Research and writing by Amber Shannon, M.A. candidate in Public History, Salem State University
Last updated 12-14-2021
For over 60 years (roughly between 1800-1861), the Underground Railroad – a covert network of free Black Americans, Black Americans who had escaped enslavement, Indigenous Americans, abolitionists, and those sympathetic to the injustices of enslavement- operated throughout the country and successfully supported thousands of people who achieved their freedom. Marblehead played a small part in this vast network, working closely with activists in Salem, Danvers, and Boston who could physically transport passengers from one station, or safe house, to another. Some freedom seekers came by water – stowing away in ships, hidden in various cargo boxes and reportedly even in coffins – and others came by land, secreted under blankets and false bottoms in wagons, inside large boxes, or hidden in plain sight by using disguises. Railroad conductors aided in passengers’ safe transport until reaching secured hideouts or the living quarters of those willing and able to provide private shelter, food, and supplies.
In Marblehead, the most well-known and longest-running Railroad station was the home of Simeon and Betsey Dodge, located at 236 Washington Street. Additionally, Dr. Samuel Young, whose family cohoused with the Ornes at 21 State Street, was remembered as having assisted multiple freedom seekers by his grand niece, possibly using his own lodgings for their safety. For 20 years the Dodges utilized a trap door in their home to keep hidden the refugees temporarily lodging there from “slave catchers”, or bounty hunters tasked with finding those who escaped bondage and returning them to enslavers who, by the early to mid-1800’s, were primarily white Southerners.
These enslavers viewed Black people as property and not as human beings, and had no intention of ever acknowledging their due equal rights- especially if it meant Black labor could increase profits and personal comforts. Enslaved people were not allowed legally-recognized marriages, and if they had children in their families, each child legally belonged to the enslavers of one or both parents. Families could be separated at any time, and children could be sold at young ages without much knowledge of their parentage. Most families were never reconnected, though individuals would often place notices in local and national papers seeking family, and rare accounts of parents reuniting with children were sometimes made known in subsequent reports.
It is important to note that Northern states were just as complicit in the business of enslavement, despite having outlawed the practice largely by the beginning of the 19th century, by producing and selling clothing, shoes, and other supplies for enslavers to keep those in bondage in garments bereft of comfort and dignity. The Northern states had themselves endorsed and engaged in “the peculiar institution” of enslavement for over 150 years- actively participating in the transatlantic slave trade- and the economic benefits of the practice retained itself in the structures of such ‘free’ societies. The resulting reality was that Northern towns and cities themselves were not safe havens for freedom seekers, and the use of the Underground Railroad was still a dangerous and life-threatening endeavor despite regional policies.
Abolitionism in Marblehead
Marblehead saw small communities of abolitionists and supporters form during the 1830’s and 1840’s, including local branches of the Massachusetts and New England Anti-Slavery Societies, with lists of representatives for the town recorded in numerous issues of William Lloyd Garrison and Isaac Knapp’s The Liberator. According to Simeon Dodge in his later writings, he served as the secretary for Marblehead’s branch of the Anti-Slavery Society while Dr. Samuel Young served as the president. In some local writings from soon after this era, remembrances surfaced of holding frequent antislavery and abolitionist gatherings at A.C. Orne’s home, also entertaining such guests as Garrison, Wendell Phillips, and Frederick Douglass on multiple occasions.
There was also some interest and involvement in the short-lived New England Anti-Manhunting League, which intended to physically intimidate and capture bounty hunters reported in the area. Samuel Goodwin of Stacey Street, Ambrose Allen of Merritt Street, and a few others not in alignment with Garrisonian methods of abolition promoted and produced votes for the Liberty party; Goodwin also represented Marblehead at the Georgetown Anti-Slavery Convention in 1841. It is understood that not all abolitionists necessarily participated in the Underground Railroad, but it is also difficult to corroborate the names of more than a few people who lived in Marblehead through remaining source materials. Interest in abolitionism in its various forms also waxed and waned as time went on; those who may have been more vocal and open about their support may have quieted once the Fugitive Slave Act was emboldened.
