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The Midnight Ride of . . . Shadrach Minkins?

On the road to Concord, three Black men in a wagon make a daring escape

It had rained that day in Boston, and now, even though the moon was full, there was little light in the sky as three men left Cambridge and headed for Concord. No, it wasn’t the midnight ride of Paul Revere, but another of unusual significance. For riding in a dark wagon was a fugitive from justice and two conspirators, unwilling to let another human being be returned to slavery. It was Saturday, Feb. 15, 1851.

The morning had started out as any other. Shadrach Minkins, a waiter at the Cornhill Coffee Shop in Boston, had put on his apron and started work. What he didn’t know was that he would soon become a test case for the Fugitive Slave Act, a law enacted by Congress to keep Southern states from bolting. The story has been told beautifully by Gary Collison in his book, Shadrach Minkins: from Fugitive Slave to Citizen, from which I have drawn here.

Born into slavery in the port city of Norfolk, Virginia, Minkins had worked for various masters, having been sold three times. In the spring of 1850, around 30 years of age, he disappeared, escaping most likely as a stowaway on a merchant ship headed north. Arriving in Boston, he joined a community of some 2,500 free blacks and former slaves. Considered a haven for those seeking their own emancipation, Boston would soon become the focus of federal agents and bounty hunters.

David Hayden was a leader in Boston’s abolitionist community.

Mandating the return of all former slaves to their owners, the Fugitive Slave Act imposed stiff penalties of imprisonment and fines to anyone sheltering fugitive slaves. Further, state governments, local law officers, and even citizens were called on to aid in its enforcement.

If Minkins could be arrested in Boston, the hub of the abolitionist movement in the North, and returned to his owner, Southern states would see that Washington was protecting their interests, muting talk of succession. Even President Millard Fillmore and Secretary of State Daniel Webster had approved Minkins’ capture.

Enacted in September of 1850, the Fugitive Slave Act divided families, towns, political parties and churches. As most governors, legislators, and clergy fell in line with the law, New England abolitionists voiced their opposition. In Boston, the Vigilance Committee, made up of Black and white abolitionists, warned of arrests and planned counter measures.

Poster urging fugitive slaves in Boston to watch out for slave catchers.

Now, as Minkins waited tables in the restaurant, a federal marshal and eight officers took up positions outside the restaurant. After a considerable delay, waiting for the man who would identify their suspect, the marshal and one of his men entered the restaurant and ordered coffee. They were served by a “stout, copper-colored man,” no other than the fugitive they sought, writes Collison.

When Minkins took the marshal’s payment to get change, two officers grabbed him under the arms, rushed out a back door and dragged him into the Court House, a block away. They had been seen, however, and word quickly spread. Within minutes a crowd of abolitionists and onlookers filled Court Square. One of them was a former slave from Kentucky, Lewis Hayden, now a clothing merchant and owner of a boarding house on Beacon Hill.

For several years, Hayden had been owned by Henry Clay, the senator and future architect of the Fugitive Slave Act. After seeing his siblings, then his wife and child sold, Hayden had fled with his second wife and her son to Philadelphia, then on to Canada. In 1846 Hayden brought his family to Boston. Lewis and Harriet Hayden became leaders in the abolitionist community, and their home on Southac Street a station on the Underground Railroad.

As Shadrach Minkins awaited arraignment, abolitionists packed into the stairway and hallway outside the upstairs courtroom. After the judge arrived, federal officers presented evidence that the suspect was in fact a fugitive from Virginia and the property of a Norfolk businessman.

Meanwhile, the crowd inside and out became more agitated. Defense attorneys, including Richard Henry Dana, Jr., presented petitions for Minkins’ release. When they were denied, black activists led by Hayden forced their way into the courtroom, surrounded Minkins and carried him “by the collar and feet” out to the street. Then, mixing in with the crowd, Hayden and Minkins scurried off towards Charles Street.

Turning quickly into a side street, Hayden took Minkins to the widow Elizabeth Riley, who hid him in her attic. Returning after dark, Hayden then took Minkins across the bridge to Cambridge and the home of the Rev. A. J. Lovejoy. HHe knew, however, that the fugitive could not stay there for long.

Later that night, Hayden returned to the minister’s home. This time he came in a wagon drawn by two horses, one black and one white. The wagon was driven by John J. Smith, a barber and fellow abolitionist. Picking up Minkins, they headed west.

My guess is Hayden and Smith, dressed in oil-cloth and sou’esters, sat up front, while Minkins lay covered by a tarpaulin in the bed of the wagon. They may have traveled on the Concord Turnpike, which was the most direct route, but which had several steep hills. Or they may have taken the old route through Lexington along Battle Road to Concord. Perhaps the rain had stopped by then and the moon was penetrating the cloud cover with faint light. Given the muddy roads, it must have been slow going.

