CENTER of the AMERICAN EXPERIENCE for 375 Years

In 1838, James L. Smith and two companions who were all enslaved in northeastern Virginia, escaped their bondage and made their way north seeking to live free. Their travel was mostly on foot though they used a canoe and small boat which they found to sail across the Chesapeake Bay. The arrived near Frenchtown, Maryland. One of James’ companions was familiar with the area and recommended that they avoid going through Frenchtown in order to evade being captured as fugitives. Once they reached the road to New Castle, they stopped to rest and had to hide in the woods in order to sleep without fear of discovery. Upon resuming their walk, James could not keep up with his travel companions due to an old injury to his leg. His companions decided to leave him because he slowed them down and they worried about being captured by a patrol. After they left him, James nearly gave up hope, but soon found the strength and courage to continue. He continued walked and soon experienced his first encounter with a steam locomotive of the New Castle-Frenchtown Railroad. The engine’s appearance, noise and steam frightened him, and he scrambled away to hide from it. The second time he encountered the train he looked in the passenger cars to see if it carried any black passengers, but it did not. Only white passengers were aboard. He imagined the locomotive to be the devil taking souls to Hell. He continued walking until he came to a house owned by a white family. Though he was afraid they might capture him as a fugitive, he asked for breakfast because he was very hungry. He was invited inside and fed. He paid a quarter for his meal and continued walking to New Castle. Upon his arrival at noon, he was soon reunited with his companions. Within a couple of hours, they were able to board a steamboat sailing to Philadelphia. Although James heard that New Castle was “one of the worst slave towns in the country, and the law was such that no steamboat, or anything else, could take a colored person to Philadelphia without first proving his or her freedom” he found that no one stopped them or asked them for any documentation at all. They boarded the ship and purchased their tickets with no difficulty. They arrived safely in Philadelphia that afternoon. Smith eventually made his way to Springfield, Massachusetts where he received a formal education and founded the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. After marrying in 1842 he moved to Norwich, Connecticut where he continued working as a minister and a shoemaker.