Slavery

In a book To Kill Mokingbird, the writer’s intention was to talk about the amount of racism in Alabama history, where there were many events that show how aggressive the whites are toward blacks. Their definition and belief is that differing ideas, beliefs, convictions, and actions are what elevate the value of a particular group or category at the expense of other groups, based on inherited things related to people’s abilities, typologies or habits.

Their reliance on skin color, culture, place of residence, habits, language, or beliefs. It can also give the right to the category that has been raised by controlling other groups in their destinies, identities and depriving their rights and disrespect without a right or a clear cause. But in this article has been the events of what they lived in Alabama for many years, some of the influential events that were unfair to Africans, including some positions and defense by the white, and then the presence of KKK period of horror and massacres against Africans, followed by the duration of suffering that they have to If Martin Luther was a leader of the revolution and a beginning to have the rights to live and life. The novel ‘To Kill Mokingbird ‘ traces an important aspect of the history of the United States of America to the policy of apartheid, as well as human values and models of innocence and the perseverance of a man who risks everything he has to defend his beliefs.

The meaning of the author of this article is to know and document the duration of the changes that have taken place since the ancient time that Harper Lee talked about in her book to kill Mokingbird, to our present time, childish external living, and children’s innocence and love for learning and participation. For example, when Scout and Jem shared their father Atticus their opinion, talk with him and learn from his culture and constructive ideas.

There are some dramatic and dramatic events, such as the adventures of Scout and Jem abroad, and the events that happen to them, for example, when going to the house of Boo Radley, and including the trumped-up charge of Tom from the white woman, and the attempt to avenge Malaya’s father from the children of Atticus. What made the article more influential is the presence of emotions and feelings in the expression of the story, and try to document events with similar events at the time, this makes the reader more sad and affected that they lived injustice and enslavement. The writer wrote a message that luck is not always an ally of Africans there was not a lot of those who help and defend them as did Atticus with Tom, in a similar story, “the 1934 trial of a black man, Walter Lett, accused of raping a white woman.

The case was shaky, the woman unreliable, no hard evidence; yet Walter Lett was convicted and sentenced to death. Before he was electrocuted, calls for clemency proved successful; but by then Lett had been languishing on Death Row too long, within earshot of the screams of doomed men down the hall, and he was driven mad. He died in an Alabama hospital in 1937” (Monroeville). His innocence was late after he received torture and slow death. The most important thing that led me to the article is the sharpness of words and the sharpness of the language, the insistence on remembering a harsh past that we should not even accept to repeat itself.

The article considered that it was to make the reader aware that the mistakes of old times should not be committed. We can not accept injustice and cruelty, in dealing with people in fact they are like us and there is no difference between each other.One of the most changing events in African life was in 1955, when a black woman named Rosa Parks and a white man were killed in a bus. The woman refused to leave her seat to the white passenger in accordance with the racial discrimination laws. The blacks, led by Martin Luther King, they boycotted all the buses in Montgomery for two years and until 1956. The case was brought to the United States Supreme Constitutional Court, which abolished the racial discrimination laws on transportation. After this victory, Martin Luther King emerged as a strong leader around whom blacks gathered throughout the United States. Blacks were not allowed to engage in violence or riots even if the violence was self-defense.

King organized the demonstrations in protest against every apartheid incident. King succeeded in passing laws to prevent black and white segregation in restaurants, entertainment venues and parks. In response to Martin Luther King’s peaceful approach, some white fanatics burned churches frequented by blacks, homes and restaurants, and abducted and killed innocent blacks. This violence has led to both blacks and whites surrounding the leader Martin Luther King.In 1965, King led a peaceful demonstration from Selma to Montgomery, protesting that black citizens were not granted the right to elect their representatives on state and US Congress. As a result of this demonstration, a law was passed that gives the right to elections to all citizens regardless of the colors of their skins.

In 1963, the Supreme Constitutional Court approved the admission of black schools and universities to blacks. However, state governor George Dallas prevented two black students from attending high school in Alabama and then prevented other students from joining the University of Alabama, prompting President Kennedy to intervene through the National Guard to resolve the problem.King led the path of peaceful resistance to social and electoral rights for blacks, a process that culminated in the 1979 election of Black Mayor Richard Arrington of Birmingham, more than ten years after the assassination of leader King by a white fanatic. But this progress was a miracle and a message of human peace that brought together and loved people.

