The Underground Railroad Brides Collection: 9 Couples Navigate the Road to Freedom Before the Civil War

by Barbara Tifft Blakey, Ramona K. Cecil, Lynn A. Coleman, Cecelia Dowdy, Patty Smith Hall, Terri J. Haynes, Debby Lee, Darlene Panzera

  Unperturbed, Reverend Strong moved in front of the pulpit and continued to look each person in the eye. “Who was a neighbor to the wounded man in today’s teaching? Was it someone who was prejudiced or indifferent or afraid of the inconvenience or cost? I ask you again, who was a neighbor?”

  “The one who had pity on him,” a clear voice rose from the back.

  Annie’s heart lurched, and with a gasp, she spun around in her seat. Isaiah?

  Beneath his top coat, he was dressed in a dark brown waistcoat and trousers and wore his hair slicked over to the side, sharpening his features and giving him yet a different look than the other two times she’d seen him. A freshly scrubbed, gentlemanly look that somehow made him appear even handsomer than Henry Pennington.

  Her cheeks grew warm as Isaiah met her gaze. Then he sat down in the last pew and bowed his head. Perplexed as to what prompted his sudden arrival, Annie glanced over at her parents, but they had no idea who the young man was. And Will wasn’t there to guide her. He’d caught their father’s sickness and remained at home in bed with a low-grade fever.

  Turning back toward Louisa, she said in an urgent whisper, “It’s him.”

  “The same young man who was staring at you in town is…Isaiah Hawkins, the handsome ferry dock worker?” Louisa murmured, lifting a brow.

  Annie’s heart fluttered inside her chest like a caged bird. “What do you suppose he is doing here?”

  Louisa’s mouth curved into a smile. “After the service, be sure to go over and ask him.”

  “Me?” Annie could barely breathe as she fought a surge of panic. She wasn’t usually the one who took the initiative. Not like Louisa or Will, who were both a year older than her. She peeked at Isaiah over her shoulder then turned toward Louisa and asked, “What shall I say?”

  After the service, Isaiah stood outside the double doors of the church waiting for the rest of the congregation to emerge. After twisting the wide brim of his brown bowler hat around in his hands, he spotted the Morrisons. Squeezing the edges of his hat tight, he walked toward them, his attention on Annie, who looked off in another direction, as if searching for someone. Then he put his hat back on his head and approached her father.

  Shaking his hand, he introduced himself, then asked, “Mr. Morrison, may I speak to your daughter?”

  Annie’s gaze snapped toward him, and her mouth popped open to form a small O.

  Her father gave her a questioning look, and at her nod, Mr. Morrison said, “Yes, Mr. Hawkins, you may.”

  Mr. Morrison and his wife then promptly stepped aside to give them a few paces of privacy, as if such a thing were possible while standing in the middle of the milling crowd of people who were all eagerly bent on conversing with one another.

  Annie pulled her white silk gloves from the pocket of her wool mantle and slid them on before looking at him. But when she did, she smiled.

  His pulse kicked up a notch and he swallowed hard, suddenly unsure of what he had wanted to say. Or how to say it.

  Finally, he drew in a deep breath and grinned back at her. “I wanted to let you know that the cargo was delivered safely and is now headed up through New York to Canada.”

  Annie nodded. “Thank you. I was concerned.”

  “Do your parents know?”

  “Of course. My father would have put him on the ferry himself, if he hadn’t been sick. And my mother is the one who thought up the disguise.”

  Isaiah glanced around to make sure no one was eavesdropping. “How long has your family been a station?”

  “We’re not,” Annie said, glancing around as well. “Our involvement was…one time only.”

  “That’s too bad,” he said when she met his gaze. “I had hoped we could work together.”

  Annie shook her head, and fear entered her eyes. “It’s too dangerous. If we were caught…the fine would devastate our family. We could lose everything.”

  “I know the risks.”

  “How long have you been a ferry worker?” she asked in a hushed whisper.

  “I’m not,” Isaiah informed her. “I’m a ‘watcher.’”

  Annie frowned. “What’s that?”

  “The captain pays a few of us to ride the ferry and keep watch over the docks on either shore. I’m supposed to be on the lookout for thieves who might want to steal the ship’s real cargo.”