About 3 a.m. Smith turned the horses onto Main Street in Concord. Proceeding through the sleeping town, they then angled left onto Sudbury Road and entered the yard of the blacksmith, Francis Bigelow. Hearing the wagon, Francis got out of bed and went to the door. Francis’ wife, Ann, who was unwell, may have looked out the upstairs window, for it was she who noted the color of the horses. Years later, Ann would tell the story to Edward Waldo Emerson, Harriet Robinson and others, accounts found in the Concord Free Public Library.

“Mr. Bigelow, hearing the carriage, opened his door, and let in the poor fugitive [and his escorts], though the penalty was a thousand dollars, and six months’ imprisonment, for ‘aiding and abetting’ a slave to escape. The blinds of the house were at once shut, and the windows darkened, to evade the notice of any passers-by.”

As Ann told it, the Bigelows then warmed the fugitive and brought him into their own bedroom, where Ann served breakfast, using the bureau for a table. Minkins, worn by anxiety and lack of sleep, could barely keep his eyes open. Meanwhile, the Brooks, sympathetic neighbors, arrived.

After Minkins had eaten and rested, Francis found him warm clothes, but had no hat his size. But Nathan Brooks did. He promptly left and returned with “a hat of his own with which to disguise himself—the hat of a law-abiding citizen!”

Before dawn, Francis Bigelow led Minkins to his own wagon outside, and the blacksmith and fugitive drove west again, this time to a safe house in Leominster. From Leominster, Minkins was transported to Fitchburg, where he boarded a train to Montreal.

Many years later, Ann Bigelow would retell the story of Minkin’s escape. Photo courtesty of the Concord Free Public Library

For Minkins the flight to Canada was a continuation of a life in exile. Separated from his family in Virginia, he joined a small community of former slaves in Montreal. He got a job as a waiter, saved his money and opened his own restaurant. Later, he set up a barbershop.

Over time, he married, and had four children. He never returned to the United States. He was the first runaway slave arrested in Boston under the Fugitive Slave Act, but not the last.

Meanwhile, Minkins’ rescuers returned to Boston. As Ann Bigelow recalled: “Mr. Hayden and Mr. Smith drove leisurely to Sudbury, stopped with friends there, went to church, and, after a good dinner, returned unmolested to Boston.”

Hayden did not, however, escape prosecution. One of several abolitionists charged with aiding and abetting Minkins’ escape, Hayden was acquitted after a jury—which included none other than Francis Bigelow himself—would not convict.

For years after, Lewis and Harriet Hayden continued their militant opposition to the Fugitive Slave Act, hiding and transporting fugitives and raising money. Lewis joined the black Masonic lodge created by Prince Hall, and later served in the state legislature. He also led a successful effort to integrate Boston schools and campaigned for women’s rights.

During the Civil War, Hayden helped to convince his friend, Governor John Andrew, to form a black regiment and actively recruited soldiers for the Massachusetts 54th.

Today, you can visit the Hayden home, a site on the Black Heritage Trail on Beacon Hill. And in Concord, you can still find the house on the Underground Railroad, where the Bigelows opened their doors to Shadrach Minkins and his escorts 172 years ago.

Note: This story first appeared in the magazine, Discover Concord, Summer 2024, as “A Midnight Stop on the Underground Railroad.”

The Coyote and the Rooster

One of my grandchildren’s favorite stories is The Rooster and the Coyote. The story comes from the Hopi people in Arizona, and it’s been passed down orally for centuries. In many Native American stories, the Coyote is a trickster, outsmarting others and causing trouble. But in the story of Coyote and Rooster, Coyote competes in a contest that reveals him as little more than foolish. In this fable I find wisdom for our time. Yes, even for us adults.

So here it is, as I remember it.

Coyote and Rooster were sitting by the fire one night on the mesa. As the long night wore on, first Coyote, then Rooster, began to sing. Each had a vibrant, clear voice, pleasing to listen to.

Coyote, however, was sure he was the better singer, and so he said to Rooster: “You have a good voice, my friend, but clearly my singing is better.”

Rooster, however, insisted that he had the stronger voice, and to illustrate, he let out a soaring refrain.

Then Coyote answered with a long, melodic trill.

Rooster, however, was not impressed. “Clearly the voice of an amateur,” he said, turning one eye on Coyote.

“All right,” said Coyote, “let’s have a contest. Each of us will sing, one after the other, until it becomes clear who has the most powerful voice.”

“Agreed,” said Rooster.

For the next few hours the night above the mesa was full of song. First one would sing, then the other. Back and forth, neither Coyote nor Rooster backing down.

But as the campfire burned down to embers, and the stars shifted in the sky, a faint light seeped onto the eastern horizon. By now, however, Coyote’s and Rooster’s throats had become sore and scratchy.

Coyote could only make weak yipp-yapping sounds. And Rooster, whose voice once soared on the wind, could only make raspy, screeching sounds.

Still, Coyote and Rooster would not let up. Finally, although exhausted, Rooster let out a loud, desperate cry.

Just then, on the ridge to the east, the sun began to rise. Rooster held himself up, weak but proud. “Did you see that?” he said.

“Clearly,” Coyote conceded, “your voice is indeed powerful.”

