Review of Escape Betweixt Two Suns

792 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: The institution of slavery in america and its impact on the civil war

In 1809 the Indiana Territory was divided into two separate territories, the second being the Illinois Territory. In 1818, Illinois drew up a constitution, and entered the Union as a free state. However, as we have learned, the North was notoriously a racist society. Their cause for disallowing slavery was more so for reasons of wanting to promote racial purity, as opposed to reasons concerning morality. Many settlers even drew their income from bounties received in exchange for the capture of runaways on the Underground Railroad.

Americans must understand that the horrors of slavery and oppression were not just limited to the South, one reason why the Underground Railroad ran to Canada. Although Fugitive Slave Laws were not dated until 1850, slaves—in this case indentured servants—could not be sure of freedom until they reached Canadian soil. This book gives readers a glimpse of who we might have found as a conductor on the Underground Railroad, and what kind of predicaments they put themselves into for the sake of others. The author’s tone generally seems to sympathize with the abolitionist plight, and she refers to the prejudices of southern Illinois society as a “legacy of shame” (Pirtle 120-121).

Carol Pirtle, an author whose works are primary focused around Randolph County, Illinois, has written a book concentrated on the civil court case of William Hayes vs. Andrew Borders of Randolph County, Illinois. The book provides in depth information regarding how Borders made his way to Randolph County in 1816 by way of Georgia and how he kept slaves, even though Illinois entered the Union as a free state. Mr. Hayes made his way to Randolph County much later than Mr. Borders, in 1834. Originally from upstate New York and after liv...

... middle of paper ...

...ductor on the Underground Railroad might have had to endure in order to help people they didn’t even know escape to freedom. It also give the reader an infinitesimal view of what a slave attempting to escape may have to endure, and the possibilities that they may face, should they not be successful. Also,

If the history of the Underground Railroad and abolition is of interest to a reader, “Escape Betwixt Two Suns” is a great place to start. Although it carries a very specific subject, it is an interesting read that has the ability become a gateway read into a much deeper darker portion of American history.

Works Cited

Chapman, Chas C. History of Knox County, Illinois,. Chicago: Blakely, Brown & Marsh, Printers, 1878. Print.
Pirtle, Carol. Escape Betwixt Two Suns: A True Tale of the Underground Railroad in Illinois. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 2000. Print.

Show More
Related

  • Article Analysis of Gregory Wigmore's Before the Railroad: From Slavery to Freedom in the Canadian-American Borderland

    873 Words  | 2 Pages

    As a final note, Gregory Wigmore`s article really touched upon a unique and unexplored topic on local history in the Windsor-Detroit region. I had never seen the Detroit River as a safe haven for anyone, much less slaves. His article focuses on how the borders provided freedom and screwed over the slave owners that got stuck in red tape trying to retrieve their `property.` Although cross border freedoms were created, laws at the time didn`t protect the slaves in the country they were living in; the only way to freedom was to run away. This article is an interestingly unique and an underexplored topic of slavery before the underground railroads.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Adam Rothman's Slave Country

    954 Words  | 2 Pages

    A review of his methodology shows the time and energy that entering this book. He uses a variety of sources for his research and evidence of good sources such as newspapers; memoirs; diaries; census figures; real estate listings; private letters and documents; journals and memoirs; public records and statements; the federal and local

    Read More

  • Lydia Maria Child's Propositions Defining Slavery and Emancipation

    1425 Words  | 3 Pages

    Roediger, David and Blatt, Martin H. The Meaning of Slavery in the North. JStor. 1998. Vol. 18

    Read More

  • Worchester v. Georgia

    1117 Words  | 3 Pages

    The case Worcester v. Georgia (1832) was a basis for the discussion of the issue of states' rights versus the federal government as played out in the administration of President Andrew Jackson and its battle with the Supreme Court. In addition to the constitutional issues involved, the momentum of the westward movement and popular support for Indian resettlement pitted white man against Indian. All of these factors came together in the Worcester case, which alarmed the independence of the Cherokee Nation, but which was not enforced. This examines the legal issues and tragic consequences of Indian resettlement.

    Read More

  • Analysis of The Disquisition of Government by John Calhoun

    3726 Words  | 8 Pages

    Eibling, Harold H., et al., eds. History of Our United States. 2nd edition. River Forest, Ill: Laidlaw Brothers, 1968.

    Read More

  • Harriet Jacobs Incidents And A Slave Girl: An Analysis

    1129 Words  | 3 Pages

    Slavery is a term that can create a whirlwind of emotions for everyone. During the hardships faced by the African Americans, hundreds of accounts were documented. Harriet Jacobs, Charles Ball and Kate Drumgoold each shared their perspectives of being caught up in the world of slavery. There were reoccurring themes throughout the books as well as varying angles that each author either left out or never experienced. Taking two women’s views as well as a man’s, we can begin to delve deeper into what their everyday lives would have been like. Charles Ball’s Fifty Years in Chains and Harriet Jacobs Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl were both published in the early 1860’s while Kate Drumgoold’s A Slave Girl’s Story came almost forty years later

    Read More

  • What Were the Key Issues Leading To the Civil War?

    2033 Words  | 5 Pages

    As the country began to grow and expand we continued to see disagreements between the North and South; the Missouri Territory applied for statehood; the South wanted them admitted as a slave state and the North as a free state. Henry Clay eventually came up with the Missouri Compromise, making Missouri a slave state and making Maine it’s own state, entering the union as a free state. After this compromise, any state admitted to the union south of the 36° 30’ latitude would be a slave state and a state north of it would be free. The country was very much sectionalized during this time. Thomas Jefferson felt this was a threat to the Union.

