Kuuleme Stephens aka Justice Lee

On Christmas Day, 1848, a young planter from Georgia arrived in Philadelphia, accompanied by his enslaved male body servant. There was nothing unusual about that. But in this case, things were not as they seemed. The young planter was in fact a runaway slave named Ellen Craft, and her supposed body servant was her enslaved husband, William. On their arrival in Philadelphia the couple had pulled off one of the most creative and daring slave escapes in American history—a feat that would make them famous. William Craft was a skilled cabinetmaker, whose owner allowed him to hire himself out and keep part of his earnings. With money he earned that way, William bought the suit of clothes that Ellen (who was of mixed race, light-skinned and able to pass as white) would wear during the escape. On their journey north, the couple traveled openly, by train and steamship. To avoid conversation, Ellen pretended to be ill. To avoid having to write (she was illiterate) she traveled with her right arm in a sling. Once safely in Philadelphia Ellen and William made contact with the abolitionist community there, where they were welcomed as heroes. They settled in a free black neighborhood in Boston and began speaking on the abolitionist lecture circuit, to large and admiring audiences. But with bounty hunters pursuing them and with the tightening of the Fugitive Slave Act, it soon became clear that it wasn’t safe for the Crafts to remain in the United States. So, in 1851 they escaped to Canada and from there traveled to England, where they would live for the next 19 years. Five children were born to them there. While in England, Ellen learned to read and write and in 1860, on the eve of the American Civil War, she and William published Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom, a popular and widely read account of their escape from slavery. In 1868 the couple returned to America. After operating a farm and school in Georgia for a few years, they moved to Charleston South Carolina to live with their daughter Ellen and her husband Dr. William Crum. Ellen Craft passed away in 1891 at age 65. Her husband William died nine years later, at age 76. Ellen and William Craft reached Philadelphia on December 25, 1848, completing their daring escape.... © A Daily Dose of History #archaeohistories