On the Edge of Freedom: The Fugitive Slave Issue in South Central Pennsylvania, 1820-1870
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
In On the Edge of Freedom, David G. Smith breaks new ground by illuminating the unique development of antislavery sentiment in south central Pennsylvania-a border region of a border state with a complicated history of slavery, antislavery activism, and unequal freedom. During the antebellum decades every single fugitive slave escaping by land east of the Appalachian Mountains had to pass through the region, where they faced both significant opportunities and substantial risks. While the hundreds of fugitives traveling through south central Pennsylvania (defined as Adams, Franklin, and Cumberland counties) during this period were aided by an effective Underground Railroad, they also faced slave catchers and informers. "Underground" work such as helping fugitive slaves appealed to border antislavery activists who shied away from agitating for immediate abolition in a region with social, economic, and kinship ties to the South.
And, as early antislavery protests met fierce resistance, area activists adopted a less confrontational approach, employing the more traditional political tools of the petition and legal action.
Smith traces the victories of antislavery activists in south central Pennsylvania, including the achievement of a strong personal liberty law and the aggressive prosecution of kidnappers who seized innocent African Americans as fugitives. He also documents how their success provoked Southern retaliation and the passage of a strengthened Fugitive Slave Law in 1850. The Civil War then intensified the debate over fugitive slaves, as hundreds of escaping slaves, called "contrabands" sought safety in the area, and scores were recaptured by the Confederate army during the Gettysburg campaign.
On the Edge of Freedom explores in captivating detail the fugitive slave issue through fifty years of sectional conflict, war, and reconstruction in south central Pennsylvania and provocatively questions what was gained by the activists' pragmatic approach of emphasizing fugitive slaves over immediate abolition and full equality. Smith argues that after the war, social and demographic changes in southern Pennsylvania worked against African Americans achieving equal opportunity, and although local literature portrayed this area as a vanguard of the Underground Railroad, African Americans still lived "on the edge of freedom." By the 1920s, the Ku Klux Klan was rallying near the Gettysburg battlefield, and south central Pennsylvania became, in some ways, as segregated as the Jim Crow South. The fugitive slave issue, by reinforcing images of dependency, may have actually worked against the achievement of lasting social change.
David G. Smith
David G. Smith is a research ecologist with the Conservation and Landscape Ecology Group at The Australian National University, working on the Sustainable Farms project. David manages biodiversity monitoring projects in the Western Murray region of NSW and north-east Victoria. David's research background includes extensive work with reptiles, mammals and birds across Australia, and he has a particular interest in avian biology and ecology. David contributes to several projects outside of the woodlands, including bird and mammal research in Victoria's central highlands and mammal reintroductions and broader biodiversity monitoring and research in Booderee National Park.
Related to On the Edge of Freedom
Related ebooks
On the Edge of Freedom: The Fugitive Slave Issue in South Central Pennsylvania, 1820–1870 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUnification of a Slave State: The Rise of the Planter Class in the South Carolina Backcountry, 1760-1808 Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Defining Moments: African American Commemoration and Political Culture in the South, 1863-1913 Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Amelioration and Empire: Progress and Slavery in the Plantation Americas Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Political Languages of Emancipation in the British Caribbean and the U.S. South Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Heart of Confederate Appalachia: Western North Carolina in the Civil War Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Black Identity and Black Protest in the Antebellum North Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTo Live an Antislavery Life: Personal Politics and the Antebellum Black Middle Class Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Union Indivisible: Secession and the Politics of Slavery in the Border South Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Racial Beachhead: Diversity and Democracy in a Military Town Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsQueering the Underworld: Slumming, Literature, and the Undoing of Lesbian and Gay History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5City of Refuge: Slavery and Petit Marronage in the Great Dismal Swamp, 1763–1856 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBorder Life: Experience and Memory in the Revolutionary Ohio Valley Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Made in Britain: Nation and Emigration in Nineteenth-Century America Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe World They Made Together: Black and White Values in Eighteenth-Century Virginia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Politics of Black Citizenship: Free African Americans in the Mid-Atlantic Borderland, 1817–1863 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClosing the Gate: Race, Politics, and the Chinese Exclusion Act Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Masters of Violence: The Plantation Overseers of Eighteenth-Century Virginia, South Carolina, and Georgia Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCaptives in Gray: The Civil War Prisons of the Union Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Won Cause: Black and White Comradeship in the Grand Army of the Republic Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDark Work: The Business of Slavery in Rhode Island Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5William Still: The Underground Railroad and the Angel at Philadelphia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Black Politics in New Deal Atlanta Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGovernment of Our Own: The Making of the Confederacy Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInterwoven Lives: Indigenous Mothers of Salish Coast Communities Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUrban Dreams, Rural Commonwealth: The Rise of Plantation Society in the Chesapeake Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsManaging White Supremacy: Race, Politics, and Citizenship in Jim Crow Virginia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Making Black Los Angeles: Class, Gender, and Community, 1850-1917 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFinal Passages: The Intercolonial Slave Trade of British America, 1619-1807 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Beneath the Backbone of the World: Blackfoot People and the North American Borderlands, 1720–1877 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Ethnic Studies For You
Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Rock My Soul: Black People and Self-Esteem Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5All About Love: New Visions Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Black Rednecks & White Liberals Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Barracoon: The Story of the Last "Black Cargo" Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Life Sentence: The Brief and Tragic Career of Baltimore’s Deadliest Gang Leader Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Self-Care for Black Women: 150 Ways to Radically Accept & Prioritize Your Mind, Body, & Soul Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Black Like Me: The Definitive Griffin Estate Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Wretched of the Earth Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of the Donner Party Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5100 Amazing Facts About the Negro with Complete Proof Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Our Kind of People: Inside America's Black Upper Class Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Red, White, and Black: Rescuing American History from Revisionists and Race Hustlers Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Spook Who Sat by the Door, Second Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks about Race Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Heavy: An American Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Stories of Rootworkers & Hoodoo in the Mid-South Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Blood of Emmett Till Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Blackout: How Black America Can Make Its Second Escape from the Democrat Plantation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Black Elk: The Life of an American Visionary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5James Baldwin: A Biography Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for On the Edge of Freedom
0 ratings0 reviews