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Events
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STEAL AWAY TO FREEDOM, JULY 30 AUGUST 1, 2004
The "Steal Away to Freedom" conference in Greenwich, New York, will begin
on Friday afternoon, July 30. Plans for the conference include walking
tours, exhibits, dance, drama and storytelling. Lectures on Saturday
include Tiffany Patterson, (Binghamton University) on "Making Sense of
Freedom: Life After Slavery for Runaways in Canada in the 19th Century,"
Cliff Oliver on URR Research, Jane Williamson (Rokeby Museum) on "Cross Border Networks," Ted Corbell on "The Canadian Experience," and Fergus
Bordewich on "Bound for Canaan." The Sunday event will be a bus tour of
local sites.
For conference details, including an on-line registration form, go to:
http://www.stealawaytofreedom.com/
INDIANA URR SUMMIT, AUGUST 13-14, 2004
The fourth annual Indiana Underground Railroad Summit, co-hosted this year
with the Michigan Freedom Train Commission, will be held August 13 and 14
at the Northern Indiana Center for History.
For information or for a registration form, please contact Jeannie
Regan-Dinius at 317/232-1646 or [email protected].
NEW BOOK ON URR IN DELAWARE, MARYLAND AND WEST VIRGINIA
Stackpole Books has just published William J. Switala, Underground Railroad
in Delaware, Maryland and West Virginia, a companion to Switala's earlier
book, The Underground Railroad in Pennsylvania.
QUILTS AND THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD?
Quilt expert Leigh Fellner has updated her article on the existence of a
"quilt code". The text of the article is available on the web at:
http://hartcottagequilts.com/railroad.htm
For more discussion on this topic, see recent postings to the "Underground
Railroad Research Forum" at Afrigeneas: http://www.afrigeneas.com/forum-ugrr
WILLIAM INGRAM, PETERSBURG, VIRGINIA, URR AGENT?
The Friends Intelligencer (10th Month 8, 1904), 650-1, reported the death of William Ingram at Telford, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. The
Intelligencer reprinted an article from "a local paper" which included the
following: "In the stormy times before the Civil War William Ingram was one
of the best-known characters in the Southern States. His presence in a town
was generally followed by the mysterious disappearance of the most
intelligent and valuable slaves. He pursued his business of tea-selling
during the daytime, but when the first dark came, he started a little group
of negroes on their way to Canada. According to his carefully-kept records,
exactly two hundred slaves were set free by his efforts, and enable to
reach the North without being recaptured. As might be expected, he had
narrow escapes while carrying out his own private policy of emancipation.
His house and store at Petersburg, Va., were burned over his head. He was
arrested several times and spent a number of days in prison. In one town he
was driven out with threats of tar and feathers if he dared to return. He
promptly accepted the challenge, came back a few days later, and brought
away with him one of the highest-priced slaves in the town, one who had a
local reputation as an evangelist. William Ingram was an Englishman by
birth. At the time that "Uncle Tom's Cabin" first appeared, he was
generally pointed out as the original of the Quaker in Mrs. Stowe's story."
Anyone know of this individual? He's outside my area of research. I did
check the Quaker records in Philadelphia, and found that William Ingam and
wife Jane were received as members of Philadelphia Monthly Meeting
(Hicksite) in 1872, which suggests that they had not previously been
members of the Religious Society of Friends. This puts the claim of his
being identified as a Quaker at the time of the publication of Uncle Tom's
Cabin in doubt.
Christopher Densmore, July 16, 2004
Friends Historical Library
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