    Read More

  • Abolitionist Movement after the 1930s

    712 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...er what escaped slaves followed through the Underground Railroad. As well with the famous fictional book of Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. In Uncle Tom’s cabin Stowe talks about the life of slaves in the plantation. Douglass also publishes an autobiography talking about the horrid life of a slave and how honored he was to had been able to learn how to read and write. All this propaganda caused commotion within the union and the confederates leading up to the war.

    Read More

  • The Growing Opposition to Slavery

    1222 Words  | 3 Pages

    In 1776, Delaware becomes the first state to prohibit the importation of African slaves. One year later, in 1777, Vermont becomes the first colony to abolish slavery (within Vermont’s boundaries) by state constitution. Ten years later, in 1787, slavery was prohibited in the Northwest Territory by the Northwest Ordinance. The Northwest Territory was the first organized territory of the United States. The states pertaining to the Northwest Territory: Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. The abolition of slavery in the Northwest Territory led to thought held by pro-slavery southerners that the North had the edge in the Senate and The House of representatives.

    Read More

  • Simple Justice

    1367 Words  | 3 Pages

    This story was set in the deep south were ownership of African Americans was no different than owning a mule. Demonstrates of how the Thirteenth Amendment was intended to free slaves and describes the abolitionist’s efforts. The freedom of African Americans was less a humanitarian act than an economic one. There was a battle between the North and South freed slaves from bondage but at a certain cost. While a few good men prophesied the African Americans were created equal by God’s hands, the movement to free African Americans gained momentum spirited by economic and technological innovations such as the export, import, railroad, finance, and the North’s desire for more caucasian immigrants to join America’s workforce to improve our evolving nation. The inspiration for world power that freed slaves and gave them initial victory of a vote with passage of the Fifteenth Amendment. A huge part of this story follows the evolution of the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment more acts for civil rights.

    Read More

  • Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl And Frederick Douglass

    1202 Words  | 3 Pages

    The issue of Slavery in the South was an unresolved issue in the United States during the seventeenth and eighteenth century. During these years, the south kept having slavery, even though most states had slavery abolished. Due to the fact that slaves were treated as inferior, they did not have the same rights and their chances of becoming an educated person were almost impossible. However, some information about slavery, from the slaves’ point of view, has been saved. In this essay, we are comparing two different books that show us what being a slave actually was. This will be seen with the help of two different characters: Linda Brent in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and Frederick Douglass in The Narrative of the life of Frederick

    Read More

  • What did freedom mean to harriet jacobs

    1325 Words  | 3 Pages

    To understand the desperation of wanting to obtain freedom at any cost, it is necessary to take a look into what the conditions and lives were like of slaves. It is no secret that African-American slaves received cruel and inhumane treatment. Although she wrote of the horrific afflictions experienced by slaves, Linda Brent said, “No pen can give adequate description of the all-pervading corruption produced by slavery." The life of a slave was never a satisfactory one, but it all depended on the plantation that one lived on and the mast...

    Read More

  • Slavery’s Dehumanizing Effects on American Slaves and Slaveholders

    1652 Words  | 4 Pages

    Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, brings to light many of the social injustices that colored men, women, and children all were forced to endure throughout the nineteenth century under Southern slavery laws. Douglass's life-story is presented in a way that creates a compelling argument against the justification of slavery. His argument is reinforced though a variety of anecdotes, many of which detailed strikingly bloody, horrific scenes and inhumane cruelty on the part of the slaveholders. Yet, while Douglas’s narrative describes in vivid detail his experiences of life as a slave, what Douglass intends for his readers to grasp after reading his narrative is something much more profound. Aside from all the physical burdens of slavery that he faced on a daily basis, it was the psychological effects that caused him the greatest amount of detriment during his twenty-year enslavement. In the same regard, Douglass is able to profess that it was not only the slaves who incurred the damaging effects of slavery, but also the slaveholders. Slavery, in essence, is a destructive force that collectively corrupts the minds of slaveholders and weakens slaves’ intellects.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Underground Railroad

    942 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Underground Railroad despite occurring centuries ago continues to be an “enduring and popular thread in the fabric of America’s national historical memory” as Bright puts it. Throughout history, thousands of slaves managed to escape the clutches of slavery by using a system meant to liberate. In Colson Whitehead’s novel, The Underground Railroad, he manages to blend slave narrative and history creating a book that goes beyond literary or historical fiction. Whitehead based his book off a question, “what if the Underground Railroad was a real railroad?” The story follows two runaway slaves, Cora and Caesar, who are pursued by the relentless slave catcher Ridgeway. Their journey on the railroad takes them to new and unfamiliar locations,

    Read More

  • The Slow Road to Freedom: The Black Codes

    751 Words  | 2 Pages

    Confusion abounded in the still-smoldering South about the precise meaning of “freedom” for blacks. Emancipation took effect haltingly and unevenly in different parts of the conquered Confederacy. As Union armies marched in and out of various localities, many blacks found themselves emancipated and then re-enslaved. Blacks from one Texas county fleeing to the free soil of the liberated county next door were attacked by slave owners as they swam across the river that marked the county line. The next day trees along the riverbank were bent with swinging corpses – a grisly warning to others dreaming of liberty. Other planters resisted emancipation more legalistically, stubbornly protesting that slavery was lawful until state legislatures or the Supreme Court declared otherwise. For many slaves the shackles of slavery were not struck off in a mighty single blow but had to be broken link by link.

    Read More

More about Review of Escape Betweixt Two Suns

Open Document