Frederick Douglass and the Quakers
OWING TO THE ANTI-SLAVERY principles of Friends, New Bedford early became a station on the "underground railroad," and if a fugitive slave could once reach this haven of rest, he felt almost safe from pursuit, public opinion being so strong that in the days of the Fugitive Slave Law it would have been impossible to capture a runaway slave in this town.
Frederick Douglass, one of the most remarkable of colored men, passed some time here in safety, and always retained a most grateful recollection of his sojourn among the Quakers. It happened on this wise: Having made his escape from slavery and reached Newport after many perils, he was very anxious to come to New Bedford, that place being known among the slaves as a heaven upon earth.
Hearing the name called out, he peeped shyly around the corner of a building* and gazed longingly at the state coach which was filled with "women Friends" on their way home from New England Yearly Meeting. William C. Taber, sitting on the top of the coach, observed the pleading eyes, and said, "Yes, friend, it is all right, climb up here beside me."
No sooner said than done, William C. Taber paid his fare, brought him to his own house, and found work for him on the wharves, as he had been a stevedore at the South. While in New Bedford, he was taught to read by Charles Taber.
Thus the distinguished orator was launched on the road to fame.--Mary J. Tabor, 1907.
* When Douglass met the Quakers at the coach to New Bedford, he was not alone but had just gotten off the very public steamship accompanied by his bride. The business about peeking shyly around a corner is an entire invention. Since Mrs. Anna Douglass had never been a slave, had always been a free woman, it is likely that the initial contact that was made with these white people would have been made by her, rather than by her fugitive husband. In all likelihood the Quaker men who met Mr. and Mrs. Douglass at the stagecoach on the steamboat landing had been alerted by their contacts in New-York, and were there specifically waiting for the couple to show up, intending to serve as their escort to the relative safety of New Bedford. - From: Ashley_Meredith@brown.edu, July 2002
* Frederick Douglass "peeked around the corner" and when seen was asked to sit next to William C. Taber. Without any doubt F. D. "peeked around the corner". This is no "invention" by Mary J. Taber, as stated by Meredith Ashley. Yes, he was accompanied by Anna Bailey, his wife and a free woman (the name was later changed to Douglass in New Bedford). However, Afro-Americans were not allowed on coaches in the South unless they could show proof of their freedom. This was strictly enforced in 1837 and in former slave trading Newport it was still dangerous. Anna Bailey, a black woman, could not have acted as the modern woman would and it is a mistake to think of her as behaving thus. Frederick Douglass was an individual who later wanted the struggle for women's rights completely separated from the efforts to free the slaves. In his eyes their rights did not have the same priority as those of freeing the slaves. This led to a severe split in the abolitionist movement. Would such a person rely on a woman to gain access to the coach? Only after having received permission to accompany William C. Taber, himself, would Frederick Douglass have dared to seat himself next to him in full public view. This is in Newport, which at the time, still felt the effects of their slave trade. A Quakeress descendant in 1907 would not "invent" what has been in her family's history for 70 years under pains of being corrected by other Quakers. Why would she need to "invent" anything of the sort? - From Joseph Tardif, September 2002
Return to our
Page
