More Interesting Facts About Harriet Tubman! (Read part 1 here.)
She never lost a passenger on the Underground Railroad.
Having reached safety in Philadelphia, Harriet felt confident she could help others. She became involved in the Underground Railroad. She immediately returned to Maryland to rescue her family. Working slowly, one group at a time, she freed her immediate family and distant relatives. Dubbed “Moses” for the deliverance of her people, Harriet made twelve to thirteen missions to free approximately 70 more slaves.
Harriet always carried a gun and was not above threatening anyone with immediate death who aimed to stop her crusade—even the slaves she rescued if they got scared and wanted to turn back.
She became a nurse, scout, and a spy for the Union forces during the Civil War.
When the Civil War broke out in 1861, Harriet wanted to join the Union cause to end slavery. Hearing of her heroism in freeing her people, and known for her intelligence and bravery, a group of Boston and Philadelphia abolitionists in Port Royal brought her on. She nursed the soldiers suffering from dysentery and smallpox.
In 1863, the group, under the orders of Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War, and Harriet lead a band of scouts through the marshes and rivers of South Carolina, providing intelligence on the enemy. She was the first woman to lead an armed assault when Colonel James Montgomery raided plantations along the Combahee River. They freed over 750 slaves.
She joined the Suffragist movement.
Later in life, Harriet became involved with the cause for women’s suffrage. She would join forces with women such as Susan B. Anthony and Emily Howland. She traveled to various cities on the East coast speaking in favor of the rights of women. In 1896, at the founding of the National Federation of Afro-American Women, Harriet served as the keynote speaker for their first meeting. The following year, a series of receptions took place in Boston, honoring Harriet for her years of service.
She refused anesthesia when she had brain surgery.
Due to the head injury she suffered as a child, Harriet, in her older years, developed insomnia due to the pain and buzzing in her head. She elected to have brain surgery to relieve the condition, but refused to be anesthetized and instead opted to “bite down on a bullet,” as she had seen many soldiers do for surgery in the Civil War. The operation did give her some relief making her more comfortable.
She Died in Poverty.
Harriet never received any kind of salary for her service. Any money she made she used for her humanitarian work to help former slaves and her family. She purchased a small property in Auburn, New York, and provided shelter for most of her family and some friends. She took in boarders to help pay the bills. In 1873, she was swindled out of money in a gold deal, leaving her penniless.
In 1895, after an initial denial from the government, Harriet received the pension of her second husband, Nelson Charles Davis, and then in 1898, she petitioned Congress for her own service in the Civil War. Finally, a year later, she received a pension of twenty dollars per month for her service as a nurse.
Because of mounting debts, in 1903, she donated her Auburn property to the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church under the condition they convert it to a home for aged and indigent people of color. The plan finally came to fruition five years later.
In 1911, Harriet’s body started to give out on her and she retired to the rest home she’d helped establish. At the time, a New York reporter described her as “ill and penniless.”
She died in 1913, of pneumonia, surrounded by friends and family members.
Harriet Tubman did not receive the recognition she deserved while she lived, but history remembers her as an empowered woman of grit and integrity, who helped change the lives of her contemporaries, and the mindset of those who came after her.
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