Ever after this, Rooster has strutted around with great pride, the way roosters are known to do. And no matter what Coyote says, he is certain that he is the one who brings the sun into the world.

After I’ve finished telling this story to my grandchildren, I sometimes ask: do you know anyone like the Rooster and the Coyote?

Calibri, Fraktur and “Saving America”

When Marco Rubio announced recently that the State Department was switching its official typeface, I wondered what was going on. Having taught a course in typography, I am well aware of type design and the nuanced notions associated with certain fonts.

I also immediately thought of a typeface called fraktur, a Germanic font Adolf Hitler loved, then hated, and the controversy over typefaces during the Third Reich.

The typeface Rubio doesn’t like is Calibri. It’s a standard sans-serif font. For many years it was the default in Microsoft programs, most recently replaced by a similar one called Aptos.

“Sans serif” means the letters are simple strokes without serifs, the little hands and feet at the end of lines. There is also no variation in line width. Their development was part of the avant garde movement in art, meant to express simplicity and modernity.

One of many sans-serif fonts in the modernist or humanist style, Calibri was created by Dutch typographer Lucas de Groot. With clean lines and slightly rounded corners, it is easily readable online and print and is often selected for presentations. Used during the Biden presidency, it is easier to read in small sizes and considered more accessible for those with disabilities.

So, what’s wrong with it? According to Rubio, Calibri is too informal, not befitting the dignity and tradition of America. In a directive to all diplomats, Rubio mandated the use, instead, of Times New Roman, a traditional serif typeface. He called the use of Calibri by the previous administration a capitulation to DEIA–that’s diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility. In short, Calibri is too “woke.”

But why Times New Roman?

One of many classic serif typefaces, Times New Roman was designed in 1931 as the typeface for the Times of London and has long been a go-to font for books and newspapers. Its condensed letter forms and spacing make it efficient for presenting large amounts of text. I use it occasionally, when I want a traditional look in my designs.

The hullabaloo about typefaces reminds me of what happened in Germany in the 1930s, just as the modernist typefaces were gaining popularity. It should not surprise you to learn that Adolf Hitler and the Nazis abhorred the sans serif designs. Instead, they wanted a typeface that would reflect their heritage and status as a Nordic power. They chose an old typeface called fraktur.

Fraktur is distinctly unlike both the sans serifs and traditional “romans” in use throughout the Western world. Designed in the 16^th century, it’s an updated version of a German blackletter, with thick, angular forms similar to what we know as Old English. As the official Nazi typeface in the 1930s, it was used in all government documents and propaganda.

That ended abruptly in 1941, however, when the Nazis discovered that the designer of fraktur was–can you imagine their shock–a Jew. In an about-face, the Nazis then outlawed its use and instead mandated that Antiqua, an old roman typeface, be used.

Fraktur and similar blackletter designs never disappeared, however, and since World War II have been widely used by neo-nazis as a link to the Third Reich. Appearing in banners, graffiti and tattoos, they have also crept into mainstream use, as on U.S. Army football jerseys in a recent Army-Navy football game.

In another appearance, Fraktur is used in an ICE recruitment video in which ice agents smash down doors and unleash an attack dog on a suspect. At the end of the video are three phrases: HUNT CARTELS, SAVE AMERICA, JOIN.ICE.GOV.

So, what can we say about typefaces? It’s important to know how typefaces work, why one font works better than another. It’s also important to understand that the typeface you use is part of the message. In some cases, it is the message.

EC 101 or How to Make Ethnic Cleansing Work for You

Welcome to EC 101. We hope you will find this course helpful to you in the challenging days ahead.

Intro: Ethnic Cleansing is a useful tool for removing people from your country or community. The beauty of it is, you can use it on the basis of several factors. Race is just one. It also works well with religion, language or politics.

Background: Over the years, EC has been used successfully by many countries and societies to rid themselves of unwanted elements. There are many examples. China, Sudan, Serbia and Rwanda. And of course, Nazi Germany, the country that took EC to its highest level.

In this course you will learn how to put in place the building blocks of a successful EC campaign. But remember. Each step is important if you are to achieve your goals.

Step One: The first step is to identify your target population. Consider the fears and prejudices within your own group. Who don’t you like? Who do you resent? Who are you afraid of? This will lead you to target people who don’t look or speak like you.

Your targets can be a racial group, like Blacks or Asians, or a national group, like Mexicans or Somalis. Or religious groups, like Jews or Muslims. If you’re trying to maintain dominance of a specific demographic, for example, white Christians, any or all of the above can become targets. You can also identify cultural subsets you may wish to rid society of, like gays or transsexuals.

A good place to start is with immigrants. Because they often have a different skin color, wear strange clothing or speak a different language, they will meet most of your criteria for EC.

