
by Samuel C. Eastburn
Delaware Valley Advance, 1929
Samuel C. Eastburn's "old Attleborough" 1929
I have written in my previous papers that the village of Attleborough in the time of which I write was an advanced, able and intelligent community, but isolated . When the railroad from Philadelphia to Trenton was opened in 1934, it was brought nearer to the outside world and a stagecoach was started to Bristol (later to Schenck's Station.) an era of railroad building then began, and many efforts were made to have a railroad to, or through, Attleborough. The first charter was from Trenton to Norristown, via Attleborough. After much talking, surveying and locating, it fell through because of lack of financial support.
Next a charter was secured from Trenton, via Attleborough, to Philadelphia. The bank on the Country Club grounds, of which I have spoken in a previous paper, is the only evidence that it ever existed. Later a National Railroad was proposed from New York to Washington, via Attleborough. It was prevented from crossing the state of New Jersey by the then Camden and Amboy, and afterward, Pennsylvania Railroad interests. A mile of grading north of Woodbourne which can still be seen is its tombstone. On all of thee I carried water, chain and drove stakes. There was much feeling and disappointment that we couldn't get a railroad to Attleborough. It was not until 1876 that the Bound Brook road came through.
A Secret Railroad
While all these efforts were being made, and much disappointment felt over their lack of success, there was a "railroad" running through Attleborough with its station about a mile southwest of the village on the Comfort, (now Devlin), farm and which functioned steadily from 1840 to 1850. It was not generally known to these other promoters, for it did not advertise itself. It ran from the Mason-Dixon line by an irregular course north to the Canada border, but always north.
It was unique in its methods, as we now understand railroads. It had no charter from the state of the United States. Indeed, the laws of both as then administered were against it. Its right of way was by the public roads and many lanes and byways. Its stations were almost exactly ten miles apart. It ran but in one direction, always north. The North Star was its headlight. Its motive power was a pair of mules hitched to a closely covered wagon. Its conductors were plain faced but determined looking Quaker farmers. It ran only at night and without lights. Its passengers were all black people who found an eating-house at every station. No telegraph wire ran along it, only a "grapevine telegraph;" its code known only to the conductors. No fare was charged. It paid no money dividends to its stockholders. It was called the Underground Railroad. Its purpose was to help runaway slaves from the South to reach Canada, where they would be free.
When they crossed Pennsylvania or New York they could be pursued and if caught, taken back the same as any animal of the owner, and they were followed by men with officers of the law and bloodhounds. This railroad was to help them evade these. Notwithstanding the care of the conductors, many were taken from its trains and returned to slavery. The most physically able men, cooks, and girls were pursued the longest and strongest with the highest rewards offered for their capture.
In our country a muscular man, "Big Ben," thinking his pursuit was over, stopped off at one of the stations and went to work for a farmer. The next year a posse of men and dogs in search of another runaway came across him felling trees in the woods, and as a large reward was offered for him, they attempted to arrest him and he killed on eof the officers with his axe. This made a great sensation.
Philadelphia was a great station on it; but by no means a terminal. It was easy to secrete them in a large city where there were many sympathizers besides the Quakers, but by the same token, there were more officers of the law and mercenary-minded people to assist them in their search. If there was too much notoriety, they were forwarded on through Bucks County. Some never came via Philadelphia, but came up the Pequa Valley through York and Lancaster Counties, and sometimes west of them-but always north.
It might be said that t. Passmore Williamson was attorney for this railroad, giving most of his time and legal talent to keep it off the many hidden rocks that were continually in its path, often with bodily risk from disappointed pursuers. In the country districts there were many who were ready to give information if a stranger had been seen in the neighborhood, and would give assistance in his capture for a piece of silver or a drink at the nearest hotel.
I have said that some of the most prominent of the settlers about here had slaves, but generally they did not. Though often spoken of as coming over from England with their families and two or three "servants," these were either their servants in the old country, or people who wished to come to America and sold their service for passage. They were white people. The colored people here were not slaves in the way they were slaves driven to hard work by masters or bosses in the cane and cotton fields of the south. Nor was there the same manner of ownership, but rather as family dependents, whose bodies and souls the Quaker owners felt a responsibility for and for which the slaves felt grateful.
One of the cardinal principals of George Fox's Quakerism was that of a "free conscience" and that could hardly live in an enslaved body. It has always been interesting to me to find out how these Quakers about here came to have these "slaves" and where they came from. As there is no record of their being bought and sold here, but sometimes transferred from one to another by will or gift. I am sure in some cases they were acquired by way of the West Indies, and I think in most.
When the Quakers were being so fiercely persecuted in England before Penn succeeded in getting Pennsylvania as a haven for them, thousands of them went to the West Indies, the Barbados, and Jamaica, etc. There they got into various businesses and by fairness and honest dealings "won confidence and great profits in trade." These Quakers became very prominent in business, especially in sugar and cocoa. The great English firm (The Frys and the Roundtrees) still in the latter business, had their inception there.
At one time the largest school in Quaker history was in Jamaica. It is still maintained by English Friends, but is not so large. The small island of Portola had at one time four Friends Meetings. "Preaching Friends" from both England and the colonies, made frequent religious "visits" there some dying there from the climate. The Journals of others are the best intimate English history of those islands at that time.
Old Joseph Richardson of Four Lanes End sold great quantities of rum sugar and molasses in his extensive business. This was all brought from these. He went there on one of the return vessels. So with such constant communication, it was very easy for slaves from there to drift into the neighborhood of Philadelphia as helpers on these boats, or runaways or stowaways, and stay in its friendly atmosphere. A little earlier had been the peak of the English slave trade and it is said more than 100,000 Negroes were brought into Jamaica, in a certain thirty years, to work on the sugar plantations.
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