Underground Railroad Tour
I'm on my way to Canada
by Dr. Joshua McCarter Simpson (1860)
(Sung to the tune of Oh! Suzannah!)
I'm on my way to Canada that cold and dreary land,
The dire effects of slavery I can no longer stand,
My soul is vexed within me more To think that I'm a slave,
I'm now resolved to strike the blow for freedom, or the grave.
Oh, righteous father, wilt thou not pity me,
And aid me on to Canada, where colored men are free.
I heard the Queen of England say If we would all forsake
Our native land of slavery and come across the lake,
That she was standing on the shore with arms extended wide,
To give us all a peaceful home beyond the rolling tide.
Farewell old master, that's enough for me,
I'm going straight to Canada where colored men are free.
Grieve not my wife, grieve not for me, Oh, do not break my heart
For nought but cruel slavery would cause me to depart,
If I should stay to quell your grief, your grief I would augment,
For no one knows the day that we asunder may be rent.
Oh, Susannah don't cry after me, I'm going up to Canada where colored men are free.
I served my master all my days, without a dime's reward,
But now I'm forced to run away to flee the lash abhored,
The hounds are baying on my track, the master just behind,
Resolved that he will bring me back before I cross the line.
Oh, old master don't come after me
I'm going up to Canada where colored men are free.
Sexton’s House Site, Former “Colored Cemetery,” Avondale
A stop on the Underground Railroad
In 1848, the United Colored American Association dedicated a cemetery on what is now Burton Avenue in Avondale. The cemetery no longer exists. There are many stories about this place; an overlooked facet is its role in the Underground Railroad.
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Delia Webster, Calvin Fairbank, and the Escape of Lewis Hayden
Delia Webster and Calvin Fairbank emerged as fiery white abolitionists as well as Underground Railroad activists.
Delia Webster was born in Vermont in 1817, studied briefly at Oberlin College in Ohio, and moved to Kentucky in 1842. Calvin Fairbank was born in New York in 1816, studied for several…
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Village of Ripley
Important River Port and Underground Railroad Site
The community was founded on a portion of the 1,000 acres of Survey No. 418 of the Virginia Military District purchased by Colonel James Poage of Staunton, VA. Poage was determined to live in a free state and settled on his claim as early as 1804. His anti-slavery views attracted other souther…
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John P. Parker House
Inventor, Entrepreneur and Underground Railroad Conductor
According to historian Wilbur H. Siebert, there were at least twenty-three ports of entry for freedom seekers along the Ohio riverfront, and Ripley was an active Underground Railroad stop.
Overlooking the Ohio River in Ripley, the John P. Parker House is now a small museum devoted to sharing the…
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Rankin House
home of abolitionist and Presbyterian minister
The Rankin House at 6152 Rankin Hill Rd. in Ripley was home to abolitionist and Presbyterian minister John Rankin, his wife Jean and their 13 children. It's estimated that over 2,000 slaves seeking freedom stayed with the Rankins, sometimes as many as 12 at a time. Though slavery was illegal…
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LaBoiteaux Woods
Ravine to Freedom on the Underground Railroad
LaBoiteaux Woods, a nature preserve in the Cincinnati neighborhood of College Hill, is believed to have been part of the Underground Railroad during the 1840s and 1850s. The LaBoiteauxs were early settlers in the College Hill/Mt. Healthy area, and several family members were known for their…
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Wilson Family Home
A Stop on The Underground Railroad
Samuel Wilson and his wife Sally (née Nesmith) were descended from the Pilgrims who had settled in Londonderry, New Hampshire in 1719. After 13 years of hard life in New England, the Wilsons set off in 1828 for the milder climate and more fertile soil of Ohio, settling first in Columbia, and then…
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Farmers' College
How this institution helped facilitated the Underground Railroad in College Hill Underground.
In 1813-14, William Cary, having migrated from New Hampshire to Cincinnati in 1802, purchased 491 acres (1.99 km2) north of Cincinnati along what is now Hamilton Avenue. Cary built a log cabin and moved his family to this “wilderness,” then known as Mill Creek Township. In 1833, Cary’s son Freeman…
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Escape of the 28 in Cincinnati
The story of an undercover operation at Wesleyan Cemetery that led to the escape of 28 enslaved men, women, and children along Hamilton Avenue's road to freedom.
