Underground Railroad

Compiled by faculty and students from the House Divided Project at Dickinson College, this online research guide to the Underground Railroad aims to provide teachers, students and preservationists with easy access to a wide range of free digital tools that can assist in their important work on this topic.  Last updated November 2018

House Divided Project

• Digital Classrooms:  Underground Railroad and Emancipation
• Exhibits:  Henry “Box” Brown and Daniel Anthony
• Field Trips:  Google Earth files
• Videos:  Henry W. Spradley
• Interviews:  Kate Larson on Harriet Tubman and Fergus Bordewich on myths
• Lesson Plans:  K-12 units featuring Runaway Ads
• Research Engine:  Fugitive Slave Law and Underground Railroad
• Graduate seminar:  Numbers  and Handouts

PRIMARY SOURCES

Federal Laws and Codes

• US Constitution: Fugitive Slave Clause (1787) with debate August 28, 1787
• Fugitive Slave Act (1793)
• Fugitive Slave Act (1850)
• US Commissioners (1850s)
• Contraband of War (1861)
• Confiscation Acts (1861-62)
• Revised Articles of War (March 13, 1862)
• Repeal of Fugitive Slave Acts (June 1864) with Senate debate (April)

Supreme Court

• The Amistad (1841)
• Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842) with law review article and full Peters report
• Jones v. Van Zandt (1847)
• Strader v. Graham (1851)
• Moore v. Illinois (1852)
• Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) with multi-media resources
• Ableman v. Booth (1859)

State Laws

• Alabama slavery laws (Hurd)
• Arkansas slavery laws (Hurd)
• California fugitive slave law (1852) with Hurd digest
• Connecticut personal liberty laws (Hurd)
• Delaware slavery laws (Hurd)
• District of Columbia slavery laws (Hurd)
• Florida slavery laws (Hurd)
• Georgia slavery laws (Hurd)
• Illinois black codes with Hurd digest
• Indiana laws (Hurd)
• Iowa black codes with Hurd digest
• Kansas laws (Hurd)
• Kentucky laws (Hurd) and  Slave stealing prisoners
• Louisiana slavery laws (Hurd)
• Maine personal liberty laws (Hurd)
• Maryland fugitive statutes with Hurd digest and 1818 statute
• Massachusetts personal liberty law (1855) with Hurd digest
• Michigan personal liberty laws (Hurd)
• Minnesota laws (Hurd)
• Mississippi slavery laws (Hurd)
• Missouri slavery laws (Hurd) with slave-stealing prisoners
• New Jersey slavery laws (Hurd)
• New York slavery laws (Hurd)
• North Carolina slavery laws (Hurd)
• Ohio personal liberty laws (Hurd)
• Oregon black codes (Hurd)
• Pennsylvania personal liberty law (1826) with Hurd digest
• Rhode Island laws (Hurd)
• South Carolina slavery laws (Hurd)
• Tennessee slavery laws (Hurd)
• Texas slavery laws (Hurd)
• Vermont personal liberty law (1843) with Hurd digest
• Virginia slavery laws (Hurd) with 1850 & 1860 prisoner tables
• Wisconsin personal liberty laws (Hurd)

