by Tim Black
“I wonder how long it will take him to reach Harper’s Ferry?” Samuel asked.
“I have no idea.”
The next night they resumed their journey northward, walking as far as Smyrna, Delaware, where they spent an uneventful day hiding out in a barn. The following morning just before daybreak, they reached the back entrance of Thomas Garrett’s hardware store. From research, Samuel knew that Garrett was the most successful station master on the Underground Railroad. He guided over two thousand slaves to freedom. Mrs. Tubman hesitated to knock on the door. She turned to her followers and said, “I have worked with Mr. Garrett on several occasions. One trip, I and a man I rescued had worn the shoes off our feet and he gave us two dollars and hired a carriage to take us into Pennsylvania. I felt like a queen crossing into a free state in a carriage.”
As she finished the sentence, a portly, clean-shaven man whom Samuel guessed to be seventy, opened the door and shone a candle lantern at eye level to make sure he could see the faces of his visitors. When he saw Mrs. Tubman’s face, he smiled and said, “Harriett, it is God’s blessing to see you again.”
Samuel remembered what he had read about Thomas Garrett. The Underground Railroad station master left instructions upon his death that he was to be carried to his grave by African Americans. It reminded Samuel of the story of Pennsylvania Congressman Thaddeus Stevens, a white man, being buried in a colored cemetery.
Garrett led Harriet Tubman and her group into a warehouse that he kept for his hardware supplies and which doubled as an Underground Railroad depot. When everyone was safely inside, Garrett told Mrs. Tubman, “Do you recall when you brought your brothers out and we hid them under the straw in a wagon and crossed the Market Street Bridge?”
“The slave catchers were hot on our trail, Mr. Garrett. Yes, it was the closest I ever came to being captured.”
“Yes, but I pretended to be intoxicated and sang songs as I drove the wagon across the bridge. Thinking I was drunk, the slave catchers at the other end of the bridge ignored me and my wagon…well, I think we might wish to try that again with two wagons. The white girl,” Garrett said, pointing to Heather, “will drive one and I will drive the other. How does that sound?”
“We can wait until nightfall, Mr. Garrett,” Mrs. Tubman replied.
“I’m not so sure, Mrs. Tubman. My sources tell me there are many slave catchers patrolling the streets of Wilmington at night. You will be most likely be spotted. You aren’t the only ones escaping it seems. Two fugitives left Wilmington last night and were captured by the slave catchers.”
The news seemed to stun Mrs. Tubman. Samuel realized that Mrs. Tubman had meticulously planned the rescue and escape, and Mr. Garrett was suggesting a change to her plans. She thought about it a moment, before replying. “I trust your judgment, Mr. Garrett. When do you want to leave?”
“In a few hours. I want to have you in Pennsylvania by nightfall. Do you plan to take them on to Canada, Mrs. Tubman?”
“Of course,” she replied.
After Garrett returned to his hardware store, the group stretched out on the floor of the warehouse for a few hours of sleep. Around noon, Garrett, carrying a basket of cheese, bread and fruits for the fugitives, returned. After sitting and eating a meal with the runaways, Garrett approached Heather.
“What is your name, girl?” he asked.
“Heather.”
“Come with me, Heather,” he instructed,
She followed Garrett into an alley between the warehouse and the hardware store. He led them to a stable where two wagons, pulled by two horses per wagon, were waiting. A copious amount of straw was in the truck beds. The station master indicated for Heather to take the second wagon.
The station master and Heather drove the wagons to the warehouse. Heather kept watch in the alley to make sure no one saw them load the fugitives in the wagons. When everyone was in a wagon, the straw was placed over the two groups. Just as they were about to drive off, Mr. Garrett handed Heather a small “pepperbox” pistol and asked, “Do you know how to use it?”
“It has four barrels,” she said.
“Yes, to use it, just pull the trigger. A bullet will fire, and the barrels will rotate. Four bullets in all. A nice gun for a lady, I think,” Garrett said. “I hope you will not need to use it, but I won’t let anyone harm Mrs. Tubman.”
