HARRIET TUBMAN


Born around 1820 - Died in 1913



Harriet Tubman
 

Harriet Tubman was born around 1820 in Maryland. Her parents were slaves, so she also was a slave when she was born. She had to work even when she was a little child. When she was twelve years old, she suffered a serious injury when an overseer threw a heavy weight which hit her in the head. After that incident she slept a lot. This condition remained with her the rest of her life. People with narcolepsy will suddenly fall asleep wherever they happen to be.

When she was 25, she married John Tubman who was not a slave, but a free African American.

Harriet was afraid she was going to be sold and sent to the South, so she decided to run away. A white neighbor gave her some names of people she could contact to help her. She was about to escape through the Underground Railroad.


Map of the Underground Railroad

To understand the story of Harriet Tubman we first need to learn something about the Underground Railroad. It was not a railroad, and it was not under the ground. It was a network of "safe houses" where slaves could flee from one house to the next until they made their way to the Canadian border. The people helping them had to do it secretly, so it was an "underground" or covert* operation.

The safe houses were called "stations" or "depots". The owners of the houses were called "stationmasters". A compassionate* religious group of Quakers were stationmasters as well as certain free blacks who were sympathetic to the slaves.

The people who traveled with the slaves to help them escape were called "conductors".

The slaves knew they had to go north to find freedom. They used the North Star, Polaris*, as their guide. They would use the coded words in the song "Follow the Drinking Gourd" to find their way. (The drinking gourd was the Big Dipper in the sky from which they could locate the North Star.)

During a forty year period about 100,000 slaves escaped from the South through the Underground Railroad.

Harriet contacted a person her friend had recommended, and through a series of safe houses made her way to Canada where she became a free woman. Her next concern was to help her family also become free. She returned to Maryland again and again freeing her sister and her sister's two children, her brother and two other men. When she went to rescue her parents who were seventy years old, she had to arrange for a wagon because they were too frail to make the trip on foot.

She made a trip to free her husband, John, only to find that he had married another woman! It made her very sad that he had rejected her and chosen another to be his wife, but she decided to devote herself to helping others gain freedom. She later married Nelson David, a former slave who was a Union soldier.

Harriet made nineteen trips as a "conductor", risking her life every time, and successfully freed about 300 slaves. She carried a gun and threatened any slave who wanted to turn back.

A reward of $40,000 was offered to any bounty hunter who brought Harriet in to the authorities, but she managed to avoid capture. She was such a brave woman! Harriet became known as "Moses" because she was freeing her people just as Moses freed the children of Israel from Egyptian slavery.

She made friends with many influential* people including abolitionists* John Brown and Frederick Douglas. She befriended Senator William H. Seward from New York. He and his wife provided a house where she moved her parents down from Canada. She later was able to buy the home and stayed there when she was not on the road helping slaves escape.

During the Civil War Harriet worked for the Union Army. Sometimes she worked as a cook, sometimes she served as a nurse, and even worked as a spy! After the war she returned to her home in Auburn, New York.



Harriet Tubman died at the age of 93. After her death she received many honors. A ship was named for her; the Liberty Ship Harriet Tubman, and in 1995 the federal government issued a commemorative* postage stamp in her honor.

Fergus M. Bordewich, the author of "Bound for Canaan: The Underground Railroad and the War for the Soul of America" states that myths grew up around the Underground Railroad. He says one fact that can't be substantiated is that quilts with secret code in the squares were displayed to indicate safe houses. View excerpts from the book.

You might like to read an article Underground Warfare: A New Museum Sheds Light on the History of the Underground Railroad

. (When you get to Amazon view the "Search Inside" to see the contents of the book.)





Work a Jigsaw Puzzle

Online Crossword Puzzle

Online Word Search

Online Word Scramble

Color Picture Online

PRINTABLES

Harriet Tubman Word Search

Harriet Tubman Crosswork Puzzle

Harriet Tubman - Word Scramble

Harriet Tubman Study Sheet

Worksheet

Color a picture of Harriet Tubman





Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad
from Pocantico Hills School

The Life of Harriet Tubman

I Got a Right to Two Things
a play about Harriet Tubman including two songs

Some scenes in the life of Harriet Tubman

Harriet Tubman
from PBS

Harriet Tubman
America's Story

Mini unit about Harriet Tubman


Harriet Tubman
from Digital History

The Underground Railroad
presentation of National Geographic

Follow the Drinking Gourd
explanation of the song lyrics

The Underground Railroad
information at PBS

The Underground Railroad
from the History Channel

Underground Railroad "Quilt"
by Mr. Leahy's class

Underground Railroad Timeline

Maryland and the Underground Railroad

The Underground RR in Rochester N.Y.

The Abolitionist

Africans in America
resources describing slavery in early America

Time for Kids
Harriet Tubman

Harriet Tubman
printable study sheet

Homespun Heroines and Other Women of Distinction
a a book by Hallie Quinn Brown
(Look for Harriet Tubman.)

Unsung Heroes
Online book by Elizabeth Ross Hayes, Harriet Tubman, page 87

Abolition of Slavery
video lesson
(Click on the topics "Interactive Media Files", be sure volume is turned up.)