Teachable Cases

• Johnson v. Tompkins (US Circuit Court, ED PA, 1833) with summary
• Frederick Douglass (Baltimore, MD, 1838) with 1845 version and map
• Thompson, Work & Burr (Palmyra, MO, 1841) with memoir & Twain connection
• George and Rebecca Latimer (Norfolk, VA, 1842)
• Richard Eells (also Eels) Case (Quincy, IL, 1842-43), later Moore v. Illinois
• John L. Brown (South Carolina, 1843-4)
• Charles Torrey (Baltimore, MD, 1844) with Letter from Baltimore Jail
• Jonathan Walker (Pensacola, FL, 1844) with daguerreotype and poem
• Calvin Fairbank and Delia Webster (Lexington, KY, 1844-45) with memoir
• McClintock Riot (Carlisle, PA, 1847) with post and video
• Matson Slave Case (Coles Co, Illinois, 1847) with resource center
• Crosswhite / Gorham case (Marshall, MI, 1847-48) w/ recollection & bio
• Daggs Slave Case (Salem, IA, 1848) with post
• The Pearl Escape (Washington, DC, 1848) with article
• William and Ellen Craft (Macon, GA, 1848) with memoir
• Thomas Garrett and John Hunn (Wilmington, DE, 1848)
• Henry “Box” Brown (Richmond, VA, 1849) with post, exhibit, tour, & images
• Adam Gibson (Philadelphia, PA, 1850)
• George F. Alberti, Kidnapper (Philadelphia, 1850)
• Shadrach Minkins (Boston, MA, 1851) with post
• Thomas Sims (Boston, MA, 1851) with trial pamphlet and reaction
• Christiana Treason Trial (Lancaster Co, PA, 1851) with post, map and models
• Jerry Rescue (Syracuse, NY, 1851)
• Wilkes-Barre Fugitive Case (Wilkes-Barre, PA, 1853) w/ article & PA SC opinion
• Anthony Burns (Boston, MA, 1854)
• Weimer v. Sloane (Sandusky, OH, 1854) with description and recollection
• Stephen Pembrook (New York, NY, 1854)
• Joshua Glover and Sherman Booth (Milwaukee, WI, 1854)
• Harriet Tubman and her brothers (Cambridge, MD, 1854) with handout
• Rosetta case (Cincinnati, OH, 1855) with Ex parte Robinson (John McLean)
• Jane Johnson and Passmore Williamson (Philadelphia, PA, 1855)
• Dick Rutherford Case  (Burlington, IA, 1855)
• Margaret Garner (Cincinnati, OH, 1856) with description
• Abraham Galloway (Wilmington, NC 1857)
• Addison White (Mechanicsburg, OH, 1857) with newspaper accounts A & B
• Frederick Clements (Springfield, IL, 1857) with newspaper report
• Daniel Prue and John Hite kidnapping (Geneva, NY, 1857) with report (col 6)
• John Price and Oberlin-Wellington Rescue (Oberlin, OH, 1858-59)
• Eliza Grayson & Stephen Nuckolls (Nebraska City, NE, 1858) with article and site
• Daniel Webster (Philadelphia, 1859)
• John Brown (Vernon Co, MO, 1858)
• John Brown (Harpers Ferry, VA, 1859)
• Logan Brothers (kidnappers and capturers of John E. Cook) (Franklin Co, 1859)
• Robert E. Lee and Wesley Norris (Arlington, VA, 1859)
• Jackson Whitney (Springfield, KY, 1859) –letter from Canada
• Jim Gray and John Hossack (Ottawa, IL, 1859-60) with speech at sentencing
• Charles Nalle (Troy, NY, 1860) with news report and book
• Moses Horner (Honner) w/ Jeremiah Buck  and Banneker men (Philadelphia, 1860)
• Harris Family (Chicago, IL, 1861) with reports from New York and Chicago
• Contrabands: Baker, Mallory & Townsend  (Fort Monroe, VA, 1861)
• Lucy Bagby (Cleveland, OH, 1861)
• Prince Rivers (Beaufort, SC, 1862) with Google exhibit
• Anna Harrison Chase (Caroline Co, VA, 1862)
• James T. Ayers (Huntsville, AL, 1864)
• Jourdan Anderson (Big Spring, TN 1865) –the now-famous letter

Case Compilations 

• Freedmen Inquiry Commission (1863) and Report on Refugees (1864)
• Paul Finkelman, ed., Fugitive Slaves and American Courts (2007)
• Samuel J. May, ed., Fugitive Slave Law and Its Victims (1856)
• Marion Gleason McDougall, Fugitive Slaves, 1619-1865 (1891)
• William Still, Underground Railroad (1872) with McGowan Index and Temple U

