The Abolitionist Movement in Connecticut
From research in 2016 by an Avon resident:
The Abolitionist Movement to emancipate the slaves in Connecticut probably began in the years following the Revolutionary War, when humanitarians across the state struggled to apply the statement in the Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal” to those in bondage. If this statement were true, then a way had to be found to abolish the dreadful practice of slavery.
Horatio Strother writes in his book The Underground Railroad in Connecticut: “After the Revolution, that basic lesson in freedom, the (Connecticut) General Assembly moved further toward universal emancipation. A law of 1784 provided that no Negro or mulatto born in Connecticut after March 1 of that year was to be held as a slave after reaching the age of twenty-five. Further measures soon followed this law in the same direction. An enactment of May 1792 gave teeth to the 1784 law by defining penalties for its violation; anyone who removed from Connecticut a slave who was entitled to freedom at twenty-five would be punished by a “fine of $334, half of which should go to the plaintiff and half to the State.” The same session of the Assembly also enacted that all slaves between the ages of twenty-five and forty-five were entitled to freedom. A measure of 1797 took an additional step, decreeing that no Negro or mulatto born after August of that year should remain a slave after reaching the age of twenty-one.”
Consequently, the number of slaves in the state declined from 951 in 1800 to 23 in 1830. Although no slaves were living in Hartford County at that time, Fran MacKie writes in her book, Avon, Connecticut, an historical story, that Shubael and Romanta Tillotson, whose family owned a large farm on the east side of Lovely Street, “had a sugar plantation in New River Parish, Ascension County, Louisiana, and spent their summers at the family home in Avon, bringing with them twenty or thirty of the ninety slaves they owned to harvest tobacco. They maintained a school for their slaves and are said to have treated them with kindness. However, they were threatened with excommunication from the West Avon Congregational Church because they were slave-owners.”
Meanwhile, the number of African Americans fleeing the brutality of slavery below the Mason-Dixon Line began to increase. By the late 1830s, the abolitionists had developed a series of escape routes and hiding places to help the fugitives get to Canada. After the American Revolution, Canada viewed the United States as “the enemy”, and escaped slaves were never returned to the enemy country. Twenty years after the American Revolution, Canada abolished slavery and became the destination of the journey to freedom.
The escape routes became known as the Underground Railroad. However, it was neither a train with tracks nor was it underground. The name came from an incident in 1831 when a slave named Tice Davids eluded his owner by swimming the Ohio River and disappearing on the other side. His owner searched and searched, but he was unable to find Davids. He glumly concluded that Davids must have gotten away by an “underground road”. Railroads were the technological wonder of the era, and it did not take long for “road” to become “railroad”.
The abolitionists who “worked” on the railroad continued the jargon by calling themselves agents, conductors, stationmasters, and stockholders. A stationmaster usually fed and housed the “passengers” until they were turned over to the agents or conductors who escorted them along the “railroad tracks”. The stockholders were the organizers and actually advertised in newspapers to notify the stationmasters that “human merchandise” would be arriving. One such ad said, “Hold on to Your Stock!”, encouraging the abolitionists to keep the faith and to hold on to their hope.
The Underground Railroad in the Farmington Valley
The Underground Railroad was a clandestine organization, and no one used their given names because some of their activities were outside the law. Abolitionists were very unpopular, and they were not always treated well by their neighbors or the authorities. Only the most important stationmaster knew the names of the stationmasters in neighboring towns.
Pastors may have preached openly about the evils of slavery, but even some of them were dismissed by their parishes. Fran MacKie writes that “West Avon Congregational Church members considered proposals ‘opposing the baleful system of slave holding’ in 1855 and 1856, but no action was taken. However, a majority voted in 1858, ‘the voluntary enslavement of one portion of the human race by another is a violation of the law of love and, therefore, a sin against which the church of God should everywhere bear distinct testimony.’ But there were church leaders who did not agree; two deacons immediately resigned, and one appointed successor requested to be excused from serving.” Prof. Strother points out that in Mystic and Naugatuck, people carried squirt guns so they could squirt ardent abolitionists when they became overly zealous about their convictions.
Farmington, Connecticut, was considered the “grand central station” of the Underground Railroad because all the “tracks” seemed to lead to this town. If a slave could escape the plantation and make it to the border states of Ohio and Pennsylvania, he had a good chance of finding abolitionists willing to help him. Slaves from the Southeastern states headed north to Pennsylvania and from there to Philadelphia and New York City; those from the other Southern states went north to Ohio and on through Michigan to Canada. They had no maps, so at night they used the North Star to guide them.