In 1850, the original Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 received an even more dangerous compromise that gave bounty hunters and federal marshals complete allowance to track refugees to any city, town, or private residence, and required compliance from local officials to achieve their goal. Station masters such as the Dodges and Dr. Young undoubtedly encountered increased difficulty keeping freedom seekers safely hidden once these laws were enacted. Only once the Emancipation Proclamation was put into motion in 1862 did the bounty hunters’ efforts begin to ease, as there was no longer a federal encouragement for their enterprise. Places such as Marblehead likely would have started seeing a decrease in Underground Railroad activity by this time, but it is doubtless that freedom seekers were still employing a variety of routes and transportation methods to find new homes until all enslaved in the United States were released from legalized bondage.
Lewis Hayden
Born into enslavement and separated from his first wife and child by sale, Lewis Hayden was determined to improve both his own life and circumstances, and the lives and circumstances of everyone enslaved in the United States. Hayden taught himself to read, made arrangements with enslavers who also allowed him to work elsewhere and earn savings, and married a second time. Hayden and his family utilized the Underground Railroad in 1844 to escape from Kentucky to Canada, a journey that sometimes required disguising their faces with flour in order to remain undetected. The family returned to the United States soon after their escape, establishing a school for Black children and a church in Detroit, before traveling to Boston and settling down in Beacon Hill. Hayden immediately connected with the abolitionist circles and served as a traveling lecturer for the American Anti-Slavery society for a short time before becoming an executive member of the Boston Vigilance Committee. He and his wife, Harriet, utilized their residence as an Underground Railroad station and assisted countless freedom seekers along their journey through the North, often communicating with other station masters and guides in Essex County. Lewis Hayden was greatly admired and respected by local antislavery circles, and spoken of highly in their remembrances years later- they knew him as one willing to put everything, including his own life, on the line for the protection and safe passage of freedom seekers passing through Boston. Later in his life, he was elected to the 1873 Massachusetts State Legislature, serving for one term.
Henry “Box” Brown
Henry Brown was enslaved in Virginia from the time he was born, working in a tobacco factory and living with his wife, Nancy, and their three children. Though Brown had been paying his enslaver to keep him from selling his family, he was betrayed, and they were separated. In 1849, Brown created a plan to have himself shipped to Philadelphia in a small crate, with the collaboration of James C. A. Smith and Samuel A. Smith, the latter of whom he paid $86 for the shipping. With only meager rations and a single airhole in the box, Brown was shipped from Richmond to Philadelphia in 27 hours, enduring all kinds of shipping transportation methods and uncomfortable angles in the box. Upon his arrival to the address of Passmore Williamson, a member of the Philadelphia Vigilance Committee, Brown’s first words to those awaiting his arrival were “How do you do, gentlemen?” Despite an incredibly uncomfortable journey, his safe escape and passage proved the efficiency and potential liabilities inherent in the mail system of the era, worrying proslavery Americans once Brown’s narrative was made public. Brown eventually began touring with a lecture about his escape, eventually earning the nickname “Box” and taking it on as part of his public moniker.
He became a friend and frequent guest of many Massachusetts abolitionist families and worked on behalf of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. His stay in the North would not last long, however, once the Fugitive Slave Act was enacted in 1850, and Brown made the decision to move his residence to England. It is not clear when exactly he may have stayed at the Dodges’ residence, but it could have been during his work with the Anti-Slavery Society, and potentially during the final weeks in America before his move. Brown eventually married again in England and had a family there before moving them back with him to the United States in 1875. Brown had created his own magic act, and was known as a lecturer and performer with his family in these later years, with the Marblehead Messenger even making note of his upcoming lecture at Lyceum Hall in late October of 1875.