This is why the writing of the article and the reminder of the meaning. In my opinion the title of To Kill Mokingbird was about the Mokingbird nice and beautiful and good sound that does not hurt anyone, but in fact is a metaphor for the Africans they are people with feelings and conscience and there is no difference between them and another, and the meaning of why they were killed innocent people do not assault anyone, are they guilty only because they have a different skin color! What a backwardness. Despite the success of black Americans in the elimination of slavery and apartheid, their society is still suffering from the manifestations of lagging and many problems of American standards.

Half a century after Martin Luther King’s historic speech ‘I have a Dream,’ the difficult living conditions of blacks in America are still there. But it is hard to say that the black American has won all the rights and opportunities for his white counterpart. Yes, the living conditions of blacks have generally improved, but the differences remain stark.What America has seen in the past and so far there are some white fanatics and a lot of racism is an accurate translation of what Martin Luther King, the historic leader of American blacks, said that “Riots are a language that is not heard”(King, M). From here, the struggle of blacks and other non-believers becomes an ongoing process even if a black American arrives at the White House throne. ‘There is no such thing as a struggle for a small, temporary or temporary right, but there is a permanent struggle for a human being. God created him free and he has to live free and dignified'(King, M).

The slave culture is still prominent today and it resonates among all races. Whether is it through our political system, religion, workplace or media, many minorities still believe they are “enslaved” and still have not “freed their mind”. However, the slave culture today is not “black or white”, but it is a matter of “the haves” and “the have nots”. The slave trade began in the 15th century, after the Portuguese started exploring the coast of West Africa. At first the number of enslaved Africans taken was small, but overtime that number increased over because the Europeans realized how beneficial African were to them.

The majority of slaves taken in the transatlantic trade were from the states on or near the west coast of Africa. The growing demand for slaves from Europe meant that the African suppliers increased their activities. The Africans were sold in many ways. They were sold to traders by other Africans, and eventually forced into slavery by men with guns. From here, slaves were placed aboard ships to be taken across the Atlantic on a voyage that was eventually coined “the middle passage.”

The beginning of slavery started with the enslavement of African Americans in the mid 1600’s, when whites identified African American as servants. To make sure the slaves made it cross sea as healthy as possible the owners of the ships divided the watercraft into holds with a very small amount of room. The slaves were only allowed a small space for headroom and had to lay side by side cramped together along with the dozens of other slaves. Owners of the slave ship did their absolute best to hold as many slaves as they possibly could by cramming chaining and selectively grouping the slaves by size to maximize the space and bring as much profit they could possibly bring. Over the period of the slave trade, millions of slaves were shipped from West Africa.

Approximately 300,000 slaves were shipped from Africa to the Americas before 1620 by European slave traders. As a result, almost 12 million Africans were shipped were stripped from their homes and brought to New World against their will. After being placed in the New World these Africans were forced to do a lot of hard labor under horrible conditions. Enslaved men and women were beaten very badly, separated from family and friends and, regardless of sex, treated as property in the eyes of the law. Men who were slaves had a variety of labors that ranged from building houses to plowing fields. Men had some of the hardest jobs because they tend to be stronger and able to take more of a beating than female slaves.

Furthermore, slavery in America began when the first slaves were brought to the North American Colony of Jamestown, Virginia in 1619. Slavery took several decades to develop in Virginia and enslaved men and women were beaten very badly, separated from their family and friends and, regardless of sex, treated as “property” in the eyes of the law. Men who were enslaved performed labors that ranged from building houses to plowing fields. Men had some of the hardest jobs because the slave master viewed them as physically stronger than female slaves.

Enslaved Africans resisted, or rebelled, against their position as slaves in many different ways. The many slavery who accepted their situation. Instead they proved their strength and determination in fighting for their freedom. There were many slaves that successfully escaped away from their owners such as Harriet Tubman. As one of the most well-known conductors of instances of resistance show that slaves were not victims of the underground railroad Harriet Tubman rescued over 300 slaves in the time p of 11 years. Tubman felt she would be sold away from her family because she was sick, so she fled to Philadelphia to then return and rescue her family and other slaves. The great antislavery leader Frederick Douglass had a lot of respect for Tubman.

Another ally was John Brown, who justified armed struggle to destroy slavery. Harriet Tubman helped him recruit supporters. John Brown referred to her as “General Tubman” because it always seemed like she had a plan for everything. John Brown saved 11 slaves, and killed over 200 white people which made him a very wanted man. Brown was most famous for his raiding of the federal arsenal in Virginia to give weapons to slaves so they come overpower their slave owners. On August 21st 1881 Nat Turner and other slaves, he gathered to rebel against the whites, launched one of the largest slave rebellions in American history. The rebels moved from home to home killing every white person that they met.