Along the way, they depended upon the kindness of people for food, shelter, and the name of the next stationmaster. Some came to Connecticut by boat, landing in New Haven or Old Lyme, while others walked from New York. The main routes in Connecticut were Wilton to Plymouth to Farmington; New Haven to Southington to Farmington; New Haven to Meriden to New Britain to Farmington; and Old Lyme to East Haddam to Glastonbury to Hartford and then to either Farmington or Bloomfield.
Avon was on the “main line” from Farmington, straight through to Simsbury and then on to Granby, crossing over into Massachusetts at Westfield. From there, the line went to Northampton and on to Canada through Vermont.
It was a dangerous passage, and both the conductors and their charges lived in fear of being exposed. Most “passengers” on the railroad were taken only a distance of 10 to 30 miles each night before being turned over to the next stationmaster. The choice of the route taken and of the mode of transportation was often changed to ensure the safety of all. Traveling at night, staying in way stations during the day, was best. Hay wagons, where people could be concealed in compartments under a load of hay, proved to be very good hiding places when being moved. Others simply walked at night, either alone or guided by a conductor to the next station. Some traveled by boat.
The preferred routes from Farmington to Avon were either Waterville Road (Route 10) or the Farmington River. The Farmington Canal operated until 1848, but it probably was not used because inspections of the canal boats were made at different locks; plus, it was not open during the night, when most of the moves were made. The Farmington Canal Railroad was operating in the 1850s, but it is not known if this was used by the Underground Railroad. There was also an alternate route, as Fran MacKie points out, that was used by one of Farmington’s most famous conductor’s, Elijah Lewis. He “is said to have escorted a fugitive ‘along the high road to the Deer Cliff Farm’ in Avon and from there to Simsbury”.
1838 Anti-Slavery Adertisement in "The Emancipator"
All this secrecy meant that there are very few written records about the abolitionists in Avon. What is known is that in February 1838, 16 men from Avon signed a full-page ad in the anti-slavery broadside, “The Emancipator”, calling people to an anti-slavery convention to be held in Hartford on February 28, 1838. The men who signed the broadside were William Brown, Hector Chidsey, John Chidsey, Francis H. Coe, Samuel Dickinson, Phineas Gabriel, Gideon Goodrich, J. G. Hubbard, Bela Crocker Kellogg, Isaac Osborn, Elizur Porter, Romanta Porter, Seth Soper, Levi Thompson, Ashbel Webster, and Amasa Woodford. This was a very brave thing to do. For every person who hated slavery, there was someone who was pro-slavery.
Phineas Gabriel, one of the men who signed the ad, lived in a house that is still standing on West Main Street across from what is now the gazebo on the Avon Town Green. He made his living as a cobbler, making shoes and boots. He may also have been an agent or conductor for the Underground Railroad, but he was definitely an abolitionist.
In 1896, his son Oliver Gabriel sent a letter to W. H. Siebert, who was collecting information for his book The Underground Railroad from Slavery to Freedom, published in 1898, corroborating his father’s involvement in the Abolitionist Movement:
Dear Sir,
In reply to your letter of inquiry some days ago, I would say that the following names are suggested as having been the six old-line abolitionists in this town (Avon) …. Amasa Woodford, Romeo Andrews, John Chidsey, Phineas Gabriel, Bela Kellogg, John Willard.
These people are all dead. About the Underground R.R. I am a son of the above named Phineas Gabriel and within my remembrance can recollect of fugitive slaves who were on their way to Canada from the South having stopped in this town over night and of their having been assisted with food, clothing, shelter and God-speed. I was young at the time but can remember the old abolitionists all flocked around to see them. As to the so called Underground R.R. I have no knowledge and cannot give you any information concerning it.
I have the honor to be
Cordially yours,
Oliver Gabriel
Postmaster
Avon, Conn.
Another signer of the ad, Bela Crocker Kellogg (1811 – 1892), lived in a house two doors to the west of Phineas Gabriel. He was the son of the first pastor of the Avon Congregational Church. Fran MacKie writes, “ Mr. Bela Kellogg (1780 – 1831) and his family still found time to help strangers. On January 8, 1829, as the son was reading to his father from the Anti-Masonic Intelligencer, they were interrupted by the entrance of a very ragged and cold black man. “He came to the fire…and we let him stay with us all night as the weather was somewhat severe out,” Bela wrote. “We have the pleasure of entertaining black as well as white,” he added.” Although Pastor Bela Kellogg died in 1831, it must be assumed that his son Bela Crocker Kellogg was influenced by his father’s kindness.
