The Underground Railroad Free Essay

The Underground Railroad was a system of tunnels that were underground that lead to freedom(the north) for slaves. The Underground Railroad was one of the most used things for slaves to escape. The Underground Railroad was also the most dependable escape plan a slave could have. Inside the underground railroad were many people that helped fugitive slaves escape from their owners. The Underground Railroad was first recognized when one of George Washington’s slaves ran away with the help of a “society of quakers, formed for such purposes”.

This system grew in 1831 and it was dubbed “The Underground Railroad,” after steam railroads. For a slave, running away to the north was very hard. First they had to escape from their owner, which meant they had to rely on what they had. Sometimes they had someone come onto the plantation pretending to be a slave and then guide the slaves to the north, or to the underground railroad. They would have to move at night and they would usually go about 10-20 miles to the next station so that they could rest up for their next travel.

They would hide in barns or far away places and while they were there a message wound be sent to the next station to alert the station master. The slaves would also travel by train and boat, but that cost money and the money was needed to buy the slaves clothes because they had tattered clothes which made them very suspicious. The way they got this money was from other people who didn’t support slavery so they’d donate money to help slaves be freed. Levi Coffin played a big roll in the Underground Railroad because he helped free over 3,000 slaves. Harriet Tubman also played a big role in the Underground railroad because she was a slave and she risked a lot to help free other slaves.

If she had been caught then she’d be beaten to death because first, she was an escaped slave and second, she was helping free other slaves. Harriet Tubman had probably had the biggest impact on the underground railroad for those reasons even though she didn’t free 3,000 slaves she still freed 300 and that’s good for being an escaped slave. Levi Coffin was also taking a big risk even though he wasn’t a slave he was helping slaves escape as a southerner which might have even been more risky. Mainly because if he would’ve been caught there could’ve been so many bad things the south did to him. How it Impacted the war The Underground Railroad impacted the war because it was making the south angry that the north was freeing the south’s slaves.

The south didn’t like the fact that the north could free the south’s slaves without them knowing so then the south just kept getting angrier and angrier which eventually led to the war(and this wasn’t the only cause of the war there were many other causes.) How the War Impacted The Underground Railroad The war had a very large impact on the Underground railroad because the war was to free slaves and if the north won then the slaves would be free and if the south won then the slaves wouldn’t be freed. As you already know, the north won the war so that meant the Underground Railroad was largely impacted. In fact, it was so largely impacted that it vanished out of existence. That’s only because the north had one so all the slaves were free which meant they had no reason to escape. So you could say that the Underground railroad was impacted for a good reason because if it still had to be used then that means that there were still slaves and that wouldn’t be good.

This will conclude this report on the Underground Railroad thank you for reading this and have a great day