  “Does he know what you are really doing?”

  Isaiah shook his head. “Only some of the crew.”

  “Aren’t you afraid of being caught?”

  “I am,” Isaiah admitted.

  “And yet, still you put your life on the line…for people you don’t even know.” Annie pursed her lips. “Why?”

  Isaiah chuckled. “Because I am their ‘neighbor,’ Miss Morrison. And because…it’s the right thing to do.”

  Chapter 4

  Whoa! Easy, Blue.” Isaiah drew back on the reins and brought the fidgety blue roan to a stop beside the grassy embankment west of the tracks, several hundred feet from the Jersey City train terminal. The young horse didn’t care much for the noise of the incoming trains, but Isaiah’s brother, Tom, hoped that with time and training, they’d be able to use Blue to pull a carriage for paying customers. For now, they took turns driving him past the tracks each day to show him there wasn’t anything to be afraid of and used him to pull the carts and wagons carrying their incoming supplies. Earlier that morning, Isaiah had picked up a full load of hay from one of the outlying farms, at a better price than the feed store in the heart of the city, a perfect cover to hide his other intended cargo.

  If it arrived.

  He’d come to this section of the tracks the last three days in a row, waiting. But each day the train passed right on by, with no drop-offs for him to collect. That’s the way it was with the Underground Railroad. Sometimes you were told someone was coming, but you didn’t know when. And sometimes you didn’t know they were coming at all…until they showed up.

  Of course, there were also the ones who took a different route than originally planned. Which is what he was beginning to suspect had happened with the pair headed his way. While he waited at the train tracks, his expected cargo could be headed toward the city on foot or by boat from the east.

  All he knew was that a woman, dressed in a fine green cloak and bonnet, had come into the livery on Saturday and told him to expect a double delivery this week, most likely aboard the New Jersey Railroad.

  The distant chugging of the steam-powered engine drew closer, and Isaiah climbed down from the wagon seat to stand by Blue’s side, not only to keep a firm hold on the horse to keep him from rearing, but also to whisper words of encouragement.

  The train slowed as it passed, hissing and chugging, but although Isaiah kept a sharp lookout, he didn’t see anyone jump. Not even his horse jumped. He gave the roan a gentle pat. “You did good today, Blue. Much better than yesterday. Wait until I tell Tom. Maybe he’ll mix an extra treat with your grain tonight.”

  Blue’s ears pricked forward as if he liked that idea. No doubt the horse understood the word treat. Horses were much smarter than some people gave them credit for.

  So was he. Most people in Jersey City thought he was only a ferry-dock laborer when he wasn’t helping his brother with the livery. What they didn’t know was that he’d graduated from the Dickinson School of Law. And once he had enough money saved, he planned to open his own law firm. One that sought justice for all people, not only the rich and the free.

  Blue’s eyes widened, and the roan let out an aggravated snort.

  Isaiah followed the horse’s gaze and scanned the embankment near the tracks. “Hey, boy. Did you see something?”

  Releasing his hold on Blue’s reins, Isaiah took a few steps forward, and a small dark face with bright eyes peered over the edge of the embankment. A child?

  Whistling the tune of “Wade in the Water” to put her at ease, Isaiah extended his hand to help her up and found that a dark-skinned woman, whom he assumed was the mother, foll
owed behind.

  The woman eyed him with caution. “You know the true name of Moses?”

  “Harriet Tubman,” Isaiah whispered.

  “Praise God in heaven above. I’m Emmeline, and this here is my Lucy.” Smiling, some of the tension left the woman’s face, although the wariness in her eyes remained. “That your wagon?”

  Isaiah nodded. “Quick. Let’s get you aboard.”

  The livery had been the intended destination, but when Isaiah spied the crowd gathered on the street outside, he decided to leave the wagon beside the blacksmith’s shop and paid the owner’s son to keep watch.

  “I’ll be right back,” he murmured to his two passengers hidden beneath the hay then hurried up the street to find the cause of all the commotion.

