The Underground Rail Road. A Record of Facts, Authentic Narratives, Letters, Etc. Narrating the Hardships, Hair-Breadth Escapes and Death Struggles of the Slaves in the Efforts for freedom, as related by themselves and others, or witnessed by the author; together with Sketches of Some of the Largest Stockholders, and Most Liberal Aiders and Advisers, of the Road

William Still

The Underground Rail Road. A Record of Facts, Authentic Narratives, Letters, Etc. Narrating the Hardships, Hair-Breadth Escapes and Death Struggles of the Slaves in the Efforts for freedom, as related by themselves and others, or witnessed by the author; together with Sketches of Some of the Largest Stockholders, and Most Liberal Aiders and Advisers, of the Road

Philadelphia

Wm. Still

1883

Clemens’s stepfather Jervis Langdon was a “conductor” on the Underground Railroad, helping people escape enslavement in the South. This is Clemens’s copy of a history of a historical account written by William Still, a leading Black abolitionist hailed as “the father of the Underground Rail Road,” collecting firsthand accounts of formerly enslaved people’s journeys to freedom. In a long autograph note, Clemens adds a story from the Langdon family recounting the story of Mrs. Luckett and her daughter, two formerly enslaved women who escaped from Richmond to Elmira, New York.