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No Longer Yours:
Aspects of Slavery and Freedom Seeking in North Carolina

Indiantown Chasing “Guerrillas”

Along the portion of the Atlantic coast shown on the map will be seen long lines connecting Southern with Northern ports. These represent routes to liberty by sea. It is reported by a station-keeper of Valley Falls, Rhode Island, that “ Slaves in Virginia would secure passage either secretly or with the consent of the captains, in small trading vessels, at Norfolk or Portsmouth , and thus be brought into some port in New England, where their fate depended on circumstances ; " 5 and the reporter gives several instances coming within her knowledge of fugitives that escaped from Virginia to Massachusetts as stowaways on vessels. Boats engaged in the lumber trade sometimes brought refugees from New Bern, North Carolina, to Philadelphia. Captain Austin Bearse, who was active in the rescue of stowaways from vessels arriving in Boston harbor from the South , cites two instances in which fugitives came by sea from Wilmington, North Carolina, and another from Jacksonville, Florida.1 William Still gives a number of cases of escape by boat from Richmond and Norfolk, Virginia, and Wilmington, North Carolina, to the Vigilance Committee at Philadelphia. Negroes arriving in New York City and coming within the horizon of Isaac T. Hopper's knowledge were often sent by water to Providence and Boston."