My Own Books
personalize an online story about Harriet Tubman
by inserting your name in the story

Harriet Tubman Poem







40983: Courage to Run: A Story Based on the Life of Harriet Tubman Courage to Run: A Story Based on the Life of Harriet Tubman
By Wendy Lawton / Moody Publishers

Born Arminta Ross, young Harriet Tubman (named after her mother when she was full-grown) was a faithful strong girl growing up in the late 1800's as a slave in the south. Her faith was at the center of everything she did and she was tested at every turn. The story of her childhood is a record of courage and bravery. Even more, it's the story of God's faithfulness as he prepares her to eventually lead more than 300 people out of slavery through the Underground Railroad. For ages 8-12.

165849: Harriet Tubman Harriet Tubman
By George Sullivan / Scholastic Trade

This book tells the exciting story of Tubman's life using interviews with Harriet as well as the words of her freinds. Hear Tubman's story as if you were really there.



From Word Central's Student Dictionary
by Merriam - Webster

(Pronunciation note: the schwa sound is shown by &)

covert
Pronunciation: kO-'v&rt, 'k&v-&rt
Function: adjective
not openly made or done as in a covert military operation

compassion
Pronunciation: k&m-'pash-&n
Function: noun
sorrow or pity caused by the suffering or misfortune of another
: SYMPATHY
com pas sion ate /-'pash-(&-)n&t/ adjective

Polaris
Pronunciation: p&-'lar-&s, -'lahr-
Function: noun
the North Star

influential
Pronunciation: "in-(")floo-'en-ch&l
Function: adjective
having influence

abolitionist
Pronunciation: ab-&-'lish-(&-)n&st
Function: noun
a person who is in favor of abolishing especially slavery

commemorative
Pronunciation: k&-'mem-&-r&t-iv
Function: adjective
intended to commemorate a person, thing, or event
as a commemorative postage stamp



Biographies in this Series

Presidents of the
United States
George Washington
1st U.S. President

John Adams
2nd U.S. President


Thomas Jefferson
3rd U.S.President


James Monroe
5th U.S. President


Andrew Jackson
7th U.S. President

Abraham Lincoln
16th U.S.President

Franklin D. Roosevelt
32nd U.S. President

John F. Kennedy
35th U.S. President


James Madison
4th U.S. President

Theodore Roosevelt
26th U.S. President

American Patriots Benjamin Franklin
patriot and statesman

Francis Scott Key
Star Spangled Banner

Deborah Sampson
woman soldier in the Revolutionary War

World Leaders Constantine
Roman Emperor

Alexander the Great
conqueror
Winston Churchill
British Prime Minister

Inventors Alexander Graham Bell
telephone

Johann Gutenberg
printing press

Cyrus McCormick
mechanical reaper

The Wright Brothers
first airplane

Henry Ford
Automaker

Thomas A. Edison
electric light bulb

Sequoyah
Cherokee alphabet

Nikola Tesla
700 patents

.
Explorers Christopher Columbus
explorer

Meriwether Lewis
explorer

Robert Peary
Arctic explorer

John Muir
Naturalist

Matthew Henson
Arctic Explorer

Sir Edmund Hillary
Mr.Everest

Kit Carson
Indian agent

"Johnny Appleseed"
orchardist

.
Women who made
a difference
Clara Barton
founder of the Red Cross

Helen Keller
overcame blindness & deafness

Florence Nightingale
founder of nursing profession

Joan of Arc
religious and military leader

Amelia Earhart
Aviator

Annie Oakley
sharpshooter

Susan B. Anthony
Suffragette

Elizabeth Keckly
Seamstress

Harriet Tubman
deliverer of slaves

Anne Frank
Diarist

Eleanor Roosevelt
Humanitarian

.
Scientists George Washington Carver
botanist and educator

Sir Isaac Newton
explained gravity and properties of light

Marie Curie
scientist, physicist

Louis Pasteur
Biologist

Albert Einstein
physicist, genius

Galileo
Astronomer, physicist

Educators Noah Webster
writer of dictionary

Booker T. Washington
leader and educator

Aristotle
Greek philosopher

Physicians Hippocrates
father of medicine

Walter Reed
discovered cause of yellow fever

Albert Schweitzer
humanitarian

Religious Leaders Increase Mather
Salem witch trials

.
Athletes Lou Gehrig
baseball player

Wilma Rudolph
Olympic gold medal winner

Tiger Woods
golfer

Michael Phelps
Olympic swimmer

. .
Civil Rights
Leaders
Martin Luther King
civil rights leader

Rosa Parks
bus desegregation

Sojourner Truth
Former slave

Frederick Douglass
Abolitionist

Mary Ann Shadd Cary
Civil rights leader

James Forten
Inventor, abolitionist

Composers Beethoven
composer

Artists John James Audubon
artist and naturalist

Gutzon Borglum
sculptor, Mount Rushmore

Ansel Adams
photographer



Home


Back to Famous Leaders


Public domain picture from the Library of Congress

Coloring picture courtesy of Wikipedia.



Puzzles on these pages courtesy of
Songs of Praise and Armored Penguin