Step Two: Begin a wide-scale campaign of verbal abuse and dehumanization. This will take time, so it’s important to start early. For example, Adolf Hitler began slandering Jews and calling for their removal as early as 1919. And our president didn’t just suddenly start trashing immigrants. As early as 2015 he was calling Mexicans criminals and rapists. Over time he added to his vocabulary, calling them snakes, blood polluting, and garbage. Descriptions of weird behavior are also effective, like accusing Haitians of eating cats and dogs.

At the same time, it will be helpful to identify with the dominant culture and religion. Tactics might include showing up at religious conferences and prayer breakfasts. Find an opportunity to hold up a Bible and stress your support for posting the Ten Commandments in schools.

Step Three: Marshall all economic and political resources. For this you will need the installation of patriots at all levels of government, from Town Hall to the Supreme Court. Once this has been achieved, you can obtain the legislative, judicial and financial support you will need.

Step Four: Preparation—before you launch your campaign, you must put in place adequate infrastructure for operations, detention and deportation. This takes years to put in place, and involves major construction projects and hiring of loyal personnel. It also will require specific working agreements with private contractors in incarceration and transportation.

You will also need agreements with other countries, who will receive and house your EC deportees. Warning: some countries will want nothing to do with this. Others, like El Salvador, will gladly accept and imprison your deportees if compensated.

Finally, set high goals. Note, for example, the recent goals set by the Department of Homeland Security of arresting 3,000 persons a day.

Step Five: The Launch–It’s important when launching your campaign to develop effective marketing tools. Coming up with catchy names and phrases that can help sell your EC product. Recent examples include the naming of the Florida detention center ‘Alligator Alcatraz,” and the ICE surge into Maine as “Catch of the Day.” Another is the staging of Homeland Security Director Kristi Noem in front of tattooed criminals in cages at El Salvador’s infamous CECOT prison.

Implementation: Now that everything is in place, launch your EC campaign. You now have power. Use it. The worst thing you can do is to appear weak or confused. If you must use violence—know that at the highest level of government, your leaders will back you.

When making arrests, you may need to separate parents from children, or children from parents. Don’t let your feelings get it the way. Focus on the larger good you are doing for your country.

Caution: At some point you may come into conflict with people like you, that is, white Americans, who try to deter or distract you from doing your job. Sadly, they have been indoctrinated by radical, leftist propaganda. As difficult as it is, you must treat them as the domestic terrorists they are.

A useful tip: It’s important when conducting your EC campaign to send signals to the dominant group that you are not targeting them. One way is to welcome white immigrants from South Africa or Northern Europe. This makes it clear that you are not opposed to all immigrants, only those with darker skins.

A final word: Throughout your Ethnic Cleansing campaign, keep your eyes on the prize. Make America Great Again by making America White Again. Conducting a successful EC campaign will require your perseverance and undying loyalty.

The Children Know the Way

If we are to find our way through the current moral and political crisis, we should pay more attention to our children.

That’s the message I got on Monday as Becky and I watched the HBO documentary, “We are the Dream: The Kids of the Oakland MLK Oratorical Fest.”

The film was shown at the Stoneham Public Library, which opened on the holiday just for the screening in commemoration of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. It was sponsored by our town’s Human Rights Commission.

“We are the Dream” tells the story of the children of Oakland, California, who compete in the annual MLK Oratorical, culminating in a remarkable presentation celebrating the life of the beloved civil rights leader.

In the film, the students, K-12, bring to life the words of Dr. King and others—poets, artists and activists. Sometimes, they perform their own compositions. We see them as they prepare, rehearse and take the stage.

Oakland, California, is a city of some 440,000 residents. Like San Francisco across the Bay, it is a consortium of races and ethnicities, with no one group a majority. Hispanics comprise about 30 percent, Whites 26, Blacks 20 and Asians 15. About 10 percent are listed as bi-racial, and there are smaller numbers of American or Hawaiian natives and Pacific islanders.

Which is to say, when you walk into Oakland’s schools, you will find the America envisioned 68 years ago in Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. You’ll see Black kids holding hands with White kids and Asian kids singing with Latino kids. You’ll find immigrants from around the world–from South America to Southeast Asia, from the Middle East to Eastern Europe.

Like most urban centers in the United States, Oakland struggles with issues of poverty, housing shortages and homelessness. What Oakland has demonstrated, however, is the that all races can live and work together and that diversity, equity and inclusion are essential American values.

What the HBO film shows us is that in a country still struggling with hate and division, we can create better. That’s the message of the children, and why we must pay attention.

In Stoneham, as well, we must pay attention to our children, those in our schools, clubs and churches, those like the young people at the Boys & Girls Club who gathered on Monday to thematic mural at the Teen Center on Central Street.

Have you noticed that children don’t get tied up in political and philosophical rationalizations? Most kids are quick to tell you what is right and wrong. They have an innate sense of fairness, and they know who the bullies are. They know violence is not the answer. As one second grader in Oakland said of the late civil rights leader, “Dr. King showed us how to fight without using our fists.”

Children know you don’t steal another person’s candy or their country. Or their dignity by calling them names. And you don’t shoot people who are getting in your way.