Vigilance Records and Fugitive Journals

• Boston:  Vigilance accounts (1850-55)
• Delaware County, Ohio:  Daniel Osborn’s journal (1844)
• New York:  Sydney Gay’s Record of Fugitives (1855)
• Philadelphia:  Record of Cases (1839-44) and Journal C, Station 2 (1852-57)

Prints & Photographs

Newspapers & Periodicals

• Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 1841-1955 (Brooklyn PL)
• California Digital Newspaper Collection (Veridian)
• Chronicling America / Newspapers (LoC) with UPenn Index
• Early British Journals (Oxford)
• Historical Newspapers –Washington Co, MD with essay (WashCo Library)
• House Divided research engine:  Newspapers (Dickinson)
• The Liberator (1831-65) (Fair Use Repository)
• Making of America (Cornell)
• Making of America (Michigan)
• New South Newspaper: Port Royal (1862-66) (Univ South Carolina)
• New York newspapers (Tom Tryniski) –FYI, see video
• PA Civil War Era Newspapers (Penn State)
• Richmond Daily Dispatch (1861-65) (U Richmond)
• Secession Era Editorials (Furman)
• Signal of Liberty (1841-48) (Bentley Historical)

Government Records & Miscellaneous

• African American Experience in Ohio (Ohio History)
• Afro-Louisiana History, 1719-1820 (Gwendolyn Hall)
• John Brown / Boyd Stutler Collection (West Virginia)
• Century of Lawmaking / Congressional Globe (LoC)
• Executions 1826-1850 and 1851-1900 (Death Penalty USA)
• Freedmen’s Bureau Records (NARA / FamilySearch)
• Freedmen & Society Society Project (UMaryland)
• Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History (GLI)
• HERB: Social History (CUNY)
• Historical Census Browser (UVA)
• Illinois Servitude & Emancipation Records (IL Secy State)
• Territorial Kansas Online, 1854-1861 (Kansas State Historical)
• Official Records: War of Rebellion –Fugitive Slaves 1861-62 (Simmons)
• Race & Slavery Petitions (UNC/Greensboro)
• Slavery Era Insurance Registry (State of California)
• St. Louis Circuit Court Freedom Suit Files (Missouri Archives)
• Texas Runaway Slave Project (East Texas Research Center)
• Transatlantic Slave Trade Database (Emory)
• Valley of the Shadow (UVA)
• Voting America (Richmond)

Gilder Lehrman Institute (GLI) [free with registration]

• Advert:  Runaway Slave (1860)
• Broadside:  Read and Ponder Fugitive Slave Law (1850)
• Exhibit:  Dred Scott Decision (1857)
• Letter:  African American protest (1850)
• Letter:  Gerrit Smith circular (1851)
• Letter: James W.C. Pennington (1851)
• Letter: Charles Suttle to James Buchanan (1857)
• Notes:  Pierce Butler Papers / fugitive clause (1787)
• Essay (with sources): UGRR and Coming of War (Pinsker)

Letters & Diaries

• Frederick Douglass Papers (LoC)
• Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln  (ALA)
• Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln (PAL)
• Abraham Lincoln Papers (LoC)
• AL to Chase 6/9, Chase to AL 6/13 and AL to Chase 6/20 on fugitive law (1859)
• AL to Schuyler Colfax “for your eye only” July 6 (1859) with Colfax reply
• John Gilmer to AL, Dec. 1860 with AL reply on personal liberty laws (1860)
• Owen Lovejoy Letters & Writings (Ed. by William & Jane Moore, 2004)
• Witness for Freedom: African American Voices (Ed. by Ripley/Finkenbine 1993)
• Quakers & Slavery (Bryn Mawr/Haverford/Swarthmore)