On the Road to FreedomIt started in Petersburg, in Boone Co., Kentucky. John Fairfield, a white man, and a slave rescuer for hire, engaged in the subterfuge of buying poultry for market for several weeks in an area of the county. Being white and in Kentucky, he was assumed to be pro-slavery and…
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Wesleyan Cemetery
First Racially Integrated Cemetery in Hamilton County and Important Site of Abolitionist and Black Civil War Veteran Burials
Wesleyan Cemetery was founded in 1843 by the Methodist Church, which purchased approximately 25 acres for the facility in what was then Millcreek Township (now the Cincinnati neighborhood of Northside), on Colerain Ave. adjacent to Mill Creek. Bodies from other cemeteries were moved to this one…
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Henry Bibb
A determination for freedom for all!
Several years earlier, in 1835, Henry Bibb made his first escape attempt when he was hired out to Mr. Vires, who lived on a nearby farm in Newcastle, Kentucky. Although he was hoping to reach Canada with great ease, Bibb was captured in less than twenty-four hours, whipped and placed in isolation.…
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United American Cemetery
Historic African American burial ground
The United American Cemetery, in Madisonville, was originally called the Colored American Cemetery. It was dedicated in 1883, but it includes many older tombstones, going back to the 1840’s and 1850’s. That’s because the cemetery was originally in another location, but it was forced to move.
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Gravesite of William H. Beckley
Underground Railroad Agent
On May 16, 1834, a classified advertisement appeared in the Alexandria (Virginia) Gazette: “RANAWAY, from the subscriber, on the 5th instant, WILLIAM BECKLEY, an indented apprentice to the Ship’s Carpenter’s business, a bright mulatto, about eighteen years of age, about five feet four or five inches high.”
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Gravesite of Susan Webb Tinsley
African American socialite and Underground Railroad agent
In the pre-Civil War era, Susan Webb Tinsley was the queen of Black society in Cincinnati. She and her husband entertained lavishly at their home on Seventh Street. Susan Tinsley was also an agent on the Underground Railroad.
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Gravesite of the Fossett Family
A remarkable family journey from slavery to freedom.
This gravestone in Union Baptist Cemetery marks the burial location of four remarkable individuals: Edith Hern Fossett, her husband Joseph, their son Peter Farley Fossett, and Peter’s spouse Sarah Mayrant Walker Fossett.
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Sarah Mayrant Walker Fossett
A Black woman who built an empire, changed society, and fostered community.
Early Life Born in Charleston, South Carolina* to Rufus and Judith on 26 June 1826, Sarah, a “noble, lovable character,” had been born enslaved. As a young girl, Sarah was sent to New Orleans. There, she studied under a French hair specialist the art of hair and scalp treatment and hair goods…
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Gammon House
The Gammon House is one of only 3 existing Ohio “stops” on the Underground Railroad owned by a free person of color. It was built in 1850, the same year that the Fugitive Slave Act was passed, imposing fines and imprisonment on any person aiding a runaway slave.
George Gammon and his wife Sarah…
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Liverpool Family Home Site
Home to three Black women active in the Underground Railroad
In the story of the Underground Railroad, Black women don’t always get the credit they deserve. In Cincinnati, there was at one time a house at 46 Race Street, which was home to at least three Black women active in Underground Railroad work: Mary Liverpool, Elizabeth Liverpool, and Sarah Fossett.
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The Tragic Story of Margaret Garner
An enslaved Black woman and her family's fight short-lived fight to freedom in Cincinnati.
In an effort to escape slavery in the South, Margaret Garner and her family journeyed from Richwood, KY to Cincinnati, OH where they were quickly recaptured, but not before Margaret took matters into her own hands...
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Charlton Wallace House (Baumgartner Residence)
Former Catholic Monastery with an Underground Railroad Connection
Built between 1840 and 1849 as a Catholic monastery, the Charlton Wallace House (also known as the Baumgartner Residence) is the oldest residential structure in East Walnut Hills. According to the 1975 application to the National Register of Historic Places, “A room located under a rear porch is…
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