Oberlin College - Hi-O-Hi Yearbook (Oberlin, OH)

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SLAVERY ANEGDOTES. 23 from the first a sort of junction or focus for the converging lines of the Underground Railwayw from the South. From the town fugi- tives were transferred secretly to Cleveland, Black River, Vermil- lion, Huron, and Sandusky, and put aboard boats bound for Canada. The writer was shown a large cave between here and Black River, where it is said that fugitive slaves were concealed, thus constituting literally an underground depot. For the truth of this assertion we can not vouch. -JE lk ik I To show the complete isolation of Oberlin sentiment, it is only necessary to say that there was not the least sympathy felt toward the place by any of the neighboring towns. The little colony was quite alone in the advocacy of anti-slavery. The towns in the vicinity were ready at any time to assist the slave-holders. Often they held indignation meetings, and discussed measures for putting Oberlin down. Anonymous communications were sent in threaten- ing to burn the town, and for years an armed patrol had to be kept to guard it. Students were egged, stoned, sometimes seriously hurt, for the sole crime of hailing from Oberlin. One eminent evangelist, a man noted for his Christian love, told the writer that the legs of his horse were once cut in to the bone, for the simple reason that the animal had the misfortune of belonging to an Oberlinite. Yet these persecutors who were themselves so intolerant were punishing a dumb brute because he chanced to belong to a community which they fancied to be oifensive because of intolerance. -M .S+ 9? Another instance is related of the way in which the early anti- slavery enthusiasts from Lane Seminary were treated. Rev. Amos Dresser, one of the 'trebelsf' now of Franklin, Nebraska, was selling Bibles in the streets of Nashville, Tennesee, when some one inquisi- tively peeped into his buggy, and found that the books were wrapped up in old copies of the Philanthropist. He was thereupon arrested, tried, sentenced in due form of law, and treated to twenty lashes upon his bare back in the Public Square in Nashville! Does not such an outrage make the blood boil at the mere recital to-day? , 64- 5 Z -XA The students of to-day can scarcelyimagine what it must have been to live in Oberlin in those days. What a tremendous sensa- tion it would'take now-a-days to rouse two or three hundred stu- dent sat midnight and start them off on foot in a pursuit of slave- holders for miles, a pursuit involving weariness, often danger, and offering only the compensation afforded by the triumph of moral

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.CHAPTER 11. I SLAVERY ANECDOTES. .,QXTi -ear T is the object of this chapter to sketch in a very hasty Way V K ,,-- some ofthe incidents which form a part of the anti-slavery , history of Oberlin. These incidents have been so numerous ggthat We here are apt to think of them as commonplace, yet to Q 51 the genera.l reading public they must be most interesting. At the start We desire to acknowledge the courtesy of Mr. Sabram Cox, Rev. George Clark, Deacon Peck, Mr. Munger, Mrs. Horace Taylor, President Fairchild and others, to Whom We .are indebted for the material for this chapter. Mr. Sabraln Cox, upon Whom a call was made, is an elderly colored man of rare .intelligence and noble qualities of mind. He was at work for Mr. Lovejoy, at the time of the famous f or infamousj assassination of the latter, in Alden, near St. Louis.. He was then only a boy, but was the only person who dared haul from the river in an express wagon the -sunken printing press, upon which Mr. Lovejoy had printed his anti- slavery paper. 'As he drove through the' streets with a coil fin in which to place the body of his beloved friend and patron, he was hissed by the mob, and only escaped death by reason of his tender years. In the early history of Oberlin he played a promi- nent part, and his name will occur frequently in these sketches. -x- as ' No man in Oberlin could be trusted on the slave question. An old Southerner once said that no matter how pious or reliable Ober- linites might be in other matters, they would be Hlike horse thieves when it came to a nigger? To betray a negro would have been to lose the respect of the community, and insure lasting disgrace and odium. A , M k AL Reference has already been made to the origin of the Oberlin .anti-slavery sentiment, and the strange but characteristic Way in Which the hostility of the college as an institution became pledged to the moral crime of trafiicking in n1en's bodies. In the early times, it will be remembered that Oberlin wasthe only point in the North where anti-slavery sentiments prevailed. It thus became

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24 ' OBERLINIANA. ' right. Yet this was a common experience in those days, and the faithfulness ofthe people is attested by the statement that of all the fugitives fleeing here, and afterward purloined by 'towners, not one was ever returned to slavery. 99 at 5? . An incident will first be related which formed a part of the un- written history of Oberlin for the year 1840. A company of eight fugitives, having passed North, were deliv- ered over to the keeping of Mr. Brown, at Brown's Landing on the lake. One of this company was a shrewd old man- of some sixty years. As was customary the party was being kept until word should be received from the anti-slavery organization here that a boat had been engaged in which the fugitives might be taken to- Oanada. Mr. R. E. Gillet was at that time leader of this organiza- tion. Accordingly word was brought one day that a boat was moored near the Landing,77 and soon a messenger appeared with a note. This note was signed R. E, Gillett, and stated that the boat was waiting, and that the party would be rowed to it in a skiff by the bearer. The company started, but had not proceeded far when the saga- cious old man, who had been walking along thoughtfully, came to a sudden halt. ' Tears to me, he said, like as though dis ain't all straight, chil- lunsf' 'tWhy, whatis the trouble?'7 inquired Brown. I dunno, replied the old man, uonly something tells me it ain't right? ' 'tOh yes, it must be, said the other, 'there is Gilletis own name, and he is never deceived. ' ' - Still the old man shook his head solemnly, and in order to assure him Brown willingly agreed to wait, and investigate the matter. Accordingly the company returned to a chamber in the house, and a young man was sent to spy around near the boat. Soon he returned in the greatest haste, and told them of a conver- sation he had overheard while concealed in some bushes, proving the forgery of the note. The colored party were hurried out' the back Way into the woods, and started post haste for Oberlin, the city of refuge. In a moment more Brown's house was surrounded by the horde of slave-holders who had been lurking in the vicinity, and had discovered the defeat ofltheir plan. . The slaves, with the exception of the old man, continued their iiight to Oberlin, pursued by their greedy masters. Arriving in the