Cora, played by Thuso Mbedu, boards a train after escaping a Georgia farm, beginning on a perilous journey in search of true freedom while being pursued by a known slave hunter. While this Amazon series may appear to be yet another futile attempt to reproduce the horrors of slavery for television, the Barry Jenkins-directed historical drama expertly re-introduces the fading reality of Africans held captive in America. It appears that when individuals are oppressed the greatest, that is when they are actually at their best. That saying might easily be applied to individuals who ran the Underground Railroad in the nineteenth century, when slavery was still the law of the land.
Hundreds of thousands of slaves were able to flee their oppressors and make their way north to free states and a shot at freedom thanks to the Underground Railroad. It was so well guarded that simply mentioning it risked being discovered and subjected to severe punishment. Worse, if it had been discovered by those who wanted to prevent slaves from escaping, it would have marked the end of hope for thousands of African-Americans who were suffering from slavery’s injustice.
Because the real technique for sending slaves to freedom was not a railroad, the title “The Underground Railroad” was itself a code. It was a succession of stops connected by winding back roads that ran across the countryside. The paths were tortuous and illogical, making it difficult for those wanting to capture slaves and return them to slavery to figure out how those seeking freedom may travel.
The Underground Railroad had no established route. “Passengers” made their way from safe house to safe house, seeking safety in homes, churches, and other out-of-the-way sites that became known to those in the know as “stations.” The personnel who worked at the stations along the line frequently had no idea how long the railroad was or anything about the entire journey. They merely knew enough to accept their “passengers,” do all possible to ensure their health and well-being, and send them on their way with directions to the next station.
The paths were hazardous and difficult to navigate. Slaves attempting to gain freedom generally travelled the routes from station to station to avoid being discovered and returned to their owners in the south by slave chasers. The Underground Railroad’s paths were not literally underground, just as there was no true “railroad” to the Underground Railroad. Many times, the owners of safe homes may secure their visitors in tunnels beneath the house or beneath a farm structure.
There is a tunnel connecting the home to the barn at one such safe house in Nebraska City, Nebraska, so that if the farmer was feeding a needy family, they could immediately “disappear” if slave hunters arrived without warning. Under those houses, there were also rough dug out bedrooms and rudimentary accommodations to provide as much comfort and opportunities to rest and recover as was humanly possible under such trying circumstances.
We can’t finish talking about this incredible network without acknowledging the bravery of those who ran the “stations” who took in slaves, housed them, fed and cared for them, and helped them along the way to do what they could to fight this inhumane practice of human slavery. It is a testimony to humanity that people will overcome biases and reach out to strangers, placing their own homes and families in jeopardy in order to assist downtrodden people in their time of need.
And we must pause for a solemn moment to reflect on a terrible period in American and African-American history when such actions were required. The Underground Railroad, on the other hand, made it clear that true Americans would not stand by and watch their fellow citizens suffer unjustly. There is little question that these true heroes saved tens of thousands of lives without expecting anything in return.
It is an inspiration to all of us today to put aside our preconceptions and unite as brothers to fight prejudice, intolerance, and man’s brutality to man as a result of these evils. If we do so, we will know in our hearts, as the railroad slaves and station owners did, that a better day will come.
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