Another way slavery evolved was through Dred Scott. Dred Scott was a black slave, with a wife named Harriet who had once belonged to army surgeon named John Emerson. Emerson bought Scott from the Peter Blow family of St. Louis. After Emerson died, the Blows apparently helped Scott sue Emerson’s widow for his freedom, but lost the case in state court. Chief of Justice Robert B. Taney said that Scott was a slave, and slaves were not considered a citizen of the United States and could not sue in a federal court.

In closing, the election of 1860, Republican Abraham Lincoln was elected as President, which resulted in a major change of slavery in America. All throughout his life Abraham Lincoln said “if slavery was wrong, nothing was wrong.” President Lincoln played a major role in ending slavery. President Lincoln hated slavery because it somehow reminded him of his childhood and how he used to get sent from farmer to farmer to work for his father. Lincoln stopped slavery from growing by writing the Emancipation Proclamation. This document declared that as of the date of its issuance in 1863 that all the slaves should be freed in the states that were still in rebellion against the union.

Envision that you were born a slave. How would that affect your life? How would it feel to be sold and bought by someone of a higher class? How would you like being whipped if you didnt do exactly as you were told?

There are many definitions of a hero. There is the little kid definition which would be Superman is . He can fly and is really strong! Webster defines a hero as any person, especially a man, admired for courage or nobility (277). Heroes are people who recognize sin and try to make it right. Which is pointed in a portion of the Poem called The Heroes by Phoebe Cary in The Book of Virtues which states that:

Theres many a battle fought daily

The world knows nothing about;

Theres many a brave little soldier

Whose strength puts a legion to rout.

And he who fights sin singlehanded

Is more of a hero, I say,

Than he who leads soldiers to battle

And conquers by arms in the fray. (461)

This portion of the poem relays that people dont have to go to battle and fight using guns to be heroes. All they have to do is fight sin singlehanded and they will be more of a hero. Heroes are not only people who fight battles and superheroes that are strong and can fly on TV. They are people who are willing to serve and prevent pain and suffering in the lives of others. Heroes are people willing to risk their own life, trying to save lives of other citizens. In my opinion heroes are people who are willing to die trying to serve others, and died breaking the law doing what they believed to be right. Harriet Tubman is a hero, because she was willing to risk her life, she was willing to serve others and willing to die for what she believed to be right! Taylor points out Harriet recalling her decision. Tubman recalls:

I had reasoned this out in my mind; there was one of two things I had a right to, liberty or death; if I could not have one, I would have the other; for no man should take me alive; I should fight for my liberty as long as my strength lasted, and when the time came for me to go, the Lord would let them take me. (Taylor 96)

This quote points out that Harriet was willing to die if that is what she had to do, but she was also determined to fight for her liberty. Taylor in the book entitled Black Abolitionists and Freedom Fighters states that Tubman was born into a family of slaves. Taylor adds she worked as a conductor of the Underground Railroad. The Underground Railroad is a network of safe houses for escaping slaves Taylor explains (93-94). If anyone was tired and wanted to turn back she would pull out her pistol and say Youll be free, or die a slave (<www.americaslibrary.gov>). Americas Library online explains that Tubman knew that if anyone turned back, it would put her and the other escaping slaves in danger of discovery, capture or even death (<www.americaslibrary.gov>).

Taylor says that Tubman also helped the Union Army she was a nurse and a cook and later as a scout and a spy (102). In May of 1862 Harriet was sent to Beaufort to teach slaves skills to support themselves (Taylor 103). Harriet Tubman is a hero because she was willing to serve others with intelligence and force to save all the slaves by making them keep going.

Harriet Tubman was also a hero because she risked her own life saving others so they could be free! According to Ralph Waldo Emerson The hero is no braver than an ordinary man, but he is brave five minutes longer. Harriet was the only one brave enough in the home she was a slave of to attempt escaping. According to Emersons quote she was brave five minutes longer.

In the Book entitled Black Profiles written by George R. Metcalf, he writes She was the one on whom the slave owners had placed a bounty of $40,000 for her capture dead or alive. She had to assume the risk of being caught (175). She risked her life twice in the year 1851, going south to free one of her brothers and two other men on the first trip and the second she tried to free her husband but he was already remarried (Metcalf 174). Metcalf explains that Harriets Courage reflected her faith. I always told God Im going to hold steady on to you, and youve got to see me through. Metcalf adds, her friends who feared she might be captured during one of her seizures asked if the thought might trouble her. Just so long as he wants to use me, she replied. Hell take care of me, and when he dont want me no longer, Im ready to go. Harriet said They might catch me, but not alive as she points to the butt of her pistol (Qtd. in Metcalf 176). Harriet was willing to die no matter what it took to free those slaves, because, she was using it for God.