Samuel was lying next to Mrs. Tubman under the straw on Heather’s wagon. He wondered if this camouflage of straw would protect them from slave catchers. He suddenly felt anxious as he realized that if he was caught he would be sent into slavery along with Mrs. Tubman and the others. And if that happened, how would Mr. Greene rescue him? He recalled that Thomas Garrett had been imprisoned years before for helping fugitive slaves and was fined a considerable sum of money that cost him business, until donations from other abolitionists poured in and his hardware store was saved. But, Samuel reminded himself, a free black man helping fugitives was subject to enslavement or worse; there were several incidents where freedmen were burned at the stake for assisting fugitives. On other occasions, the freedman was lynched from a tree. Such might be his own fate if they were stopped. He felt his heart rate begin to race.
As the wagon wheels rolled and Samuel lay beneath the straw, he heard the voice of Thomas Garrett begin to sing Go Down Moses.
“Be quiet, something is going on,” Mrs. Tubman whispered.
Slave catchers! Samuel thought. It was a signal from Garrett to Mrs. Tubman. Suddenly the wagon stopped. Samuel could hear male voices. One was Garrett’s.
“Where are you headed?”
“To Claymont,” Garrett said.
“For what?”
“Business.”
“Why all the straw?”
“For the horses,” Garrett said.
Samuel sensed that there was only one man stopping Garrett.
“Let me see in the back of the wagon…wait, you don’t have to do that?” an anxious voice replied. Samuel sensed Garrett had pulled his pistol and aimed at the man.
“You have no right to stop us,” he said. “I have been stopped three times today already. What is going on?” he lied.
“Slaves,” the man said.
“Again? That’s what they have all said. Now, get out of my way, before I shoot you,” Garrett said. “I have had enough of this slave nonsense today. I thought they caught them,” he added.
“They did,” the man admitted. “But I am just making sure.”
“Enough is enough,” Garrett said and drove off. Heather, saying nothing, followed him.
“That was very dangerous,” Mrs. Tubman whispered. “Mr. Garrett was lucky there were not a bunch of men.
Samuel felt a bit of relief. His anxiety dissipated, and he quickly fell asleep. When he awoke, the wagon had stopped, and Heather announced in a whisper,” We are in Pennsylvania.”
Mrs. Tubman, Samuel and the others shook off the straw and arose from beneath their hiding place. Both wagons were stopped, and both sets of fugitives were smiling and chatting. One woman even was on her knees kissing the ground. Samuel felt choked up to see the fugitive slave so overcome by freedom. He was beginning to appreciate what it meant to be free.
The group slept in a field that night, and in the morning, they returned to their wagons, this time Samuel taking the reins from Heather, who sat beside him on the bench. Mrs. Tubman joined Mr. Garrett in the front wagon.
“Do you know what day it is, Samuel?” Heather asked.
“Not a clue. We should buy a newspaper. If I had my phone I could just check the date and time; 1859 is not a fun time to live,” he said with a smile.
As they rolled through Philadelphia, Mr. Garrett stopped and purchased two copies of a morning paper. He handed a copy to Samuel who read aloud a headline from the front page. “John Brown to be executed today.” He looked at the date on the newspaper: December 2, 1859.
“I hope Mr. Bridenbaugh got to Harper’s Ferry,” Heather said. And just as she said that, Professor Bridenbaugh floated down to
the wagon and took a seat next to Heather. “I did get there,” he said. “Mr. Greene and the gang will be at Clarkson Hall at noon today. After John Brown’s hanging.”
“We will be there,” Heather remarked to the ghost. She turned her head to see the perplexed look on the faces of the fugitives as if each face was asking, “Who is the white girl talking to?”
They proceeded to the Philadelphia railroad station and Mrs. Tubman turned to Samuel and Heather. “This is where we part,” she said. “I am taking the people on to Canada. They are not safe here as long as the Fugitive Slave Act is the law. Mr. Garrett is taking the train back to Wilmington. I need you two to drive the wagons over to Clarkson Hall and give them to the people there. Someone there will drive the wagons back to Delaware for Mr. Garrett.”
Samuel and Heather watched as Thomas Garrett boarded a train from Philadelphia to Wilmington, Delaware. Mrs. Tubman and a group of happy fugitive slaves chatted amongst themselves as the two teenagers quietly slipped out of the train station to drive the wagons over to Clarkson Hall, using a map that Mr. Garrett had drawn for them.
