The Underground Railroad eBook

William Still
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 1,446 pages of information about The Underground Railroad.

The Underground Railroad eBook

William Still
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 1,446 pages of information about The Underground Railroad.

The money to be State Bank of Ohio, or State Bank, or Northern Bank of Kentucky, or any other Eastern bank.  Send no notes larger than twenty dollars.

Levi Coffin had no money for me.  I paid twenty dollars for the skiff.  No money to get back to Philadelphia.  It was not understood that I would have to be at any expense seeking aid.

One half of my time has been used in trying to find persons to assist, when I may arrive on the Ohio river, in which I have failed, except Stormon.

Having no letter of introduction to Stormon from any source, on which I could fully rely, I traveled two hundred miles around, to find out his stability.  I have found many Abolitionists, nearly all who have made propositions, which themselves would not comply with, and nobody else would.  Already I have traveled over three thousand miles.  Two thousand and four hundred by steamboat, two hundred by railroad, one hundred by stage, four hundred on foot, forty-eight in a skiff.

I have yet five hundred miles to go to the plantation, to commence operations.  I have been two weeks on the decks of steamboats, three nights out, two of which I got perfectly wet.  If I had had paper money, as McKim desired, it would have been destroyed.  I have not been entertained gratis at any place except Stormon’s.  I had one hundred and twenty-six dollars when I left Philadelphia, one hundred from you, twenty-six mine.

Telegraphed to station at Evansville, thirty-three miles from Stormon’s, and at Vinclure’s, twenty-five miles from Stormon’s.  The Wabash route is considered the safest route.  No one has ever been lost from Stormon’s to Canada.  Some have been lost between Stormon’s and the Ohio.  The wolves have never suspected Stormon.  Your asking aid in money for a case properly belonging east of Ohio, is detested.  If you have sent money to Cincinnati, you should recall it.  I will have no opportunity to use it.

Seth Concklin, Princeton, Gibson county, Ind.

P.S.  First of April, will be about the time Peter’s family will arrive opposite Detroit.  You should inform yourself how to find them there.  I may have no opportunity.

I will look promptly for your letter at Princeton, till the 10th of March, and longer if there should have been any delay by the mails.

In March, as contemplated, Concklin arrived in Indiana, at the place designated, with Peter’s wife and three children, and sent a thrilling letter to the writer, portraying in the most vivid light his adventurous flight from the hour they left Alabama until their arrival in Indiana.  In this report he stated, that instead of starting early in the morning, owing to some unforeseen delay on the part of the family, they did not reach the designated place till towards day, which greatly exposed them in passing a certain town which he had hoped to avoid.

But as his brave heart was bent on prosecuting his journey without further delay, he concluded to start at all hazards, notwithstanding the dangers he apprehended from passing said town by daylight.  For safety he endeavored to hide his freight by having them all lie flat down on the bottom of the skiff; covered them with blankets, concealing them from the effulgent beams of the early morning sun, or rather from the “Christian Wolves” who might perchance espy him from the shore in passing the town.

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Project Gutenberg
The Underground Railroad from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.