Speeches & Pamphlets

• Black Abolitionist Archive (UDetroit/Mercy)
• Frederick Douglass, Fugitive Slave Law speech to Free Soil Convention (1852)
• Charles D. Drake, Personal Liberty Laws (1861)
• Samuel G. Howe, Refugees from Canada (1864)
• John Hurd, Law of Freedom and Bondage (1862)
• Abraham Lincoln, First Inaugural Address (1861)
• Samuel J. May, ed., Fugitive Slave Law and Its Victims (1856)
• Samuel J. May Anti-Slavery Pamphlets (Cornell)
• Joel Parker, Personal Liberty Laws (1861)
• Robert Purvis denouncing David Paul Brown, Sr. (1857)
• Charles Sumner, Report of Senate Committee on Slavery (1864)
• Lewis Tappen, Fugitive Slave Bill and James Hamlet (1850)
• Slaves and the Courts (LoC)
• Slavery & Abolition (Dickinson)
• Secession Declaration (Civil War Trust)
• Sen. Daniel Webster on proposed fugitive law, July 17 (1850)
• Justice Levi Woodbury, Charge to Grand Jury (1851)

19th-Century Books

• Google Books (Google) with Ngram Viewer
• HathiTrust Digital Library (HathiTrust)
• Internet Archive with Open Library and Wayback Machine
• Project Gutenberg

Recollections

• Henry “Box” Brown, Narrative with Stearns (1849), By Himself (1851)
• Thomas Brown, Three Years in the Kentucky Prisons (1857)
• William Wells Brown, Narrative (1847)
• Levi Coffin, Reminiscences (1880)
• William and Ellen Craft, Running a Thousand Miles (1860)
• Frederick Douglass, Narrative (1845), My Bondage (1855), Life & Times (1881)
• Benjamin Drew, A North-Side View of Slavery (1856)
• Calvin Fairbank, The Rev. Calvin Fairbank During Slavery Times (1890)
• Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1860)
• Jermain W. Loguen, Rev. J.W. Loguen as Slave and Freeman (1859)
• Solomon Northup, Twelve Years a Slave (1853)
• William Otter, History of My Own Times (1835 / 1995 ed)
• James W.C. Pennington, Fugitive Blacksmith (1849)
• Rush Sloane, Underground Railroad of the Firelands (1888)
• Thomas Smallwood, A Narrative of Thomas Smallwood (1851)
• William Still, Underground Railroad (1872) with McGowan Index and Temple U
• Peter Still with Kate E. R. Pickard, The Kidnapped and the Ransomed (1856)
• George Thompson, Prison Life and Reflections (1849/1857)
• North American Slave Narratives (DocSouth / UNC)
• Slave Narratives: Online Anthology (UVA)
• Slave Narratives from WPA (1936-38) (LoC)
• Southern Homefront, 1861-1865 (DocSouth / UNC)
• Siebert Underground Railroad Collection (Ohio History)

 

Arts and Literature

• William Wells Brown, “The Escape” (1858) with handout (NHC)
• Ellwood Griest, John and Mary, or The Fugitive Slaves (1873)
• Harriet Beecher Stowe and Uncle Tom’s Cabin with essay (GLI)
• John Greenleaf Whittier, Anti-Slavery Poems (1848-88)
• Walt Whitman and Fugitive Slave Law

SECONDARY SOURCES

Harriet Tubman

• • Biography by Catherine Clinton (2004)
  • Biography by Kate Larson (2004) with Essential Curriculum summary
  • Memory study by Milton Sernett (2007)
  • America’s Library Tubman Profile (for younger students)
  • TEACHABLE DOC: Revealing letter about Tubman’s operations (1854)
  • TEACHABLE DOC: Early letter calls Tubman a “hero” (1857)
  • TEACHABLE DOC: Tubman’s Civil War pension claim (1898)
  • ARTIFACTS:  Tubman relics at Smithsonian with article and video
  • CASE: Escape with brothers (Cambridge, MD, 1854) with handout
  • CASE:  Charles Nalle (Troy, NY, 1860) with news report and book
  • Myth-making biography by Sarah H. Bradford (1886)
  • NPS Historic Site (Cambridge, MD)