On this national holiday, the children call on us not to forget the dream of Martin Luther King. This dream, our children are showing us, can restore our spirit and renew our strength. It can lead us to renew our commitment to the “beloved community.”

Note: As we often spend time in Oakland during the winter, and as our son, who was director of academic programs for Oakland schools, was helping with this project, I was asked to fill in as one of the contest judges.. It just happened to be the year that HBO made the documentary above.

A Ballad for our Time, Too

Woodie Guthrie wrote the lyrics. Martin Hoffman set them to music. Since then, it’s been sung by Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, Bruce Springsteen, Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie.

It’s a ballad called “Deportees” and it tells of an airplane crash in California’s Los Gatos Canyon. On board were 28 migrant farm workers from Mexico.

The lyrics are as searing now as in 1848 when Guthrie wrote them:

The sky plane caught fire over Los Gatos Canyon,
A fireball of lightning, and shook all our hills,
Who are all these friends, all scattered like dry leaves?
The radio says, “They are just deportees.”

Guthrie wrote the ballad one night after news reports listed the names of the pilots, attendant and immigration guard lost in the crash, but referred to the farm workers only as “deportees.” After the braceros’ bodies were recovered, they were buried in a mass grave without names, marked “Mexican Nationals.”

The roundup of the Los Gatos laborers was just one episode in several government campaigns to remove Mexicans and those with Mexican ancestry. Mass deportation began in 1930 and continued through the Great Depression. Then in 1954, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) brought out “Operation Wetback.” Under this federal program, officials used strong-arm tactics to arrest tens of thousands of immigrants across the country. Caught up in the raids were farm and factory workers, including American citizens.

In July of 1955, several thousand deportees were found wandering the streets of Mexicali, a desert town bordering California. Yanked from their jobs and families, they had simply been dumped across the border. According to one account, 88 died of heat exposure in the 112 degree heat.

In Texas, thousands of deportees were crammed onto boats bound for Mexican ports. Testimony before a Congressional committee described conditions akin to those on slave ships. Other immigrants were packed into trucks. By the end of Operation Wetback, the INS claimed it had “repatriated” 1.3 million Mexicans.

Goodbye to my Juan, goodbye, Rosalita,
Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria;
You won’t have your names when you ride the big airplane,
All they will call you will be “deportees.”

Accompanying the mass deportations were media depictions of Mexicans as dirty, disease-bearing and lazy. News coverage focused on border and immigration officials conducting raids.

Only in time did most Americans come to see this as something shameful. In a 2012 ceremony in Los Angeles, Governor Jerry Brown and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa formally apologized for California’s role in the deportations.

On Labor Day in 2013, United Farm Worker President Arturo Rodriguez joined hundreds gathered at the Holy Cross Cemetery in Fresno, California, to memorialize the 28 farm workers killed in Los Gatos Canyon. They were 25 men and three women. This time, inscribed in the headstone, was each person’s name.

Now, deportation planes are again in the sky. Planes to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. Planes to India and Rwanda. Planes to Eswatini, a tiny country in southern Africa.

Through October 2025, the Department of Homeland Security operated 1,701 deportation flights to 77 countries. And it recently bought six Boeing 737s, expanding capacity.

Meanwhile, 66,000 men, women and children await deportation in detention centers. Arrested, often with brutal force, they were tracked down in streets, courthouses, parking lots, fields and construction sites.

Some of us are illegal, and some are not wanted,
Our work contracts out and we have to move on.
Six hundred miles to that Mexican border,
They chase us like outlaws, like rustlers, like thieves.

Compared to programs of the past, Donald Trump’s campaign is Operation Wetback on steroids. The president wants 3,000 arrests a day, or one million by the end of his first year in office. Each day, it seems, he expands his list of targets, Somalis, Haitians, Venezuelans, Afghans. What they have in common is their darker shades of skin.

As I listen to Woodie Guthrie’s song, I think of my children and grandchildren. I wonder, what song will they sing in years to come? Who will write the words, and who will remember the names?

Will there be, one day in the future, a public apology, a ceremonial mea culpa for the cruelty, the harm inflicted on so many? If so, what song will we then sing.

The Carpenter and the Cross-Dresser: a Christmas Story

In the darkness before dawn, a man from Georgia is riding in the baggage car of a northbound train. He is exhausted, and to keep awake, he opens the window. Cold air rushes in. Just then the engine whistle sounds, and sticking his head out the window, he sees the flickering lights of Philadelphia. It is Christmas Eve, 1848.

The traveler is a 24-year-old slave named William, on a journey with his master, “Mr. Johnson,” a young gentleman from Macon, traveling north for medical care. But things are not what they seem. In fact, Mr. Johnson is Ellen Craft, a tall, light-skinned African woman, cross-dressed as a plantation owner. And William is not just Mr. Johnson’s slave, he is her husband.

Allowed to marry, Ellen and William have avoided having children, shuddering at the prospect of bearing offspring who might be taken from them and sold. Their desperation has steeled them to dare an escape, despite the horrendous outcome if they are caught.

