Caelie Stefancic
English 226
Professor Coronado
9 December 2014
Wisconsin’s Role in the Underground
Railroad
When
searching for a topic to research and discover more on, I knew I wanted to
touch upon something many already knew about, but not as deeply as they would
know if they attended a public education. The Underground Railroad
was one of those topics for a person such as myself, as I remember briefly in
middle school when my social studies teacher would read my class stories or
poems out loud to wonder and only imagine what lives those who lived in the
mid-19th century in the United States of America. I
knew Wisconsin was part of the union, and the Underground Railroad did include
pathways to a free life in Canada as well with the northern United States. Using this information as my base structure,
I discovered information on the story of Lyman Goodnow, a Wisconsin
farmer who partook in escorting Caroline Quarlls, a fugitive slave
from St. Louis, to the safety of northern Canada through the Midwest. The journey that Lyman Goodnow and Caroline
Quarlls share would eventually become to be known as the first recorded usage
of the Underground Railroad in the Midwest in early American history.
Lyman Goodnow’s typed manuscript of his experiences gives
the reader an eleven page summary of his journey with Caroline Quarlls. Goodnow begins his tale with “Caroline
Quarlls, the first slave transported over the Underground Railroad from [the
Midwest], was probably an octoroon. She
had thin lips, straight noise and was not very dark…” (Goodnow 1). According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the definition of an octoroon is “a
person of one-eighth black ancestry” and Goodnow mentions this as he regards on
how Quarlls was “being able to escape from St. Louis” (1). By the time Quarlls had reached the hands of
Lyman Goodnow, she had already been on quite the journey by avoiding several
lawman and barely escaping from capture.
The most amusing fact experience I read from Goodnow’s experience is how
he was determined to accompany Quarlls to an Underground Railroad station to
safety. Goodnow stated that “some of the
friends decided we ought to take the girl to some underground railway station
and they picked on me, being a bachelor with no family to keep me from going, as
the proper one to do the job” (Goodnow 5).
The way Goodnow spoke of the experience of being picked humored me,
reminding me of times when my own friends had used a similar excuse on me to do
something so large, and I knew I could relate at that point to Goodnow with his
responsibility.
I would have thought that Goodnow’s path certainly go
direct north through the Wisconsin territory before crossing into Michigan and
then onto Ontario, Canada. However, that
wasn’t the case, as Goodnow mentions crossing through Chicago before finally
reaching Climax Prarie located in Michigan (Goodnow 9). The dangers of keeping a fugitive slave must
have been harsh on Goodnow. He expressed
a few times when Caroline had to hide herself from weary eyes of others, such
as traveling at night and “Caroline on the buffalo robe in the bottom of the
buggy which covered her so that no one would know but that I had a sheep or a quarter
of veal” (6). Goodnow also shows great
care of the girl, as one point in the story he “was startled to find Caroline
gone” when found she was moved to Gardner’s Praise, a town two miles from
Burlington (6). He cared about her well
enough to search for her before continuing on to their destination. Another important detail that struck me was
when Goodnow and Quarlls came across a Methodist by the name of Russell, someone
not familiar with Abolitionism but despite that, was more than willing to help
a fugitive slave like Caroline to a place that guaranteed safety (7). Despite so much that happened, and the fact
there were advertisements in places such as Chicago offering a $300 reward for
Caroline’s safety, that this man continued on with his promise of giving
Caroline a chance for a better life (7).
Goodnow’s words definitely defined Caroline as a real
person for me, occasionally inputting tidbits about her throughout his
journey. By far one of my favorite
descriptions of Caroline was when they visited a Sunday School. A few of the teachers came over to Caroline
to talk to her near a liberty pole.
Caroline had questioned them with “What is it for?” in which the ladies responded
with “To commemorate the birth of liberty in America.” Caroline continued by
asking what would one do with it, with the girls responding that it is to look
at, and finally Caroline asked who may look upon it, and finally the girls
simply say “Everybody” (Goodnow 8). I
broke out into a grin at the next part with Caroline’s answer, impressed by her
bravery. Caroline retorted to the women
with:
“But you said it was a
liberty pole; can a slave look at it? How can it commemorate liberty in a
country where there are slaves? Have you
repealed the law [the Fugitive Slave Act], and raised this pole to mark the
event? Do those who have their liberty
have their names written on the pole or in some book? If not, how do you know who the pole is for?” (8).
Caroline’s words left the women stunned in silence, and
the pastor they were with even had great difficulty in explaining it. A sixteen-year-old girl who could not read or
write stunned several adults with her words, and I find that admirable to bring
upon to students of today.
Finally, Goodnow and Caroline’s journey ended, with them
crossing the Detroit River into Canada.
Goodnow says, “Caroline began crying and clutched me by the arm, asking
if it were possible she was being taken back to St. Louis” and that “it took
some time to clear her mind” (Goodnow 9).
Goodnow left Caroline at a missionary in Sandwick, Canada before returning
home in Wisconsin. He leaves off his
story in a good note by saying “after Caroline arrived in Canada she obtained
some schooling and later” marrying a man, and “she wrote [to him] a number of
times” and included one of her letters in his manuscript (10). The manuscript’s last lines would make
anybody smile by saying “connect with incidents like this, the name of Lyman
Goodnow will never be erased from the richest pages of American History” (10),
and he surely does deserve to be renounced for his good deeds.
In the end, I believe Lyman Goodnow and Caroline Quarlls’
story should be included while discussing the Underground Railroad in our
schools because of how such a heartfelt story it is. Not only it gives me pride to call myself a
Wisconsinite, but also I know many others would feel the same way after reading
through the experiences. It is such a
fascinating tale and should be remembered and shared with future generations of
our schooling. Even prior the statehood
of Wisconsin, it carried humble and homely people doing good deeds for others.
Works Cited
Goodnow, Lyman. "Recollections of Lyman
Goodnow." Manuscript in the Area
Research Center, Gold Meir Library, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
(Milwaukee SC 19).
24 Nov 2014.
"Octoroon." Merriam-Webster.
Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 08 Dec. 2014.
Link to Archived piece:
http://images.library.wisc.edu/WI/EFacs/wipionexp/Goodnow2e/reference/wi.goodnow2e.i0001.pdf
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