William and Ellen Craft
The Crafts’ story of escape from enslavement was another one of the more famous and sensational narratives of its time. William, who had been enslaved his entire life and separated from his family members through their sales, and Ellen, also born into enslavement but to a white enslaver father and enslaved mixed-race mother, created a plan to disguise Ellen as a white man and have William appear as her enslaved servant in order to travel undetected to Philadelphia. In 1848, the couple escaped Macon, Georgia and their enslavers, Dr. Robert and Eliza Collins, and successfully travelled by train and steamship to the North with little difficulty. They eventually moved to Beacon Hill in Boston and befriended William Lloyd Garrison, along with other local abolitionists and free Black community members. The couple gave numerous talks recounting their escape to audiences in the Northeast, but word eventually reached their former enslavers of their whereabouts, and the Fugitive Slave Act’s passage of 1850 emboldened Dr. Collins to send bounty hunters after William and Ellen. Through the assistance of the Boston Vigilance Committee, the Crafts found sanctuary with numerous families and houses in the area- including with the Haydens and Dodges- before the dangers pursuing them became too great to stay. William and Ellen left Massachusetts in earnest and established a home in England for a number of years, eventually publishing their famous account of escape in London in 1860.
Some refugees established homes in the North, some embarked to places overseas (like the Crafts), and others- many of whom would have traveled through or made contact with towns and cities on the North Shore, headed for Canada. Africville, a prominent Black settlement in Halifax, Nova Scotia, was populated by many families and descendants of those who achieved freedom by fleeing from the United States. Sadly, these residents were denied proper roads, running water, and an effective sewage infrastructure, proving that racism and prejudiced injustices are not America-only inventions. These residents had all been forcibly removed from their homes by local governments in the 1960’s and early 1970’s, and continual protests against this injustice have taken place at Africville since 1970. The endings for those who sought freedom utilizing the Underground Railroad, along with other routes and methods, were not always just ones- and it is of great importance to recognize that popular historic narratives often keep the realities of oppression and enslavement to a minimum in order to favor white supremacy.
The stories in places like Marblehead that have survived into the present day are few, as many who believed injustice was occurring in their country feared speaking up- both for their own safety and for the safety of the freedom seekers they were potentially interacting with- as the punishment for disobeying the prevailing Fugitive Slave Act could be severe. However, there are a few whose names were made known during and after their time, and whose antislavery sentiments have survived. Simeon Dodge, in a letter to Professor Wilbur H. Siebert late in his life, stated simply “I feel ashamed that I have done so little” to combat the systems of injustice in the United States. Samuel Goodwin made such a notable impact on his community that he received an extensive obituary upon his death in 1883. Dr. Samuel Young was still remembered in the Marblehead Messenger after his death in Portland, Maine in 1893. Their dedication towards ending the injustices committed against fellow human beings and changing the economic framework of the United States during their lifetimes is worth remembering and learning from as part of Marblehead’s community history.
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Sources and Further Information:
The Lewis and Harriet Hayden House, 66 Phillips Street, Boston, MA https://www.nps.gov/boaf/learn/historyculture/lewis-and-harriet-hayden-house.htm
Gamage, Virginia Clegg and Priscilla Sawyer Lord, Marblehead: The Spirit of ’76 Lives Here, Chilton Book Company, 1972.
Network to Freedom Program, https://www.nps.gov/subjects/undergroundrailroad/network-to-freedom.htm
Roads, Samuel Jr. The History and Traditions of Marblehead, Marblehead, 1897. Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center via Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/historytradition00road_0/page/n5/mode/2up
Running A Thousand Miles for Freedom; or, The Escape of William and Ellen Craft from Slavery, London, 1860. Boston Public Library via Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/runningthousandm00craf/page/n5/mode/2up
“Safe Harbor: The Maritime Underground Railroad in Boston” via the National Park Service, https://www.nps.gov/articles/maritime-underground-railroad-in-boston.htm
Siebert, Wilbur H. “The Underground Railroad in Massachusetts”, http://pahmusa.mysite.com/The%20Underground%20Railroad%20in%20Massachusetts.pdf
Stearns, Charles. Narrative of Henry Box Brown: Who Escaped from Slavery Enclosed in a Box 3 Feet Long and 2 Wide, Boston, 1849. Boston Public Library via Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/narrativeofhenry00brow
Wilbur H. Siebert Underground Railroad Collection via Ohio History Connection, Marblehead Search https://ohiomemory.org/digital/collection/siebert/search/searchterm/marblehead