he heard the baying of hounds. He splashed up to his knees in the shallow stream and wade. The dogs tried desperately to pick up the scent but the water had destroyed it. He had no measure to waste. All he could think of was the North Star. That was his hope. That was where his freedom lay. (Flight to Freedom, Henrietta Buckmaster.) The subway railway line was a desire for all hard workers. They would use the Underground Railroad when they were ply up with working for their owners to escape for freedom. The Underground Railroad is a break apart of my history. It has always interested me so I decided to look deeper into the history, the authoritative people, and the actual journey of the Underground Railroad. Slavery had lain like a disgustful sore on our country for two hundred years. Many were shamefaced of it. Slave smuggling had became so profitable that the master of a slave ship could permit nine slaves out of ten to die from fail and still lose no money. Humane men were deeply shock. They protested, and whence they did more than protest they helped the Negro. The Black Africans who were enslaved fought against it from the start. Men like Thomas Jefferson, preparing the annunciation of Independence and the Constitution tried to have slaveholding outlawed. To abolish slavery meant to abolish profits which were astronomical, profits which were shared North and South. But to not abolish slavery struck at some of the deepest principles of Americans. For the next lux years-until the crash of the Civil War- no issue was as important as slavery. It divided homes, it spoke for the conscience, it made political parties, it challenged religion, and it turned men into brutes and into heroes. It created the U nderground Railroad. The first slave who helped a fellow slave to escape pack the spike in this ultraviolet railroad. The unknown first fugitive, the softly stepping men and women who dared the dangers of swamps and mountains and of cold and rain, the outstretched hands of friends, the disguises, the courage, the gunshots along the border, and a long unseeable train which chugged so silently and sent up such invisible smoke- all these proved in the end irresistible.