The Messrs. Craft [podcast 5 min 59 sec]
As told by NPR story teller Nate DiMeo..
[Ellen Craft was born in 1926 in Clinton, Georgia, where her mother was a slave, and her father her owner. Her skin was so light that she was often mistaken as being part of her master’s family. This angered her mistress that she was given to her daughter as a wedding gift, and moved to Macon, Georgia to work in the fields.
There, she fell in love with another slave, William, and they got married. They plotted their escape, figuring that if they got far enough from the plantation and from Macon, Ellen could pass as a white woman. However, a 20-something year old white woman traveling alone would have looked weird, and a 20-something year old white woman traveling with a 20-something year old black male was out of the question. So, when they got far enough away from the town, Ellen Craft became a white male.
But cutting her hair and wearing men’s clothing wasn’t enough. She had to learn to talk and walk like a white male, too. Furthermore, she couldn’t read or write. They knew they had to move fast, which meant taking public transportation. By the time they boarded their first train, they figured out how to do it.
A young southern white gentleman had been in a terrible accident and needed to go to Philadelphia for special medical treatment, and he needed his trusted slave William to go with him. The lower part of his face had been terribly injured and needed to be bandaged up, hiding his stubble and Adam’s apple. His leg had also been injured, causing him to walk funny. And his arm was in a sling so when he was asked to sign any travel documents or tickets all he could make was an “x.”
The Craft’s played their parts the whole way to the north, and the Abolitionist press used their story to fight slavery. The Crafts moved to Boston, which was the center of the anti-slavery movement. They would tell their story all over the Northeast and they became very famous doing so.
Therefore, their former owner had no problem finding them. In 1850, Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Law, which made slaves property. And lost property had to be returned, even if that property were in a state where they were free. So therefore, when the former owner of the Crafts sent two agents to hunt them down and bring them back, the city of Boston had to let them – the hunters had warrants and all.
But the people of Boston didn’t have to let them. A group of Abolitionists hid Ellen in another town. And William got a gun and hid in a house of another former slave. So when the agents showed up, they were outnumbered and outgunned by free black men who didn’t care that they had a warrant. And the owner of the house stood in the doorway with a gun and gunpowder and told the agents that he was ready to burn them and himself and his house before he would let them take William Craft.
The slave hunters left town and the Crafts did too – they moved to England to keep writing and telling their story. And three years after the Civil War ended, when the safety of free black Americans was still threatened in much of America, they moved back not to Boston or Philly where they would have been accepted, but to Ways Station, Georgia where she and her husband owned a plantation, grew rice and taught in a school that they founded.]
Read entire article at The Memory Palace
[Ellen Craft was born in 1926 in Clinton, Georgia, where her mother was a slave, and her father her owner. Her skin was so light that she was often mistaken as being part of her master’s family. This angered her mistress that she was given to her daughter as a wedding gift, and moved to Macon, Georgia to work in the fields.
There, she fell in love with another slave, William, and they got married. They plotted their escape, figuring that if they got far enough from the plantation and from Macon, Ellen could pass as a white woman. However, a 20-something year old white woman traveling alone would have looked weird, and a 20-something year old white woman traveling with a 20-something year old black male was out of the question. So, when they got far enough away from the town, Ellen Craft became a white male.
But cutting her hair and wearing men’s clothing wasn’t enough. She had to learn to talk and walk like a white male, too. Furthermore, she couldn’t read or write. They knew they had to move fast, which meant taking public transportation. By the time they boarded their first train, they figured out how to do it.
A young southern white gentleman had been in a terrible accident and needed to go to Philadelphia for special medical treatment, and he needed his trusted slave William to go with him. The lower part of his face had been terribly injured and needed to be bandaged up, hiding his stubble and Adam’s apple. His leg had also been injured, causing him to walk funny. And his arm was in a sling so when he was asked to sign any travel documents or tickets all he could make was an “x.”
The Craft’s played their parts the whole way to the north, and the Abolitionist press used their story to fight slavery. The Crafts moved to Boston, which was the center of the anti-slavery movement. They would tell their story all over the Northeast and they became very famous doing so.
Therefore, their former owner had no problem finding them. In 1850, Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Law, which made slaves property. And lost property had to be returned, even if that property were in a state where they were free. So therefore, when the former owner of the Crafts sent two agents to hunt them down and bring them back, the city of Boston had to let them – the hunters had warrants and all.
But the people of Boston didn’t have to let them. A group of Abolitionists hid Ellen in another town. And William got a gun and hid in a house of another former slave. So when the agents showed up, they were outnumbered and outgunned by free black men who didn’t care that they had a warrant. And the owner of the house stood in the doorway with a gun and gunpowder and told the agents that he was ready to burn them and himself and his house before he would let them take William Craft.
The slave hunters left town and the Crafts did too – they moved to England to keep writing and telling their story. And three years after the Civil War ended, when the safety of free black Americans was still threatened in much of America, they moved back not to Boston or Philly where they would have been accepted, but to Ways Station, Georgia where she and her husband owned a plantation, grew rice and taught in a school that they founded.]