  As he edged closer, Isaiah spotted the sheriff. Tom and his wife, Henrietta, stood off to the side, their expressions grim. And the fugitive they’d sheltered the previous night stood between two of the sheriff’s deputies, enslaved in handcuffs.

  “Hawkins and his wife should be handcuffed too,” a man from the crowd shouted. “Send them south with the slave, if they are so fond of them!”

  A few people threw up cheers to support the scoffer. Others from the crowd, not so much.

  Louisa Strong was one of those who opposed them. “Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins are prominent members of our community and do not deserve your judgment.”

  “Be that as it may, Thomas Hawkins will be fined a sum of six hundred dollars,” Sheriff Davis announced.

  “No!” Isaiah exclaimed, breaking through the crowd.

  The sheriff raised his brows. “Do you wish to be fined also?”

  Isaiah clenched his jaw and stared the sheriff straight in the eye. “Not unless you have proof of my involvement.”

  “This runaway,” the sheriff said, pointing toward the slave, “was hiding inside Hawkins Livery.”

  “So?” Isaiah challenged.

  “The closet he hid in was locked. From the outside. Who do you suppose put the lock on that closet door, son? Was it you?”

  “Isaiah, stand down!”

  The order came from his brother, and a swift glance in his direction showed Tom’s anger…and fear.

  Again, Isaiah heard the gunshot that had placed a bullet straight into his father’s forehead. Heard Tom scream. Then himself. Heard the Pennsylvania sheriff his father had been arguing with say anyone who dared question his authority would be fired upon next.

  “No repeats,” Tom warned.

  Isaiah held his gaze and nodded. “No repeats.”

  Taking a step back, Isaiah disappeared into the crowd and made his way back to the wagon.

  Late in the afternoon, on Thursday, Annie put on her warmest work coat, gloves, and fur-lined boots and followed her mother out to the barn to help distribute the animals’ second feeding before it got dark. The chickens often escaped their coop and ran to and fro, but at feeding time, most of the hens came running.

  Annie dipped the metal scoop into the bucket of dried corn, barley, and oats and dumped the mix into the wooden box tray feeder, while her mother refilled their water. The dairy cow, which not only gave them milk, but produced the cream they needed to make their own butter and cheese, stood in a stall beside their two horses and let out a loud moo.

  “Don’t worry, Polly, you’re next,” Annie promised.

  She gathered the grain buckets for the larger animals and turned to walk toward them, when Isaiah Hawkins stepped out from the tack room.

  “Gracious!” Annie exclaimed, jumping with a start and spilling some of the feed. She glanced over at her mother, beside her, who took a pitchfork off the wall and pointed the sharp prongs at their surprise guest.

  Isaiah put out a hand. “I mean you no harm, ma’am.”

  Her mother frowned. “You’re the young man who came to church on Sunday?”

  Isaiah nodded, and Annie hid a smile as her mother put the pitchfork down. Anyone who stepped through the doors of their church was someone they could trust, as far as her mother was concerned. Annie wasn’t sure she agreed with her, but in this case, she was glad her mother had relented.

  “He’s the one who helped Will and I sneak Kitch on the ferry,” Annie told her. “Isaiah and his brother own Hawkins Livery.”

  This information seemed to make her mother relax even more, and she stepped forward to shake Isaiah’s hand. “What can we do for you, Mr. Hawkins?”

  Isaiah sent Annie an apprehensive look and nodded toward the hayloft above. “I picked up two shipments from the South this afternoon, but I can’t hide them at the livery because the sheriff and his deputies found the cargo we’d been hiding and shut down the place. I tried to drop them off at the church, but the Strong family is also being watched.”

  Annie followed his gaze toward the hayloft above their heads, and her mouth fell open. “You brought them here?”

  Isaiah nodded. “There was no one else I could trust.”

  “You shouldn’t have come,” Annie warned, shaking her head. “The sheriff searched our place a week ago. We can’t—”

  “Let me see them,” her mother said, cutting her off.

  Annie glanced at Isaiah, wondering if she could trust him or if he’d end up getting them all in trouble. Didn’t he say his own family had been caught? And the sheriff was watching Louisa’s family as well? Her stomach twisted in knots, but she leaned forward, as curious as her mother to see who Isaiah had hid in their hayloft.

