The Underground Railroad Movement Of The South

Before the Civil War, the American slave industry in the South was thriving with over 4 million enslaved. The slaves’ lives consisted of constant arduous labor and slaves lacked any sort of freedom. Slaves in America were continuously oppressed by the American people and were used as a source of profit. Many laws and legislation, including the Fugitive Slave Acts, were passed purposefully aimed to keep freed and current slaves at a disadvantage. Liberated slaves and some Northerners wanted to end slavery and created things like the Underground Railroad to help enslaved Americans escape and gain liberation. Even with the help of abolitionists, the conditions of the life of a slave prior to the Civil War was defiling and inhumane.

The Underground Railroad was created and ran by Harriet Tubman. The route was a secret pathway that navigated through forests and hills. Nobody knew of this path but a few people. In the middle of the night, operators who worked on the Underground Railroad would come and rescue slaves and lead them to safety. The only fear was getting caught, if the slaves for one of the trail operators got caught, the plantation owners would torture them for information. Some of the slaves wanted to turn back out of fear of getting caught, but the operators warned them that they would be tortured for information. The Underground Railroad frightened slave owners and plantation owners in the South. “Never look back”, that was a quote that the conductors used while herding slaves to the north. “I never lost a slave.” -Harriet

The Underground Railroad was a huge success lasting for decades and freed around one hundred thousand slaves by 1850 (History.com). The events of the railroad happened all over the country, each trip different and all routes kept secret, but slaves from the South would escape in small groups of three to five in an attempt to pass the Ohio River to Northern Free states. Slaves mainly traveled by foot in small groups, occasionally a slave would travel by boat or train, but wagon or foot was easiest as the night provided cover and there were set up safe houses (Wikipedia). The underlying causes of the Underground Railroad was as a means of escape from the harsh lives most slaves lived. The events that caused the construction of the Underground Railroad are unknown but is believed to be started by Quakers in the late 1700s (History.com). The Underground Railroad was a huge success bringing thousands of slaves into freedom a year, giving them hope for a better

The Underground Railroad was a path to safety and freedom for thousands of slaves before the Civil War. Escaping from the chains, confinement and abuse of slavery was no easy task and it took the cooperation of many people

The Underground Railroad was a passage to freedom for the slaves which made the slave-owners exasperate. The slaves had to risk their lives while travelling to the northern states but it was worth it as the result of such hard work was freedom. The underground railroad, a secret network running from the Deep South through the free states and to the Canadian border that helped slaves escape from the slave-holding states before the Civil War, allowed abolitionists and their allies to help runaway slaves, made "conductors" like Harriet Tubman famous, and reached its height after the passage of the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act.

The Underground Railroad which many of you have heard the term before in your history classes was actually started around 1780. The Civil War started in 1861 many years later this passage contributed to the war. The Underground Railroad was a word that was used to describe a network of places to meet, unknown routes, passages and safe homes used by slave to escape into Canada from the United States for freedom. The Railroad was estimated to free 1,000 slaves a year in total the freed an estimated 100,000 between 1810 and 1850. The “conductors” of the railroad would act as a slave and go on the plantation and would convince slaves that they were slaves and could be free with their help but they would need to do as

The Underground Railroad was an intricate system of households and farmhouses alike that were all connected throughout many towns and villages in the mid 1800s. It was formed by the common goal of people taking a stand against the law and helping thousands of black slaves escape from the south to gain their rightful freedom in the north. This happened because many people began to see slaves as human beings with value, rather than brutes that were valued less than a human. Throughout the mid 1800s, there were many cases of runaway slaves attempting to escape to freedom without anywhere to hide or anyone to help. A lot of people realized that this was a very impactful movement so they began to open up their minds and homes to these fugitive slaves as an attempt to help them make it into the north. Many people helped these runaway slaves because they believed it was morally right, that black oppression was a crime; slaves held value and deserved to keep their family together and lead a life as any other man or woman would, and former slaves shed light on these critical issues.