Harriet Tubman was born a slave; she was one of eleven brothers and sisters (Hughes 103). Hughes writes that:

One evening about dusk a slave boy wandered away from the corn husking to which he had been assigned and went down the road to a country store. An overseer pursued him, intending to whip him for leaving the place without permission Then the boy started to run and the overseer called to Harriet who was standing in the door to stop him. Harriet did not stop him nor did she move out of the door so that the overseer could get by He picked up an iron weight used on scales and threw it at Harriet. The weight struck her in the head making a deep gash and knocking her unconscious in the doorway. As she lay there bleeding, everyone thought she was dead From that time on, all her life, Harriet could not prevent herself at times from unexpectedly blacking out, going suddenly sound asleep Then, after a spell she would come to herself again. (104)

Hughes points out that Tubman attempted to help her brothers, Henry and Robert to freedom and they turned back at the last minute. He also explains that she offered her other siblings the life of freedom, which all of them turned down. Hughes adds that she tried to convince her husband to go with her but he refused. Tubman, then went by herself, she had made up her mind to risk the dangerous trek to freedom with company or without (Hughes 105).

Harriet was willing to die for the little boy, so he could escape slavery. She was willing to take the risk of dieing to save herself and her siblings, because escaping slavery was illegal. If you were caught you could easily have been killed. One websites warns that There were rewards for their capture, and ads like you see here described slaves in detail (<www.americaslibrary.gov>).

Harriet Tubman freed 300 slaves including her parents and her siblings through the Underground Railroad. She went from being a slave and working in the fields to helping slaves escape the agony. Metcalf includes that Harriets success with the Underground Railroad was also due to her organizational skills (177). She didnt fear being captured by herself, but with others she wouldnt have allowed it! Harriet had the courage to stand up for whats right and was very intelligent. In the end, we should come to the conclusion that Courage conquers all things (Ovid).

Slavery was the most common form of forced labor in History. Slavery was very bad and wrong. A slave was treated like property and not like a Human Being and owned by other Human Beings.

There were important people that related to Slavery. These people are the one of the most important people in Slave History. First was Harriet Tubman. Harriet Tubman was a runaway slave. She helped a lot of slaves escape by using the Underground railroad. The Underground railroad was a secret network of people who helped runaway slaves reach the north. Another person was Frederick Dougless. He was also an escaped slave who became one of the first black abolitionists and Civil Rights leader in the US. Abraham Lincoln started the emancipation proclamation. That had stated that all slaves would be freed on January 1st 1863. That had freed most of the slaves but not all of them.

What happened was that blacks were taken from their countries and made to serve white people. The Whites had come to the blacks colonies in huge ships and take blacks away from their family and sent to the ships. The black people were then all forced to sleep on slabs of wood, to eat just enough to keep them alive and to take orders from the white people. The ships were then sent to other countries to later be sold to forced to do work for whites. But then Aberham Lincoln later had declared the Emancipation Proclamation that freed most slaves ecept the ones that were in other countries.

Africa was a main place for gathering slaves. Mostly all slaves were taken from Africa. The United States was a place where slaves were used to work on plantations and serve their owners. All through out Europe slaveposts were being setup to sell slaves.

The capture of Africans by the Europeans began in the early 1500 s. But slavery was done in the Ancient periods also. The Egyptians used slaves to build pyramids, the Chinese and Indian used slaves for large scale construction and Agricultural and the Hebrews also used slaves.

Slavery was done because Portugal needed agricultural workers. Soon Spain caught on. Then Arab traders in northern Africa took blacks and sent them to markets in Arabia, Iran, and India. Spanish Colonists first forced Native Indians to work the land but they could not survive it. So then they took blacks from Africa and made them work. Slaves were then sold like animals all over the States and Europe. They were sent to farms and Plantations to work long hours in inhumane conditions. In the south slaves were treated a bit better then in the north. The slaves in the south were mostly field slaves. The ones in the north did many things and were beaten and treated very poorly. That just about explains the who, what, where, when and why about slavery.

I remember the first time I heard about Harriet Tubman and the Under Ground Railroad. I was in the sixth grade and eleven years old. My social studies teacher showed the class a film about the network of people and Harriet Tubman who helped slaves escape to freedom through a passage to the North. She explained how Harriet Tubman who was a runaway slave herself, risked her life to save her family and others who were slaves at the time.

