LEADER 04748nam 2200637Ia 450 001 9910455382103321 005 20200520144314.0 010 $a0-674-02979-8 024 7 $a10.4159/9780674029798 035 $a(CKB)1000000000787194 035 $a(SSID)ssj0000244939 035 $a(PQKBManifestationID)11217654 035 $a(PQKBTitleCode)TC0000244939 035 $a(PQKBWorkID)10170680 035 $a(PQKB)10342339 035 $a(MiAaPQ)EBC3300268 035 $a(Au-PeEL)EBL3300268 035 $a(CaPaEBR)ebr10314278 035 $a(OCoLC)923109981 035 $a(DE-B1597)574557 035 $a(DE-B1597)9780674029798 035 $a(EXLCZ)991000000000787194 100 $a19960806d1997 uy 0 101 0 $aeng 135 $aurcn||||||||| 181 $ctxt 182 $cc 183 $acr 200 10$aShadrach Minkins$b[electronic resource] $efrom fugitive slave to citizen /$fGary Collison 210 $aCambridge, MA $cHarvard University Press$d1997 215 $a294 p. $cill 300 $aBibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph 311 $a0-674-80298-5 311 $a0-674-80299-3 320 $aIncludes bibliographical references (p. [229]-277) and index. 327 $tFrontmatter -- $tContents -- $tIllustrations -- $tPrologue -- $tNORFOLK -- $t1. "Han't Got No Self" -- $t2. "Horses and Men, Cattle and Women, Pigs and Children" -- $t3. "The Silver Trump of Freedom" -- $tBOSTON -- $t4. "Cradle of Liberty"? -- $t5. "A New Reign of Terror" -- $t6. "Much Excitement Prevails" -- $t7. "A Thing ... or a Man?" -- $t8. "Plucked as a Brand from the Burning" -- $t9. "Never Was a Darker Day" -- $t10. North Star -- $tMONTREAL -- $t11. "Please to Remember Me Kindly" -- $t12. A Home Far Away -- $t13. "Free at Last! Free at Last!" -- $tEpilogue -- $tMilitia Petition by Black Residents of Montreal -- $tNotes -- $tAcknowledgments -- $tIndex 330 $aOn February 15, 1851, Shadrach Minkins was serving breakfast at a coffeehouse in Boston when history caught up with him. The first runaway to be arrested in New England under the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law, this illiterate Black man from Virginia found himself the catalyst of one of the most dramatic episodes of rebellion and legal wrangling before the Civil War. In a remarkable effort of historical sleuthing, Gary Collison has recovered the true story of Shadrach Minkins? life and times and perilous flight. His book restores an extraordinary chapter to our collective history and at the same time offers a rare and engrossing picture of the life of an ordinary Black man in nineteenth-century North America. As Minkins? journey from slavery to freedom unfolds, we see what day-to-day life was like for a slave in Norfolk, Virginia, for a fugitive in Boston, and for a free Black man in Montreal. Collison recreates the drama of Minkins?s arrest and his subsequent rescue by a band of Black Bostonians, who spirited the fugitive to freedom in Canada. He shows us Boston?s Black community, moved to panic and action by the Fugitive Slave Law, and the previously unknown community established in Montreal by Minkins and other refugee Blacks from the United States. And behind the scenes, orchestrating events from the disastrous Compromise of 1850 through the arrest of Minkins and the trial of his rescuers, is Daniel Webster, who through the exigencies of his dimming political career, took the role of villain. Webster is just one of the familiar figures in this tale of an ordinary man in extraordinary circumstances. Others, such as Frederick Douglass, Richard Henry Dana, Jr., Harriet Jacobs, and Harriet Beecher Stowe (who made use of Minkins?s Montreal community in Uncle Tom?s Cabin), also appear throughout the narrative. Minkins? intriguing story stands as a fascinating commentary on the nation?s troubled times?on urban slavery and Boston abolitionism, on the Underground Railroad, and on one of the federal government?s last desperate attempts to hold the Union together. 606 $aSlaves$zVirginia$zNorfolk$vBiography 606 $aFugitive slaves$zMassachusetts$zBoston$vBiography 606 $aAfrican Americans$zQue?bec (Province)$zMontre?al$xHistory$y19th century 607 $aNorfolk (Va.)$vBiography 607 $aBoston (Mass.)$vBiography 607 $aMontre?al (Que?bec)$vBiography 608 $aElectronic books. 615 0$aSlaves 615 0$aFugitive slaves 615 0$aAfrican Americans$xHistory 676 $a973.7/115/092 700 $aCollison$b Gary Lee$f1947-$0890617 801 0$bMiAaPQ 801 1$bMiAaPQ 801 2$bMiAaPQ 906 $aBOOK 912 $a9910455382103321 996 $aShadrach Minkins$91989453 997 $aUNINA