Born of a white owner and his African slave, Ellen was taken from her mother at age 11 and given as a wedding present. Now a house slave, she has been granted a few days off to visit her family. William, trained as a carpenter and rented out by his owner for wages, has also obtained permission to be absent from work. Growing up, he has seen both his parents and his 14-year-old sister sold away to pay debts.

Two weeks ago William and Ellen spent the night in Ellen’s cabin, planning their escape route. The distance from Macon to a free state is a thousand miles. For the Crafts, attempts on foot are out of the question. Instead, William and Ellen have decided to escape in plain sight, that is, in disguise. Using money saved from jobs on the side, William has been buying pieces of men’s clothing a young gentleman would wear. Ellen, a seamstress, has sewed a fine pair of trousers. She has locked the clothes in a little chest of drawers William made for her. The last thing William bought for his new “master” was a pair of green-tinted spectacles. They will leave on December 21.

The night before, William and Ellen spend the hours talking, asking, what if, and what should we do when? There is a major problem. At every train or customs station, Ellen will be required to sign a register, or to show papers. And she, like her husband, is illiterate.

Ellen has an idea. She will tie up her right arm in a sling, so she will not be asked for her signature. Further, to discourage questioning, she will have bandages with a poultice wrapped around one side of her head.

Just before dawn on Dec. 21, William takes out Ellen’s scissors. Standing behind her like a barber, he cuts her hair. Then he helps her into her gentleman’s clothes, complete with top hat. At the door they pause. No one is in the street. They slip out “quiet as moonlight on the water,” William will later recall, and they separate. They meet at the train station.

Their escape is laden with peril. On each leg there is a new challenge. Settling into her seat on the train to Savannah, Ellen is shocked to see a friend of her owner’s, who would know her, take a seat next to her. Feigning illness, she avoids his inquiries and is undetected.

From the Massachusetts Histoical Society. Not to be reproduced without permission.

Arriving in Savannah, Mr. Johnson and his slave take an omnibus to the harbor, where they purchase tickets on a steamer bound for Charleston, South Carolina. Going aboard, William helps his master settle into his berth, then goes on deck to find a place to sleep. There are no accommodations for slaves, so he finds a warm place near the funnel on sacks of cotton, resting there until morning.

The next day, as William patiently waits on Mr. Johnson, a vulgar slave trader tries to purchase him from his master. Then a military officer scolds Mr. Johnson for speaking kindly to his slave. “Nothing spoils a slave so soon as saying, ‘Thank you,’” he warns him.

In Charleston, Mr. Johnson and his slave check into a hotel. Here the proprietor is solicitous of the young gentleman’s needs. While his master is served in the dining room, Williams eats off a broken plate in the kitchen.

The next morning, as they prepare to board a steamer to Wilmington, North Carolina, the station officer demands that Mr. Johnson sign the register, despite his apparent injury. Finally, the officer who has come on the same ship from Savannah steps up and vouches for the invalid gentleman. Overhearing this, the ship’s captain signs the register, “Mr. Johnson and slave.”

The next morning William and Ellen Craft arrive in Wilmington, and from there board a train for Richmond, riding in a section reserved for families and invalids. Here they are joined by an older man and two daughters, who insist on making Mr. Johnson as comfortable as possible, and share advice on remedies for rheumatism. “Papa,” one of the daughters says, “Mr. Johnson seems to be a fine gentleman.”

After the train stops in Richmond, the friendly father and daughters disembark, and a stout, elderly lady takes a seat beside the disguised Ellen. Glancing out the window, she sees William approaching on the platform and cries out, “Bless my soul, there goes my nigger, Ned.”

“No, that’s my boy,” Mr. Johnson replies. When William arrives, the lady confesses she was mistaken, then launches into a diatribe against her run-away slave, and all the slaves she owns. She plans to sell them away to New Orleans as soon as she can.

At Fredericksburg, the Crafts again board a steamer, this time to Washington, D. C. Once in the nation’s capital, they go directly to the train station and board a train for Baltimore.

When the train pulls into Baltimore, it is Saturday evening, Christmas Eve. Ellen and William are exhausted and their nerves frayed. They have expected detection at every step. For three days and nights they have had almost no sleep.

Stepping warily onto the station platform, Mr. Johnson and his slave go to the ticket office and purchase tickets for the final leg of their journey, the night train to Philadelphia.

But something goes wrong. Maryland is still a slave state, and it is illegal for any white man to take his slave into Pennsylvania, a free state, without authorization. After settling Ellen in her carriage, William returns to the platform, but is accosted by the station officer, who forbids him to board.

Returning to the station office, crowded with late-evening travelers, Mr. Johnson demands to know why he, a respected gentleman needing medical care, cannot take his faithful slave with him on the train to Philadelphia.

Ellen’s insistence turns to pleading, but to no avail. Have they come so far, only to be arrested as fugitives? They know well the fate that awaits captured run-away slaves. William has seen them attacked by dogs, whipped, tortured or killed as an example to others. Even if they survive, they will be forever separated, assigned to the hardest forms of labor.