As a child Harriet Tubman was a hero to me. Now that I’m older I realize just how important her story is to everyone and especially women. Harriet was thirty years old when she escaped from slavery. She risked her life to be free and to free others. A white neighbor told her how to find the first house on her path to Canada. At the first house she was put into a wagon covered with a sack and transported to the next stop. She had to wade through swamp water and hide in the woods. Her master knew she had escaped and was looking for her with guns and dogs. She wore the soles out on her shoes from walking in the woods. She was weak from lack of food. She had to trust white people she had never seen or didn’t know. She would get instructions on what to do at each station she stopped in and go from there. The night she escaped she didn’t know exactly what to do or were to go but the Underground Railroad conductors helped her get through the middle passage.

Harriet took three hundred slaves to freedom including all of her family after she found out the way to Canada through the Under Ground Railroad. She risked her life three hundred times so her people could get to the promise land. She was called the Moses of her people. Close to some of her last trips to Canada there was a reward for her arrest. She still made a few more trips to the South to bring out slaves knowing she was wanted. Although Harriet wasn’t allowed an education she was very bright. When her Daddy learned she was going to escape from the plantation he taught her a few survival skills she would need to know to survive in the woods. He taught her that the moon shines on the mossy side of the trees and if she followed the moss that shined from the moon she will always be going north.

African Americans used code words to speak to each other because the masters of the plantations were always watching them. Harriet wanted to let her family know she was going to escape so she went to her sister’s cabin the night before and sung an old African American spiritual through the door. She sang, “Swing low sweet chariot I ain’t got long to stay.” In another song the words go like this, “Walk together children walk together children don’t become weary we’ll get to the promise land. I have shoes you have shoes all God’s children have shoes when you get to heaven gonna put on your shoes and walk all over God’s heaven.” Heaven was a code word for Canada. When she sung about shoes that meant to get ready to escape that night.

What amazed me about Harriet was how she changed her life and other people’s lives for the better. When Harriet reached Canada she said, “When I found I had crossed that line, I looked at my hands to see it I was the same person. There was such a glory over everything. The sun came like gold through the trees, and over the fields, and I felt like I was in heaven.”

Maybe Harriet wasn’t the same person spiritually. I’m sure her soul was much lighter and she wanted others to feel the freedom she felt. She wanted to share it with her family but they were not there. I believe Harriet couldn’t rest knowing she was free but her family and friends were still in bondage and it bothered her deeply.

Other conductors could not believe Harriet when she told them she wanted to go back to the south to get her family and friends to bring them through the North passage. Even though they were afraid for Harriet and knew she was taking a chance with her life they admired her courage, bravery and made her a conductor of the Underground Railroad. Harriet led three hundred people to freedom and was the most well known conductor for the Railroad. She said, “I never ran my train off track, and I never lost a passenger.”

Her name deserves to be handed down to posterity, side by side with the names of Jeanne D’Arc, Grace Darling and Florence Nightingale, for not one of these women, noble and brave as they were, has shown more courage, and power of endurance, in facing danger and death to relieve human suffering, than this poor black woman … (4).

In 1850, Harriet Tubman succeeded with her first attempt in freeing slaves from the South. Nineteen more attempts would be performed during the time she worked in the Underground Railroad of the 1850’s. Her pursuit of abolitionism would continue with her efforts in the Civil War as a nurse and scout. Harriet’s work in the Underground Railroad and as a scout for the North in the Civil War made her a hero against slavery.

Araminta Ross was either born in 1820 or 1821 on a plantation in Dorchester County, Maryland. Records were not kept of slave births so her birthdate is a mystery. She was a fortunate slave girl because she had her mother by her side to raise her. It was common to have a slave mother and her children split apart by the slave trade. Araminta had barely any clothes to wear; usually just a soiled cotton dress. She slept as close to the fire as possible on cold nights and sometimes stuck her toes into the smoldering ashes to avoid frostbite. Cornmeal was her main source of nutrition and occasionally meat of some kind as her family had the privilege to hunt and fish. Most of her early childhood was spent with her grandmother who was too old for slave labor.

At age six, Araminta was old enough to be considered able to work. She did not work in the fields though. Edward Brodas, her master, lent her to a couple who first put her to work weaving. When she slacked off at this job the couple gave her the duty of checking muskrat traps. Araminta caught the measles while doing this work. The couple thought she was incompetent and took her back to Brodas. When she got well, she was taken in by a woman as a housekeeper and baby-sitter. Araminta was whipped during the work here and was sent back to Brodas after eating one of the woman’s sugar cubes.

