The Underground Railroad
Arrival from Maryland, 1858
GEORGE RUSSELL AND JAMES HENRY THOMPSON.
James, for convenience’ sake, was supplied with two other names (Milton Brown and John Johnson), not knowing exactly how many he would need in freedom or which would be the best adapted to keep his whereabouts the most completely veiled from his master.
George reported that he fled from Henry Harris, who lived near Baltimore on the Peach Orchard Road, and that he had lived with said Harris all his life. He spoke of him as being a “blustering man, who never liked the slaves to make anything for themselves.” George bore witness that the usage which he had received had been hard; evidently his intellect had been seriously injured by what he had suffered under his task-master. George was of a very dark hue, but not quite up to medium size.
James Henry Thompson did not accompany George, but met him at the station in Philadelphia. He contrasted favorably with George, being about twenty-eight years of age, with a countenance indicative of intelligence and spirit. He was of a chestnut color and of average size. He charged one Dennis Mannard, of Johnsonville, with being his personal enemy as an oppressor, and added that he could “say nothing good of him.” He could say, however, that Mannard was bitterly opposed to a slave’s learning how to read, would not listen to the idea of giving them any privileges, and tried to impress them with the idea that they needed to know nothing but simply how to work hard for the benefit of their masters and mistresses; in fulfilling these conditions faithfully the end for which they had been designed would be accomplished according to his doctrine.
Notwithstanding so much pains had been resorted to throughout the South to impress these ideas upon the slaves, no converts were made.
James thought that the doctrine was infamous, and that it was dangerous to live with such a man as his master; that freedom was as much his right as it was his master’s; and so he resolved to leave for Canada as soon as he could see any chance for escape.