As they wait in agonizing suspense, the train whistle sounds. Just then the train conductor enters the room and calls the all-aboard. Then, as if only by Providence, the station officer relents. Seeing how the young gentleman is in such poor condition, and it is Christmas Eve, he gives permission for the two to pass.

As quickly as possible, William settles Ellen into her carriage, then hops into the baggage car where he must ride. Slowly, in the early darkness, the engine picks up steam and the train pulls out of Baltimore station.

It is now almost five in the morning, and the weary fugitive with his head out the window gazes with fascination at the twinkling lights ahead of him. In the cold wind, tears are spreading on his cheeks, and something is happening he can hardly explain. His body has suddenly become lighter.

With a great hissing of steam, the train comes to a stop in Philadelphia station. William and Ellen wait until all the other passengers have disembarked, then William calls for a “fly,” a horse-drawn taxi, and hands the driver the address of a boarding house he has been told is run by an abolitionist. Here they will find refuge and support for their continued journey north.

Inside the carriage, Ellen leans her head on William’s shoulder and bursts into tears. It is Christmas Day. They are free.

Afterword: After boarding with a Quaker family outside Philadelphia, William and Ellen Craft make their way to Boston, where they are welcomed by the abolitionist community of free blacks and white allies. Here William works as a cabinet maker and Ellen as a seamstress until 1850, when the Fugitive Slave Act imperils their freedom and they flee to Nova Scotia, then England. Over the next 15 years they work, study, lecture and raise a family of four boys and one girl. After the Civil War, they return to Georgia and open a school for the children of former slaves. This retelling of their story is based on their book, published in London in 1860, titled “One Thousand Miles to Freedom.”

— Ben Jacques

Autumn

(a free translation of Rainer Maria Rilke’s poem)

The long summer’s over, Lord.
Time to turn our clocks back.
Time for cold winds to blow.

But wait. So the last fruits may ripen
give us two more warm days.
push the pears to plumpness,
chase the sugar in the heavy vine.

If you have no house, too late to build.
If you’re alone now, get used to it.
You’ll wake up, read a little,
write long letters,
then wander in side streets here and there,
restless as a falling leaf.

HERBSTTAG

Herr: es ist Zeit. Der Sommer war sehr gross.
Leg deinen Schatten auf die Sonnenuhren,
und auf den Fluren lass Winde los.

Befiehl den letzen Früchten voll zu sein;
gib ihnen noch zwei südlichere Tage,
dränge sie zur Vollendung hin und jage
die letze Süsse in den schweren Vein.

Wer jetzt kein Haus hat, baut sich keines mehr.
Wer jetzt allein ist, wird es lange bleiben
wird wachen, lesen, lange Briefe schreiben,
und wird in den Alleen hin und her
unruhig wandern, wenn die Blätter treiben.

The Squaretail

Cleve would forget he’ d told me about the squaretail, the brook trout he’d caught as a boy on the farm in Wiscasset, Maine, and tell me the story again. He must have told me twenty times. But I’d let him tell it again. I didn’t mind. He had given me my first fly rod, and I figured I could spare the time.

I never fished much as a boy. But soon after I married Cleve’s daughter, I started going with him and Morrill, my brother-in-law. My job was to run the boat, to put it where my in-laws could cast.

We often fished the Rangeley Lakes region, from Beaver Mountain to the Little Kennebago River. On any given day, while fishing we might see deer, otters or a beaver. Or a heron, osprey or kingfisher. Sometimes a pair of loons would surface and we’d be serenaded by their throaty calls. Once, in a stream, we heard splashing ahead. Pretty soon a young bull moose came around the bend and walked past us, not ten feet away.

The thing about brook trout is that once you catch one, other fish look ugly. Brookies, or squaretails, are small trout in general, but their sides are prettier than a church window. Their minute scales are flecked with yellow and red spots, sometimes with blue haloes. When spawning, males have orange-red sides and bellies.

Eventually, I got tired of steering the boat so my in-laws could fish, and I picked up a spare fly rod. “Put on a number 12 Hornberger,” Cleve said. That done, I started whipping the line back and forth. First I snagged it in the alders, then on Morrill’s hat. “Easy, now,” he said.

After a good deal of practice, I dropped the fly gently down on the surface and got a hit, then lost it. But at the mouth of the brook, now fishing the Hornberger wet, I brought in my first catch. I stared in amazement at the eight-inch brookie in my hand.

That autumn, after the fishing season, Cleve had a massive stroke. He lay on the hospital bed in Maine Medical Center, unable to move. Then one day I saw his thumb twitch. Miraculously, and with intense will, not to mention speech and physical therapy, he came back, but not all the way.

In the winter months I played Cribbage with him, making small talk as he struggled to shuffle and deal. By spring he was doing much better. He had learned to sign his checks with his left hand. He was also learning to drive again. He never got his fine-motor movement back, so important to fly fishing, but that didn’t keep him from trying.