As was the custom on all plantations, when she turned eleven, she started wearing a bright cotton bandana around her head indicating she was no longer a child. She was also no longer known by her “basket name”, Araminta. Now she would be called Harriet (McClard 21, 2628, 29-33).

In 1844, Harriet Ross married a well-built man with a ready laugh. John Tubman was a free slave unlike Harriet. Since she was a slave, she knew there could be a chance that she could be sold and her marriage would be split apart. Harriet dreamed of traveling north. There, she would be free and would not have to worry about having her marriage split up by the slave trade. But, John did not want her to go north. He said he was fine where he was and that there was no reason for moving north. She said she would go by herself. He replied with questions like “When it’s nighttime, how will you know which way is north?” and “What will you eat?” He told her that if she ran off, he would tell her master. She did not believe him until she saw his face and then she knew he meant it. Her goal to achieve freedom was too large for her to give up though. So she left her husband and traveled north with her brothers (Petry 80-87,90).

Harriet hitched a ride with a woman and her husband who were passing by. They were abolitionists and kind enough to give her directions to safe houses and names of people who would help her cross the Mason-Dixon line. The couple took her to Philadelphia. Here, Harriet got a job where she saved her pay to help free slaves. She also met William Still. (Taylor 35-39, 40-41).

William Still was one of the Underground Railroad’s busiest “station masters.” He was a freeborn black Pennsylvanian who could read and write. He used these talents to interview runaway slaves and record their names and stories in a book. He hoped that in the future, family’s could trace their relations using this book. Still published the book in 1872 under the title The Underground Railroad. It is still revised and published today (McClard 65-68).

In 1850, Harriet helped her first slaves escape to the North. She sent a message to her sister’s oldest son that said for her sister and family to board a fishing boat in Cambridge. This boat would sail up the Chesapeake Bay where they would meet Harriet in Bodkin’s Point. When they got to Bodkin’s Point, Harriet guided them from safehouse to safehouse in Pennsylvania (which was a free state) until they reached Philadelphia.

In September of the same year, Harriet was made an official “conductor” of the Underground Railroad. This meant that she knew all the routes to free territory and she had to take an oath of silence so the secret of the Underground Railroad would be kept secret. She also made a second trip to the South to rescue her brother James and other friends. They were already in the process of running away so Harriet aided them across a river and to the home of Thomas Garret. He was the most famous Underground “Stationmaster” in history (McClard 72-74).

At the same time that all of this was going on, a second Fugitive Slave law was passed. It allowed anyone the right to capture any black person and send them back to the South. This law caused the Underground Railroad to tighten security. It created a code to make things more secret. It also sent the escaping slaves into Canada instead of the “North” of the U.S. (Petry 125-130).

Harriet’s third trip was in September 1851. She went to get her husband, John, but he had remarried and did not want to leave. So she went back up North. Harriet went to Garret’s house and found there were more runaways (which were referred to as passengers) to rescue than anticipated. That did not stop her though. She gave a baby a sedative so he would not cry and took the passengers into Pennsylvania. The trip was long and cold but they did reach the safe house of Frederick Douglas. He kept them until he had collected enough money to get them to Canada. He recieved the money so she and her eleven passengers started the journey to Canada. To get into Canada, they had to cross over Niagara Falls on a handmade suspension bridge which would take them into the city of St. Catherine located in Canada. In St. Catherine, blacks and whites lived together in comfortable houses and they had their own land to farm and raise crops (Petry 131-138, 144-146).

In the winter of 1852, Tubman was ready to return to the U.S. to help free more slaves. In the spring, she worked in Cape May and saved enough money to go to Maryland. By now, Tubman had led so many people from the South – the slave’s called this the “land of Egypt” – to freedom, she became known as “Moses.” She was also known by the plantation owners for her efforts and a bounty of $40,000 was posted. The state of Maryland itself posted a $12,000 reward for her capture (Taylor 49).

Tubman made eleven trips from Maryland to Canada from 1852-1857. Her most famous trip concerned a passenger who panicked and wanted to turn back. Tubman was afraid if he left he would be tortured and would tell all he knew about the Railroad. The unwilling passenger changed his mind when Tubman pointed a gun at his head and said “dead folks tell no tales” (Sterling 16-18).

The spring of 1857 was the time when Harriet set out on her most daring rescue to free her elderly father, Ben Ross. Tubman bought a train ticket for herself and traveled in broad daylight which was dangerous considering the bounty for her head. When she reached Caroline County, she bought a horse and some miscellaneous parts to make a buggy. She took this and her father and mother to Thomas Garrett who arranged for their passage to Canada (Bradford 115, 128).

