 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
The Underground Railroad in CanadaCommemorationsThe following places and persons associated with Underground Railroad (UGRR) history have been designated of national historic significance by the Government of Canada: The Upper Canadian Act Against Stavery (1793)
Inspired by the abolitionist sentiment emerging in the late 18th century, Lieutenant-Governor John Graves Simcoe made Upper Canada the first British territory to legislate against slavery, which had defined the conditions of life for most people of African ancestry in Canada since the early 17th century. The Act of 1793 did not free a single slave, but prevented their importation and freed the future children of slaves at age twenty-five. Faced with growing opposition in the colonies, slavery declined. The Imperial Act of 1833 finally abolished slavery in the British territories in 1834.
The Buxton Settlement National Historic Site
In 1849, fifteen former slaves arrived on the north shores of Lake Erie where Presbyterian minister, the Reverend William King, had purchased a 3642 ha plot of land for a planned refugee settlement. Newly arrived black settlers could purchase 20 ha plots at manageable rates. According to the rules for what was then called the Elgin Settlement, each settler was obliged to clear his land, build a house of at least four rooms set back from the road with a garden, as well as to help dig drainage ditches and create roads. The settlement flourished and its school offered such an excellent education that it attracted black and white students for miles around.
Within the first few years of operation, this school sent several of its graduates on to university-level studies in Toronto. The settlement has survived as a rural, agricultural landscape with its original
road and drainage ditch patterns, several historic churches, a school and some early homes. The Buxton Museum is operated by descendants of the original settlers.
(See Web site: http://www.buxtonmuseum.com/) The AME Nazrey Church National Historic Site
The church was the heart and soul of every black community. In 1848, the growing Underground Railroad refugee community of Amherstburg, Ontario, began to erect the stone walls of a small chapel. With its hand-laid, fieldstone walls, this structure is an early and excellent example of the many small refugee churches found throughout Ontario. Historically it is important for its association with the renowned Bishop Willis Nazery, who led many African Methodist Episcopal congregations into a new Canadian-based British Methodist Episcopal Church, a denomination established by UGRR refugees so that they could govern their own church from their new homeland. The Sandwich First Baptist Church National Historic Site
One of the oldest black Baptist churches surviving from the Underground Railroad experience in Canada is the Sandwich First Baptist Church in the present-day city of Windsor. In the early 19 th-century, Sandwich was a popular destination for refugees fleeing across the Detroit River. Here and at nearby Amherstburg, the growing black community maintained its connections with friends and family in the United States. Along with the First Baptist Church in Detroit, they established the Amherstburg Regular Missionary Baptist Association. This organization fought against slavery and assisted the formation of refugee congregations in Canada. The Sandwich First Baptist congregation was established in 1840. By 1851, the community was able to raise this fine brick chapel which continues to serve its community to this day. The R. Nathaniel Dett BME Church National Historic Site
The Niagara River provided a relatively accessible border crossing for Underground Railroad refugees, and during the 19 th-century, many made their way to the Niagara Peninsula. An African Methodist Episcopal congregation established itself as early as 1814 and continued to grow as Underground Railroad refugees streamed across the river. In 1836 the community constructed this building on a lot in the area of present-day Niagara Falls then known as Fallsview. As its name suggests, the location was damp and chilly. In 1856 Oliver Parnell, a successful refugee settler, donated a more hospitable lot and the building was rolled on logs to its present location. That same year the congregation became one of the founding members of the British Methodist Episcopal conference. The church's present name is a tribute to church member Robert Nathaniel Dett, who became a famed composer of sacred music in the twentieth century. St. Catharines British Methodist Episcopal Church (Salem Chapel)
The growing city of St. Catharines was close to the border, it was on the train lines, and it offered employment opportunities. Not surprisingly, a large refugee population developed here. In 1855, the community was able to replace their first small log church with this larger and more finished building. It is an open hall plan with a three-sided balcony, providing seating capacity for the large numbers of people who regularly attended services. The congregation often included newly arrived refugees who had been led to freedom by the renowned conductor Harriet Tubman. Her passengers sheltered initially in a house just behind the church where Tubman lived during the 1850s. Thanks to her fame, the church became a frequent stopping point on the travels of many of the leading abolitionists from around the world. Josiah Henson (17891883)
Josiah Henson, a person of national historic significance, was an important leader of the Underground Railroad refugee community in Canada during the mid-19 th-century. He was one of the founders of the Dawn Settlement, a community of refugees near the village of Dresden in what was then Upper Canada. Henson wanted a concentration of black settlers in order to create a cohesive group that could co-operate for mutual benefit and support the British American Institute, a vocational school founded to provide an education to refugee children who were often barred from white schools. Widely recognized as the inspiration for Harriet Beecher Stowe's hero in her abolitionist novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, Henson became one of the most famous people of the day. Josiah Henson is commemorated at Uncle Tom's Cabin Historic Site at Dresden, Ontario. Thornton and Lucie Blackburn
The Blackburns arrived in Toronto during the 1830s. While fleeing from slavery, they had been arrested in Detroit, where their supporters' resistance to their return south sparked that city's first race riot. Thornton and Lucie succeeded in escaping into Canada and, like many other refugees, eventually made their way to the burgeoning city of Toronto. Thornton began Toronto's first cab company, becoming well-known and respected through his business and within the refugee and abolitionist communities. The site of the Blackburn home is the only documented residence built by this early wave of UGRR refugees in Toronto. Thornton and Lucie Blackburn were designated persons of national historic significance in recognition of their achievements as well as their representation of the many refugees who integrated into Canadian urban life. Mary Ann Shadd Cary (1823-1893)
Teacher, abolitionist, civil rights advocate, feminist and newspaper editor, Mary Ann Shadd was an influential voice in the Underground Railroad community in Upper Canada. She was active in Sandwich, Toronto and Chatham, teaching and editing the Provincial Freeman, an important newspaper of the Canadian Underground Railroad community. Shadd broke new ground for women, being not only an early woman newspaper editor, but also the first black woman editor in Canada. She claimed equal rights under the law regardless of colour or gender, while exhorting her community to realize the benefits of self-sufficiency. |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
||||||