In July we I asked Cleve if he was ready to go fishing again. Morrill and I helped Cleve off the dock into the boat. We crossed the lake, entered the stream, then drifted toward our favorite spot. All three of us began casting, but when Cleve hooked one, I quickly reeled in and turned to assist. He brought his fish slowly to the boat, just the way you’re supposed to. “Get the net,” Morrill called out. But I didn’t like using nets, and I reached down to gently lift the brookie in for him. Coming out of the water, the trout leaped in an arc and was gone. If it had been my fish, I would’ve cursed. “There’ll be another one,” was all Cleve said.

In later years, the fish Cleve liked to talk about, more than the salmon or togue, more than the grayling and pike he had caught out in Minnesota, was the 15-inch squaretail he caught when he was a boy, in the stream that wound through the farm before dropping into the Sheepscot River.

At dawn one Sunday morning, he had grabbed his rod and a few night crawlers and headed for the bend where the stream pooled deep. His timing was right. He caught a couple of nine-ten-inchers. Then he crawled out on a tree that bent over the pool and dropped his line straight down where the water was black.

The sudden tug almost pulled him off balance. He inched back down the trunk, then patiently tired the fish before sliding him up on the bank.

It was a beautiful trout, deep in color and thick as a man’s fist. He gathered his trophy and the other two on a string, ran up to the house, knocked on his father’s bedroom door and walked over beside the bed. Tapping his father on the shoulder, he first held out the two smaller trout.

His father squinted at the fish, then rolled over. “Now, how ‘bout this one?” the boy held out the large brook trout. This time his father in one motion swung his legs out from under the bed covers. This was a squaretail worth looking at.

Word got out at church that morning about the boy’s fish, and that afternoon Cleve’s uncle drove over from Damariscotta. “Show me your trout,” he told his nephew. “Too late,” Cleve said. “We et him for lunch.”

Over the next few years, Cleve had a series of smaller strokes and setbacks. But often, when the talk died down, or our thoughts turned to the upcoming season, Cleve would ruminate on that trout. He’d say, “Did I ever tell you about the squaretail I caught in the stream on the farm?”

I figured that trout—rich in symbol and pride—had helped my father-in-law through the hard times , the heart attack, the strokes, the long hours of therapy, the loss of his wife, the loneliness of hospital nights.

A year later, Cleve started losing his memory, or rather began returning to another time. Sometimes he’d get up a 3 a.m., get his things together and announce it was time to go home. One day when we took him out for a drive to town landing, he said he wanted to go home. But when we headed for home, he said it wasn’t the right way.

Eventually he had to go to a nursing home. One of the last times I visited with him, he was waiting for his parents to pick him up.

It’s hard having a conversation with someone with dementia. You want so bad to connect, for yourself as well as for them.

As I sat beside him in his wheelchair, there were no more words. Then I thought of asking him about the brook trout. “Do you remember the squaretail, Dad? The one you caught when you were a boy on the farm?”

He looked at me for a moment, patiently, I thought. Then he said, simply, quietly, “No.”

I was stunned. Something inside him had let the fish go. I grabbed desperately for the net. It was too late. That magnificent trout, beautiful as a Monet, had simply snapped the leader drawing it to the surface and turned back in a silent rush to the pool’s depths.

A month later, Cleve, too, entered that dark pool. I like to think he found the squaretail again. That his eyes once again lit up at the beautiful colors. But I don’t know. These things are hard to tell.

“When yellow leaves…”

As autumn wanes into winter, the voice of the greatest of poets comes again to me. “That time of year thou mayst in me behold.”

It’s not just the coming of winter, but also the accumulation of years. I will soon turn 79. William Shakespeare must have felt a similar melancholy when he wrote Sonnet 73.

Wonderfully crafted, Sonnet 73 is an appeal to the poet’s beloved, written in his later years. Setting the stage, so to speak, Shakespeare creates three scenes, one quatrain for each. The first is late fall. Most of the leaves are gone. Trees, where once birds sang, are “bare ruined choirs.”

The second is the sky just after the sun has gone down. A faint wash of color remains. For the third scene, the poet brings us indoors. He is now sitting by the hearth, before the “glowing of such fire that on the ashes of his youth doth lie.”

This is what you see in me, he tells his beloved–the last fall colors, the fading sunset, the low flames of an almost-spent fire. Perceiving all this, the poet closes in a couplet, “makes thy love more strong.”

The sonnet ends with a call to his beloved “to love that well which thou must leave ere long.”

So are we all called, as we turn the clocks back, as we approach yet another New England winter, to love well those around us, young and old.

Here, now, is Sonnet 73, a poem for the ages:

That time of year thou mayst in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruin’d choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.
In me thou see’st the twilight of such day
As after sunset fadeth in the west,
Which by and by black night doth take away,
Death’s second self, that seals up all in rest.
In me thou see’st the glowing of such fire
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,
As the death-bed whereon it must expire,
Consum’d with that which it was nourish’d by.
This thou perceiv’st, which makes thy love more strong,
To love that well which thou must leave ere long.