  He went up the ladder, and when he came down, he carried a small black girl, no older than four years, in his arms. A thin woman, dressed inappropriately for the winter weather in a thin black dress, descended the rungs behind him.

  Annie glanced at the woman then back to the child, her black, wiry hair sticking out at odd angles, tangled with hay and small sticks. The young girl’s eyes widened when she saw them, and she buried her face into Isaiah’s shoulder.

  “She’s so young,” Annie exclaimed. “I had no idea children came up the Underground Railroad.”

  “What’s happened to you?” her mother asked the woman. “Why are you here?”

  “My massa put my Lucy up for sale,” the woman told her. “If we didn’t leave, I was never goin’ to see her again.”

  Annie glanced at her own mother and tried to fathom how she would feel if put in their situation. From her mother’s haunted expression, it appeared she shared her thoughts.

  “They separate families?” Annie asked, her voice soft as she drew closer.

  The child’s mother snickered. “They sell us off to the highest bidder at the auction.”

  Annie knew the slaves on the Southern plantations were not given certain rights. Women of all color, even white, were not given certain rights either, such as the right to speak out in public or cast their vote in elections. But she’d had no idea that some of the plantation owners in the South did not treat their slaves with the respect she’d come to believe they received. She’d had no idea that slaves were whipped, separated from family, and sold like cattle.

  Unbidden, tears sprang to her eyes, and her heart swelled in her chest with sympathy toward these two slaves who had traveled hundreds of miles just to make it this far.

  “We have to help them, Annie,” her mother said softly, her voice choked.

  She nodded and glanced at Isaiah. “What do we do?”

  Chapter 5

  Annie brought clean towels into the washroom, where her mother helped Emmeline bathe little Lucy and pick the small twigs from her hair.

  “We’re going to need to use butter to smooth out the matted tangles,” Annie’s mother instructed, “and fresh water for Emmeline’s bath.”

  Annie nodded. The caked mud they had scrubbed off the young girl’s body had turned the tub almost as brown as the child’s skin.

  So different from her own.

  And yet the tender look Emmeline gave Lucy was just as strong and full of love as the look Annie’s mother gave her. A fact she pondered while retrieving the ne
eded items to clean up their guests.

  “We ran, the two of us, on foot, and hid along the clay riverbanks till we could run for the trees,” Emmeline told them as she washed herself with a sudsy cloth.

  “How did you know which way to go?” Annie asked, working the clean butter into Lucy’s hair with her hands. She’d never touched a black person’s hair before. The texture was course and wiry, but the tight spirals did soften with the butter, enabling them to drop down and touch her shoulders.

  “Moses sang us a song leadin’ the way,” Emmeline said, her face relaxing for the first time since she arrived.

  “Moses?” Annie asked, remembering Kitch had spoken of a woman by the same name. A former slave. A woman who helped slaves escape by singing encoded songs to signal when it was safe to run. “Did she come with you?”

  “Moses took us as far as Pennsylvania then put us on the train tha’ came here,” Emmeline explained.

  Lucy smiled and sang in a soft, high-pitched voice, “Wade in the water, wade in the water, children, wade in the water, God’s a-going to trouble the water.”

  Annie frowned. “What does it mean?”

  “The song is ’bout the Israelites’ escape from Egypt in the book of Exodus,” Emmeline explained. “Moses led them through to the Promised Land just like our Moses leads us to ours, the land of the free.”

  The woman they described sounded like a brave soul, who risked her own life, again and again, to help others. Someone not afraid to do what she believed was right.

  “I’d like to meet this Moses,” Annie declared, then gasped when she realized what that would mean. More danger. “What are the words to the rest of the song?”

  “There are many verses,” Emmeline said, and smiled. “One told us to hide in the riverbanks to escape the dogs chasing our trail.”

  Annie’s stomach clenched. “Did you say…dogs?”

  After both Emmeline and Lucy were given a clean change of clothes and fed a generous helping of bread, cheese, and dried beef, Annie led them up the stairs to the secret room behind the hall bookcase, where her grandfather, who had built the house, would retreat to hide his cigar smoke from Grandma.