A journey of hundreds of miles lies before you, through swamp, forest and mountain pass. Your supplies are meager, only what can be comfortably carried so as not to slow your progress to the Promised Land – Canada. The stars and coded messages for guidance, you set out through the night, the path illuminated by the intermittent flash of lightning. Without a map and no real knowledge of the surrounding area, your mind races before you and behind you all at once. Was that the barking of the slavecatchers’ dogs behind you or just the pounding rain and thunder? Does each step bring you closer to freedom or failure?

The Underground Railroad is one of the most important things created in black history. It was secret passages, and safe houses, places used to help people escape from slavery, before slavery was abolished after the Civil War. The Underground railroad was one thing that was very important leading up to the Civil War. We would not still be talking about this topic if it was not important. Black history is filled with hate, suffering, and fighting for equality. The Underground Railroad gave some slaves sense of hope; hope that they could escape the tragedy in their lives, and to live a better one. So in what ways did the Underground Railroad impact slave-owners, and slaves themselves? What kinds of people did the Underground Railroad affect? Also, why was getting to the North so important and how were fugitive slaves helped?

"Oppressed slaves should flee and take Liberty Line to freedom." The Underground Railroad began in the 1780s while Harriet Tubman was born six decades later in antebellum America. The Underground Railroad was successful in its quest to free slaves; it even made the South pass two acts in a vain attempt to stop its tracks. Then, Harriet Tubman, an African-American with an incredulous conviction to lead her people to the light, joins the Underground Railroad’s cause becoming one of the leading conductors in the railroad. The Underground Railroad and Harriet Tubman aided in bringing down slavery and together, they put the wood in the fires leading up to the Civil War. The greatest causes of the Civil War were the Underground Railroad

The Underground Railroad was the name used to describe a network of secret routes and safe houses used to help African American slaves escape into free states and Canada. Many slaves risked their lives to be free. Slavery began during the American Revolution and near the end of the Civil War when millions of African Americans were captured from Africa and were forced onto slave ships that sailed across the Atlantic Ocean to North America to be sold into slavery. Before the underground railroad, if slaves did try to escape, they’d soon return tired, hungry, and unable to survive on the run as a fugitive. The underground railroad was their only hope of becoming a free person. It was given the name “underground railroad” because everything

The underground railroad was formed as a result of the harsh and legal repercussions faced by recaptured slaves as stated in the Fugitive Slave

During the 19th century, America became polarized over the issue of slavery. The South identified as pro-slavery, while the North was opposed to it. The Underground Railroad was established in the early 1800’s after the end of the American Revolution. Aided by people involved in the Abolitionist Movement, the Underground Railroad helped many slaves escape bondage. This was not an actual railroad nor underground, rather a term used to describe a vast network of secret routes, safe places, and people sympathetic to the cause. The Underground Railroad ran until the 1860’s reaching its peak right before the Civil War began (Malaspina).

“The Underground Railroad was the term used to describe a network of meeting places, secret routes, passageways, and safe houses used by slaves in the U.S. to escape slaveholding states to northern states and Canada.”(History.Net Editors, Paragraph #1). A trip on the Underground Railroad was full of danger. The slaves wanted to get away from their slave owners. Most of this usually happened at night. The big conflict was over the South and North disagreeing about whether slavery should be permitted. It was mainly the South who wanted slaves. This was so they could have people work for them without paying them. The South liked this because they could save their money to buy more slaves

The simple fact is that everybody has heard of the Underground Railroad, but not everyone knows just what it was. First of all, it wasn=t underground, and it wasn=t even a railroad. The term AUnderground Railroad,@ actually refers to a path along which escaping slaves were passed from farmhouse to storage sheds, from cellars to barns, until they reached safety in the North. One of the most widely known abolitionists in history is a slave by the name of Harriet Tubman. She is best known as the conductor of the Underground Railroad and risked her life to help free nearly 300 slaves. The primary importance of the Underground Railroad was the ongoing fight to abolish slavery, the start of the Civil War,