Bela Crocker Kellogg served his community as Postmaster and Judge of Probate; and when he died in 1892, his obituary contained the following, “He was an anti-slavery man when “abolitionist” was an opprobrious (disrespectful) epithet and voted for James G. Birney (Birney was the Liberty Party’s anti-slavery candidate for President in 1840) when the strongest faith dared not hope for the victories which gave him joy while yet in the prime of his active life. In every relation of life he was a faithful, patriotic, Christian gentleman.”
What is known of the other signers is sketchy: John Chidsey lived close to both the Gabriel and Kellogg homes on West Main Street; Samuel Dickenson lived two houses to the west of Bela Kellogg; Gideon Goodrich lived on West Avon Road; Elizur Porter owned a wagon shop on Lovely Street; Amasa Woodford (1808 - ?) acted as the moderator of the first election of selectmen in 1830 where Romanta Porter was chosen a selectmen; and Ashbel Webster lived on Nod Road. Nothing is known about the other men.
No one is sure where the Freedom Seekers were housed during the day in Avon. The nuns of the former Alleluia House at 255 Avon Mountain Road behind the Avon Old Farms Hotel said that there was a hidey-hole in the cellar of the 1738 house, which they believed had been used to hide slaves during the day. Before its demolition in 1988, a member of the Avon Historical Society toured the house and reported that there were, indeed, holes in the foundation that may have been used by the Underground Railroad. Unfortunately, when a new house was erected in the same place, the foundation was replaced with a new one.
There is a very old hay barn remaining at the back of the property, where passengers might have been hidden under the floor. Many stationmasters cut trapdoors into the floors of their hay barns with a small room underneath, but this barn has one-foot by one-foot beams over a dirt floor, so there is no evidence that this could have been used as a hidey-hole.
Although some have thought that the houses of Phineas Gabriel or Bela Kellogg might have been used as way-stations, taking the fugitives through the center of Avon, although hidden, would not have been the safest thing to do. Hiding the passengers to the east of Waterville Road and the Farmington River makes more sense. It may be that other homes and barns, since taken down along Waterville and Nod Roads, were also used.
Edgar M. Woodford, Civil Engineer, Abolitionist, and Soldier
By Nancy Finlay for Your Public Media
A handful of maps of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine, published in Philadelphia during the early 1850s, bear the name of E. M. Woodford. Edgar M. Woodford was born April 15, 1824, in Avon, Connecticut, where his family had a farm. Self-taught as a civil engineer, Woodford became county surveyor for the County of Hartford. A nephew recalled his Uncle Edgar as “a great strapping man,” who would come “over the hills with his [surveying] instruments over his shoulder, crying for fear his work would not come out right.”
Woodford became deeply committed to the Abolitionist cause and, in 1856, went West with a group calling themselves “The Connecticut Colony in Kansas.” These settlers were determined to secure Kansas as a free state by moving there in sufficient numbers to outvote the slaveholders. In 1857, he returned to Hartford to encourage other like-minded individuals to join them.
When the Civil War broke out, he enlisted in the Seventh Connecticut Volunteer Infantry under the command of an old friend, Colonel Joseph Hawley. A brief article in the Hartford Daily Courant on October 21, 1862, noted that “Quartermaster Sergeant Edgar M. Woodford, 7th Conn. Regiment from Avon, died recently at Hilton Head of congestive fever, after an illness of less than twenty-four hours.”
Although Woodford’s name appears on a brownstone monument in the West Avon Cemetery, his family’s effort to retrieve his body was unsuccessful, and he rests in an unmarked grave in the National Cemetery at Hilton Head. More than 50 years after his death, at a memorial service in 1913, a family member recalled his “noble and precious life,” remembering him as “a man of marked abilities” who “filled an important place in the activities and life of his community.” Today, Woodford’s maps survive as a monument to his meticulous and painstaking work, proof that in the end, the results of Uncle Edgar’s surveys always came out right.
Nancy Finlay, formerly Curator of Graphics at the Connecticut Historical Society, is the editor of Picturing Victorian America: Prints by the Kellogg Brothers of Hartford, Connecticut, 1830-1880.