Station Master on the Underground Railroad: The Life and Letters of Thomas Garrett, rev. ed.

By James A. McGowan

Book Overview

Thomas Garrett, a Quaker from Wilmington, Delaware, had a genial disposition unless provoked to defend his strong anti-slavery beliefs. He believed strongly in the Underground Railroad and in helping slaves escape and chafed under the Quaker belief in non-violence. When he died in 1871, Wilmington's black community saluted him as "their Moses."

Station Master on the Underground Railroad was an important work in antebellum reform when it was first published in 1977. Author James McGowan disputed earlier arguments that white abolitionists were unified in their opposition to slavery and that they were largely responsible for the success of the Underground Railroad while the escaped slaves were helpless and frightened passengers who took advantage of a well-organized network. The present volume has been revised (in 2005) to include new information on Garrett's relationship with Harriet Tubman and the abolitionist newspaper editor William Lloyd Garrison. Now published in paperback, the book also gives readers a new perspective on Thomas Garrett, recognizing his shortcomings as well as the uncompromising nature of his Quaker faith.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0786442409
• ISBN13: 9780786442409
• Release Date: May 2009
• Publisher: McFarland & Company
• Length: 232 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.9" x 9.9"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Who's for Abolition? I am!

Garrett, like so many in his fambly, was one of the unsung heroes of the American experiment. Which has failed, I hate to say it but we should all pack up our things and join other countries. But before it failed men like Garrett, and so many in his fambly, showed the truest, farthest measure of human goodness. And, somehow, managed to make a buck doing it. Don't ask me how, I don't know. Perhaps their decadent addiction to the capitalist system would result in those they championed, those they freed, and those they loved, finding oppression even after emancipation. Way to go. All the same, though, they did a lot better than most people. Most of those dead people were bastards. Especially in the South.