Historic Sites & Museums

• National Park Service:  Network to Freedom
• National Park Service:  Featured Sites
• Princeton, IL:  Owen Lovejoy Homestead
• Indiana:  UGRR Sites
• Fountain City, IN:  Levi Coffin House
• Iowa:  Underground Railroad Pathways (IPTV)
• Iowa:  Existing UGRR Structures
• Iowa:  John Brown’s Last Trip (1859)
• West Des Moines, IA:  Jordan House
• Kansas:  Lane Trail
• Baltimore, MD:  Frederick Douglass Google Map Tour
• Nebraska:  Nebraska Network to Freedom Sites
• Nebraska:  John Brown’s Cave
• New York: Network to Freedom Map
• Brooklyn, NY: “On The Trail of Brooklyn’s UGRR,”
• Brooklyn, NY:  Historical Society Abolitionist Exhibit
• Syracuse, NY:  Syracuse University Library
• Cincinati, OH:  National Underground Railroad Freedom Center
• Carlisle, PA:  Old Courthouse Video
• Lancaster, PA:  Stevens-Smith Site
• South-Central, PA:  UGRR Google Map Tour

Myths, Memory, Folklore and Monuments

• NY Times, “In Douglass Tribute, Slave Folklore and Fact Collide” (2007)
• Fergus Bordewich on quilt code myths (2007)
• Leigh Fellner website / e-book on UGRR Quilt Code (2006)
• Joel Bresler website on Follow the Drinking Gourd myths (2008-12)
• Scholastic on Myths of the Underground Railroad (2015)
• Ethan Kytle and Carl Geissert on post-war UGRR memories (2015)

Classroom Resources

• MODELS:  Dean Eastman’s Primary Research (Beverly, MA)
• MODELS:  Barry Jurgensen’s Forever Free Project (Arlington, NE)
• MODELS:  Megan VanGorder’s Lincoln’s Bloomington (Bloomington, IL)
• LESSONS: Teaching with Primary Sources (EIU / LoC)
• LESSONS:  K-12 units with Runaway Ads (House Divided)
• LESSONS:  Network to Freedom (NPS)
• GAMES: Flight to Freedom simulation (Bowdoin College)
• GAMES: Underground Railroad interactive (National Geographic)
• GAMES: Escape from Slavery (Scholastic)
• MAPS:  Interactive UGRR (Houghton Mifflin)
• MAPS:  Contraband Camps (NPS)
• MAPS:  Mid-Atlantic Black Communities (House Divided)
• BLOG:  Stealing Freedom Along Mason-Dixon Line (Milt Diggins)
• REF: BlackPast.org:  Online Guide to African American History (2007-)
• REF: Mary Ellen Snodgrass, Underground Railroad Encyclopedia (2015)
• VIDEOS:  Clips from PBS series, “The Abolitionists” (2013)
• VIDEOS:  Full PBS film, “William Still Story” (55 mins) (2012)

Full Text Journal Articles

• Joseph Borome, “Vigilant Committee of Philadelphia” PMHB (1968)
• Larry Gara, “William Still and the Underground Railroad,” Pa History (1961)
• Michael Wayne, “Black Population of Canada West,” HS/SH (1995)
• Paul Finklemna, “Sorting Out Prigg v. Pennsylvania,” Rutgers L Rev (1993)
• Paul Finkelman, “States’ Rights, Southern Hypocrisy,” Akron Law Rev (2012)
• James & Lois Horton, “A Federal Assault: 1850 Law,” Chi/Kent Law Rev (1992)
• Harold Schwartz, “Fugitive Slave Days in Boston,” New Eng Q (1954)
• Julius Yanuck, “Force Act in Pennsylvania,” PMHB (1968)

Classic Scholarship (Full View)