In Canada, she met John Brown, a radical abolitionist, who had heard much about Harriet. When he came to St. Catherine, he asked J.W. Loguen to introduce them. When Brown met Tubman, he was overwhelmed by her intelligence and bearing and said “General Tubman, General Tubman, General Tubman.” From then on he would refer to her by this name. Brown called Harriet, “one of the best and bravest persons on this continent” (Petry 195-198).

Harriet Tubman’s career in the Railroad was ending by December 1860. She made her last rescue trip to Maryland, bringing seven people to Canada. In the ten years she worked as a “conductor” on the Railroad, Harriet managed to rescue over 300 people. She had made 19 trips and never lost a passenger on the way. For Tubman’s safety, her friends took her to Canada (Sterling 25).

Tubman returned to the U.S. from living in Canada in 1861. The Civil War had begun and was enlisting all men as soldiers and any women who wanted to join as cooks and nurses. Tubman enlisted into the Union army as a “contraband” nurse in a hospital in Hilton Head, South Carolina. Contrabands were blacks who the Union army helped to escape from the Southern compounds. Often they were half starved and sick from exposure.

Harriet nursed the sick and wounded back to health but her work did not stop there. She also tried to find them work. When the army sent her to another hospital in Florida, she found white soldiers and contrabands “dying off like sheep” (Taylor 84-86). She explains a role of hers while working in a hospital: (dialect omitted)

I would go to the hospital, I would, early every morning. I’d get a big chunk of ice, I would, and put it in a basin, and fill it with water; then I’d take a sponge and begin. First man I’d come to, I’d thrash away the flies, and they would rise, they would like bees around a hive. Then I would begin to bathe the wounds, and by the time I had bathed off three or four, the fire and heat would have melted the ice and made the water warm, and it would be as red as clear blood. Then I would go and get more ice, and by the time I get to the next ones, the flies would be around the first ones and thick as ever (Bradford 97)

She treated her patients with medicine from roots and miraculously never caught any of the deadly diseases the wounded soldiers would carry.

During the summer of 1863, Tubman worked with Colonel James Montgomery as a scout. She put together a group of spies who kept Montgomery informed about slaves who might want to join the Union army. After she and her scouts had done the groundwork, she helped Montgomery organize the Combahee River Raid. The purpose of the raid was to harass whites and rescue freed slaves. They were successful in shelling the rebel outposts and gathering almost 500 slaves. Just about all the freed slaves joined the army (Petry 224-227).

After the war, Harriet returned home to Auburn. In 1869, she married Nelson Davis and together they shared a calm, peaceful 19 year marriage until he died. In 1908, Harriet purchased property adjoining her home where she opened a house where old black people could live and be taken care of. Before she died on March 10, 1913, she gave her home for the elderly to the Methodist Episcopal Zion Church (McClard 113, 117, 121-124).

Pioneers of abolitionism devoted their lives to fight for freedom and the pursuit of a better life for African-Americans. Harriet Tubman’s efforts in the Underground Railroad and in the Civil War strengthened the abolitionist movement by accomplishing the goal it had intended to do: free slaves and abolish slavery. Why did she choose to help with the pursuit of abolitionism? She chose to help because she wanted to be free and heal the wounds that slavery had left her. Harriet thought, if slavery was non-existant, then her past was really behind her and she could finish her life as a free citizen of the United States. She had opened the eyes of white people all over America and assisted them in understanding why slavery was immoral. 

The notion that sub-Saharan Africa is a region riddled with difficulties for good governance and economic expansion has been coined “Afro-pessimism.” The term gained popularity in the 1980s, when western countries believed there was no hope for uniting democracy and attaining maintainable commercial development in the region. Advocates for Africa have criticized the dominant pessimism in the West on Africa’s economic development. Africa has been seen by other countries as poor, but the truth is Africa is a rich continent inhabited by poor people. Why are they poor? What has led to a constant state of political unrest and economical fluctuations? Is the blame to be placed on the current government or do we squarely put the fault on western colonization? Africa’s irony is exasperating. Inside the continent there is immense mineral wealth yet obstinately stuck in filth, dejection, scarcity, and disorder. While a few countries of Africa have moved ahead, the overall economic performance remains appalling, straggling after those of other regions considered third world. The causes of this lack of development have always induced fiery and sensitive debates. There are those who depict Africa as a victim of controlling external forces and schemes, yet there are also those who believe Africa’s crisis exist mostly within Africa, such as its governance or how African leaders run their own matters. The externalists believe that Africa’s afflictions are due to the haunting effects of Western colonialism and imperialism, the effects of the slave trade, inadequate flow of foreign aid, waning terms of trade, and expatriate owned banks that discriminated against African entrepreneurs. Let’s not forgot the long and unnecessary African Slave Trade. Thousands upon thousands of innocent African men, women, and children, taken from their homes to slave away in another country, many of whom didn’t even survive the trip. The slave trade took over 10 million Africans from their lands and left them unmanned and unfarmed, reducing the agriculture production that could have helped the economy.

