Description

pp. xv, 168, b/w illustrations, “Imagine escaping from the terrors of plantation slavery, only to live for years in a swamp full of biting insects and deadly snakes. Picture yourself making a dangerous journey to freedom, guided by nothing but courage and the North Star. Think of beginning a new life in a new country, only to fall prey to bounty hunters. The stories of the people who made up the Underground Railroad, that amazing network of quiet farm houses, peaceful country lanes, and busy city streets that reached from the slave-owning areas of the southern United States to the free states of the north and on to Canada, are among the most moving in our history. Meet some of the men and women who planned daring and ingenious ways to escape slavery, such as the resourceful Henry “Box” Brown, who mailed himself to Philadelphia_s Anti-Slavery Society in a box, and the strong-willed Harriet Tubman, who fled with nothing more than a scrap of bread and the clothes on her back, and then returned to the south year after year to help others find their way to freedom.”