“That was quite a trip,” Samuel said.
“Yes, it was,” Heather said, offering Samuel her hand. He took it and gave it a gentle squeeze.
“We were lucky, Heather,” he said.
“Yes, I think we were. Mrs. Tubman was smart to only rescue people from an area she knew well.”
“So much has been exaggerated about her,” Samuel said. “But the truth is, she is…or was…a very intelligent, resourceful person.”
Following Garrett’s directions, the kids drove the wagons over to Clarkson Hall as Professor Bridenbaugh floated along. On the steps leading up to the entrance stood Victor Bridges who waved and smiled as Samuel approached, before ducking into the building to reemerge with Bette Kromer, Minerva Messinger and Mr. Greene.
Hugs were in order as the History Channelers reunited. Mr. Greene saw to it that the proper authorities were notified about Garrett’s wagons and the five students compared notes on their experiences. A grandfather clock in the vestibule showed that it was 11:30 A.M.
“We are early,” Bette explained. “We didn’t stay for the hanging. We didn’t have the stomach for another hanging after Nat Turner, I think.”
“I certainly didn’t,” Minerva said.
“We’ve been escaping from Maryland through Delaware,” Heather said.
“How was Mrs. Tubman, Samuel?” “Victor asked.
“Inspirational. The woman cannot read or write, but she is smart. She has ‘street smarts.’ She knows how to stay alive. It was the thrill of my life getting a chance to meet her, let alone work with her on rescuing enslaved people.”
As they were conversing, Mr. Greene approached and asked for their attention. “We need to get back to the portable. We parked it in Fairmount Park again… Mr. Bridenbaugh will you float ahead and prepare the classroom for travel?”
“Of course,” the ghost replied and floated off.
When the group arrived at the portable, Bridenbaugh lifted the cloaking device and the students scampered up the ramp and into the classroom, taking their seats appropriately.
When everyone was seated, the teacher addressed the class, “We need to go back in time and pick up Mr. Tesla at Harriet Beecher Stowe’s house in Maine. Mr. Bridenbaugh set the coordinates, please.”
The professor nodded. “Ready.”
“Take us there, professor,” Mr. Greene said.
Within a few moments the portable had landed in a field not far from Harriet Beecher Stowe’s house.
This time around, Mr. Greene sent Professor Bridenbaugh by himself to find the Serbian scientist who was sitting alone in the house’s library reading Mason Weems’ fictionalized biography of George Washington and chuckling delightedly at all the hogwash the “Parson” had proffered, including the silly fable about the cherry tree. He waved to Bridenbaugh when he saw his fellow ghost.
“Time to go, Nikola,” Professor Bridenbaugh said.
He closed the book but did not return it to the bookshelves and as he was walking out, Harriet Beecher Stowe walked into the library and, seeing a book float across the room on its own, let out a shriek and turned and ran away. Tesla judiciously decided to drop the book and float alongside his fellow spirit.
Everyone in the portable was delighted to see the ghost of Mr. Tesla again and Mr. Greene announced that they were headed to the John Brown Emancipation Day Party on January 1, 1863. Tesla floated back to the closet to prepare himself to reanimate as a six-and-a-half-year-old boy.
Chapter 16
The classroom came to rest on the grounds of the twenty-six-acre estate of wealthy businessman George Luther Stearns in Medford, Massachusetts, on the evening of January 1, 1863. Through the window and aided by the light of a nearly full moon, Samuel was able to see the large mansion in the distance. They had landed on a large, well-manicured lawn, which reminded Samuel of a golf course fairway, although the grass was a winterish, yellow-brown. They seemed to be in the back of the house, for a marble staircase, lit by several lanterns, provided a passageway into the main building. Samuel’s concentration was broken by the voice of a small boy.
“Hello, Minerva,” it said.
Minerva Messinger was unprepared for a pint-sized Serbian scientist jumping up onto her lap. She recalled their trip to Gettysburg when the reanimated Nikola Tesla had been a mischievous little scamp and frankly, a pint-sized pest.
