IN THE 1830s fugitive slaves increasingly moved to New York City for sanctuary. Many of these escapees were fleeing plantations located along Maryland’s Eastern Shore.
In his autobiography Samuel Ringgold Ward, above, wrote about his escape from slavery and his career. In the mid-19th century he lived in Poughkeepsie.
Slave catchers, backed by laws requiring support from law enforcement and private citizens alike, engaged in aggressive tactics. Abolitionists fought back and established networks of safe homes, called “way stations,” throughout upstate New York, including the Hudson Valley.
The networks managed primarily by Quakers and freed Blacks were dubbed the Underground Railroad. Columbia County had four “way stations” located in Hudson, Claverack, Ghent and Chatham, according to historian Fergus M. Bordewich, author of The Underground Railroad in the New York Hudson Valley.
Bordewich says that overland travel by horse-drawn wagons from New York City to the Hudson Valley way stations took an average 10 -14 days, but the invention of the steamboat shortened the journey on the Hudson River, from days to hours. The People’s Line sailed up to 500 “Abolition Boats” daily as 20 years of improvements to steamboat travel cut the journey to Albany from 15 to 7 hours. Read more…