Many African leaders also held similar views of Africa’s adversities to external factors. Since gaining its independence in the 1960s, almost every African disaster was suspected to have been caused by the act or complicity of extrinsic agents. The British were under the impression to “hold that our right is the necessity that is upon us to provide for our ever-growing population…”, instead of the natives right to their own land. Education provided during colonialism was geared toward training males for colonial administration. The Belgians and Portuguese did not endeavor university education as it held the possibility of teaching African natives their political rights. Once Tanzania gained its independence in 1964, there had only been four university graduates. With this thinking, leadership was released of any responsibility for the condition of Africa. The other group of people, the internalists, believe the colonialism-imperialism excuse has been exaggerated and has lost its significance and credibility. The internalists hold the belief that Africa’s problems are a direct ramification of incompetent and unethical political leaders who seized/maintained political office by way of the gun. These are people that are angry with African leaders who fail to take responsibility for their own losses. While external factors have played a part, the internal factors have been more substantial. This thought sustains that while, yes, Western colonialism and imperialism did cause damage, Africa’s state of deterioration has been made more critical by these internal factors such as foolish leadership, mis-governance, corruption, economic negligence, failing infrastructure, and desecrations of human rights.

There is gap that has grown between the government leaders and the people that has made the leaders anxious, sensitive, ruthless, and less amenable to the wishes of its people. The African mass, in turn, view their leaders with fear, reservation, and uncertainty as they believe they are no longer valid or applicable in their lives. The president of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe, who once started out leading the Zimbabwe National Union party and was seen as a “liberating hero” , slowly fell under the spell of power and became a cruel dictator. It was only the West which supported revolting dictators in Africa. An African leader is supposed to follow the interests of his people, not his own. Instead of removing a dictator from power, it was argued that since the West put Mobutu, for example, in power, it was their responsibility to remove him. If Mobutu was helping Western interests, why would the West be willing to remove him? Even if they did remove him, wouldn’t they just exchange him with another that would serve their purposes? However, it wasn’t the West that told Mobutu to loot the treasury in Zaire in order to benefit himself nor did they order Idi Amin to butcher over 200,000 people in Uganda. It is the leaders of their countries that need to be held accountable for their actions, not the West. At least, not for current struggles. Africa is now tantamount to war, famine, refugees, malnourishment, and chaos in need of handouts. Africa has not been producing and you can’t trade on the international market if you have nothing to sell. The physical volume of exports has been declining and therefore it is not a question of Africa not being able to earn enough because of low prices. Burundi’s coffee exports, Ivory Coast’s cocoa exports, and Sierra Leone’s diamond exports have been devastated not because of low world market prices but by civil wars have devastated the countryside and uprooted millions of people. Trade blocks are marginal to the core issue of Africa’s under development. Africa’s exports are comprised mostly of cash crops like cocoa, cotton, and coffee and minerals such as gold, diamonds, and copper. Trade barriers and agricultural appropriations affect only a few African exports, such as cotton, peanuts or groundnuts, sugar, and tobacco.

Neglect of agriculture caused by the emphasis on industrialization, the constant civil wars, decaying infrastructure, and erroneous socialist policies has subjugated Africa’s farmers through a network of price controls. Prices of cash crops were fixed at artificially low levels; markets were cornered by giant western corporations, paying low wages and raking huge profits. While prices Africa received for its exports remained low, the prices Africa paid for imported manufactures soared astronomically. Black Americans, drawing upon their own horrific experience, unfortunately have a much different perception and understanding of Africa’s anguishes. Most black Americans are unable to differentiate between African leaders and the African people and see Africa as a target of colonialism and imperialism – just as they see themselves as victims of racism, white supremacy, and the lasting effects of slavery. However, Black Americans haven’t lived under brutal oppressors such as Idi Amin, Robert Mugabe, or Mobutu Sese Seko and are unable to empathize to true black despotism The African people know that government is the primary obstacle that stands in the way of poverty reduction in Africa.