“Mr. Tesla! Behave!” she said as the reanimated Nikola Tesla gleefully smiled at her. He managed to kiss Minerva’s cheek before she wiggled away from him. The little sprite then went after Heather, before Carl Bridenbaugh intervened.
“Enough, Nikola. Don’t be an ass,” he said. “I don’t want to report you,” he cautioned.
“Carl, don’t be such a prude,” Tesla replied.
“He’s right, Nikola,” Mr. Greene said. “We don’t have time for this. Are you going to behave or stay behind in the portable?”
Tesla suddenly calmed down. “I am sorry,” he apologized. “Reanimation always makes me frisky. It takes a few moments to get my bearings. This suit seems a bit large,” he added.
“You were six months older when we bought that suit in Gettysburg,” Mr. Greene said.
“That explains it,” Tesla said.
“Professor Bridenbaugh, please install the cloaking device. It might be a bit nippy, but it is a short walk to the party,” Mr. Greene said.
As the first one down the ramp of the portable, Minerva caught the first breath of the frigid air; It was bracing cold and Minerva was glad it was a short walk to the mansion. As they climbed the marble steps a large group of partygoers was visible on the inside. Little Nikola Tesla ran ahead to walk beside Minerva.
“Is there any hope for us, Minerva?” he asked impishly. “Or are you still holding a candle for Victor Bridges?” He tried to grab her hand, but she slapped it away.
“Behave!” she said to him, fighting back a smile.
“We had best go around to the front,” Mr. Greene said.
They circled the building but were met at the front door by a butler who inquired who they were. “I am Nathan Greene, here with my students,” Mr. Greene said. “Mr. Garrison can vouch for me.”
The butler turned to another servant and whispered something. To Mr. Greene he said, “Wait here a moment.”
Victor came up to Mr. Greene and said, “Mr. Greene, you met Garrison over twenty-five years ago. He won’t remember.”
Suddenly a much older, spectacled William L. Garrison appeared in the doorway. Bald now, he had the withered, wrinkled face of an old man. He was in fact, fifty-seven. He looked at Mr. Greene as if trying to place him.
Mr. Greene gave him a clue. “Boston 1835, I saw you in jail, remember?”
Garrison snapped his fingers. “That’s where it was! Yes, I remember now. My heavens man, you don’t look a day older than you did then.”
“Clean living,” Mr. Greene said. “A
ll in the diet.”
To the teacher’s surprise, the old abolitionist believed his baloney.
“Let them pass, Jeeves,” Garrison told the butler.
Victor Bridges was amazed. His teacher had told a whopper and the most famous abolitionist in New England had believed him. Not only that, but Garrison introduced Mr. Greene and his entourage to the host, the long-bearded George Stearns, who had made a fortune manufacturing lead pipes.
Remembering the photographs he had seen of antebellum abolitionists, Victor identified Wendall Phillips, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Amos Bronson Alcott, who was accompanied by his daughter twenty-year-old Louisa May Alcott, who would, in a few years, catapult to literary immortality with the publication of her novel Little Women.
“I just have to talk to Alcott,” Bette whispered to Minerva.
Bette knew that Louisa May Alcott never married; Bette had read some things the author had written preferring women to men and wondered if she might be a lesbian. Miss Alcott smiled at young Tesla, patted him on the head and saw the embarrassment on Bette’s face.
“Don’t be embarrassed miss,” she said. “Boys will be boys. It was nice that you brought him.”
“Thank you. My name is Bette. Bette…Kardashian,” she said, and she began chatting with the soon-to-be famous writer as Tesla rejoined Mr. Greene and the rest of the group.
Just then, conversations stopped, and a singer was introduced. The man took his place on a make-shift stage. He was a tall, bearded African American and he began to sing, in a rich full baritone, John Brown’s Body.
John Brown's body lies a-moldering in the grave
John Brown's body lies a-moldering in the grave
John Brown's body lies a-moldering in the grave
But his soul goes marching on
The stars above in Heaven are looking kindly down
The stars above in Heaven are looking kindly down
The stars above in Heaven are looking kindly down
On the grave of old John Brown
Glory, Glory, Hallelujah
Glory, Glory, Hallelujah
Glory, Glory, Hallelujah
His soul goes marching on