• Alice Dana Adams, Neglected Period of Anti-Slavery, 1808-1831 (1908)
• Sarah H. Bradford, Harriet: The Moses of Her People (1886)
• William Greenleaf Eliot, The Story of Archer Alexander (1885)
• Frank Edward Kittredge, The Man with the Branded Hand (1899)
• Marion Gleason McDougall, Fugitive Slaves, 1619-1865 (1891)
• Wilbur H. Siebert, The Underground Railroad (1899) with Collection and Index
• R.C. Smedley, History of the Underground Railroad (1883)

Modern Books (Partial View)

• H. Robert Baker, The Rescue of Joshua Glover (2006)
• R.J.M. Blackett, Making Freedom (2013)
• David Blight, A Slave No More (2007)
• Fergus M. Bordewich, Bound for Canaan (2005)
• Stanley W. Campbell, The Slave Catchers (1968)
• Scott Christianson, Freeing Charles (2010)
• Gary L. Collison, Shadrach Minkins (1997)
• Catherine Clinton, Harriet Tubman (2004)
• Paul Finkelman, An Imperfect Union (2000)
• Eric Foner, Gateway to Freedom (2015)
• John Hope Franklin & Loren Schweninger, Runaway Slaves (1999)
• Harriet C. Frazier, Runaway and Freed Missouri Slaves (2004)
• Larry Gara, The Liberty Line (1961)
• Keith P. Griffler, Front Line of Freedom (2004)
• Kathryn Grover, Fugitive’s Gibralter (2001)
• Stanley Harrold, Border War (2010)
• Graham Hodges, David Ruggles (2010)
• James and Lois Horton, In Hope of Liberty (1998)
• Walter Johnson, Soul By Soul (1999)
• Steven Lubet, Fugitive Justice (2010)
• Thomas Morris, Free Men All: Personal Liberty Laws (1974)
• Sydney Nathans, To Free a Family (2012)
• James Oakes, The Scorpion’s Sting (2014)
• Mark Reinhardt, Who Speaks for Margaret Garner? (2010)
• Randolph Runyan, Delia Webster (1996)
• Matthew Salafia, Slavery’s Borderland (2013)
• Philip J. Schwartz, Slave Laws in Virginia (2010)
• Thomas P. Slaughter, Bloody Dawn (1991)
• David G. Smith, On the Edge of Freedom (2013)
• John Stauffer, The Black Hearts of Men (2001)
• Nikki Taylor, Frontiers of Freedom (2005)
• Albert Von Frank, The Trials of Anthony Burns (1998)
• Jean Fagan Yellin, Harriet Jacobs (2004)

Eric Foner’s Gateway To Freedom (2015)

• • Partial View Text via Google Books
  • Columbia U. Archives:  Sydney Gay’s Record of Fugitives (1855)
  • New York Times, “Eric Foner Revisits Myths,” January 14, 2015
  • Politico, “When the South Wasn’t a Fan of States’ Rights,” January 23, 2015
  • Review by Adam Goodheart for The Atlantic, March 2015
  • Interview with History Channel (Video // 2:45 min)
  • C-SPAN “After Words” Interview, March 22, 2015 (Video // 130 min)
  • Conversation with David Blight at Yale, April 17, 2015 (Video // 96 min)
  • New York Times, “On The Trail of Brooklyn’s UGRR,” October 12, 2007
  • New York State Network to Freedom Map

Related Works by Matthew Pinsker

• Vigilance in Pennsylvania (PHMC, 2000)
• William Still (Clarke Center, 2003)
• Underground Railroad: A New Definition (NEH, 2006-11)
• Underground Railroad and Coming of Civil War (Gilder Lehrman, 2010)
• Emancipation Moments (NTHP / USCRC, 2013)
• Panel video: Underground Railroad Reconsidered (CUNY, 2014)
• Interpreting the Upper-Ground Railroad (Rowman & Littlefield, 2015)
• Did the End of Civil War Mean the End of Slavery? (Smithsonian, 2015)

Additional Suggestions

Please use the comment form below to suggest any additional sites or free digital collections related to the Underground Railroad that might be useful for this guide.