Curated OER
Running for Freedom: The FUgitive Slave law and the Coming of the Civil War
In order to understand the complicated nature of slave laws during the Civil War, learners compare and contrast an abolitionist poster and a runaway slave ad. They use an attached worksheet to consider each primary source document, then...
Curated OER
Runaway Indentured Servants
Students compare and contrast indentured servants and slaves. In this US history slavery lesson, students discuss the owners' perceptions of indentured servants and slaves, then view ads for runaway slaves to support their opinions....
Curated OER
Primary Source Adventures: Runaway Slaves Lesson Plan
Fourth graders examine social changes in Texas during last half of ninteenth century relating to the institution of slavery. They brainstorm methods that unhappy slaves may have used to avoid obeying their masters, and read and discuss...
Curated OER
Runaway Slaves
Students examine struggles for freedom. In this Underground Railroad lesson, students listen to "Follow the Drinking Gourd" and "Freedom" to lead them into a discussion regarding freedoms . Students watch the video "The Freedom Station"...
Curated OER
Runaway Ad - Using Primary Documents
Young scholars examine a runaway slave advertisement. For this American history lesson, students investigate a missing slave advertisement run by Thomas Jefferson in 1769. Young scholars make inferences based on the advertisement.
Curated OER
Runaway Journeys Migration
Students use the Runaway Journeys site maps and image resources in rounding out their study of the slave migration. They access an excellent multi-media narrative imbedded in this plan.
Curated OER
Planning an Escape
Pupils identify characteristics of runaway slaves in the 18th century, Generalize about reasons slaves ran away, and construct plan of how a slave might be successful in running away.
Curated OER
Geography and Runaway Journeys Lesson Plan: The Great Dismal Swamp
Students examine the geography of swamps and the Great Dismal Swamp. They research primary accounts, period literature, and analyze how fugitive slaves lived in the swamps.
Curated OER
Living on the Fringe Lesson Plan: Maroon Communities
Students read a section of the narrative, Runaway Journeys, and examine how fugitives lived in remote areas. They identify maroon communities on a map, and research and write about maroon communities.
University of Virginia
Virginia Center for Digital History: The Geography of Slavery in Virginia
A digital collection of advertisements for runaway and captured slaves in the period before the American Civil War. In addition, there are historical documents related to slavery. Gives the option of browsing or doing a detailed search....
Yale University
Yale New Haven Teachers Institute: Connecticut Blacks in 18th and 19th Centuries
A curriculum unit that examines the history of slavery in Connecticut, the laws permitting it, segregation, and the struggles faced by freed blacks to achieve equality.
Wikimedia
Wikipedia: Harriet Tubman
This article overviews Harriet Tubman's involvement with the Underground Railroad, her service in the military during the Civil War, and her fight as an activist for African-American and women's rights.
Other
Virtual Jamestown: Laws on Slavery
This site provides the original text of Virginia colonial laws concerning different aspects of slavery for Africans, Native Americans, and indentured servants.
The Henry Ford
Living Under Enslavement: African Americans on Hermitage Plantation
This virtual tour of the slave quarters of the Hermitage Plantation tells of the family life of slaves, their skills, and their resistance to the institution of slavery.
PBS
Wnet: Thirteen: Slavery and the Making of America: Slave Responses to Enslavement
Using primary documents, oral histories, and other historical resources, learn how African Americans responded to enslavement prior to the Civil War. Includes interactive exercise.
British Library
British Library: Barrett Browning's Poetry: Social & Political Commentary
Elizabeth Barrett Browning gave a voice, in her poems, to many of those oppressed by contemporary injustice: child laborers, the poor, and the enslaved. In this lesson, students will give these voices dramatic form, using the techniques...
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Runaways, Making of African American Identity: V. 1
Several accounts by slaves of running away from bondage, written in the nineteenth century and also recorded in the 1930s, as well as newspaper advertisements seeking information about fugitive slaves in the eighteenth century.
Digital History
Digital History: The Fugitive Slave Law
See why the Fugitive Slave Act was such a contentious, divisive law that exacerbated tensions between North and South.
Digital History
Digital History: The American Revolution and Slavery
Read about the plans for using slaves in both the British and Continental armies during the Revolutionary War. See why some of the plans were scuttled and how the end of the war affected blacks who fought and those who remained in the...
Smithsonian Institution
National Museum of American History: Slave Life and the Underground Railroad
A brief summary of the history of African American slavery and the Underground Railroad. Activities and books pertaining to slave life, plantations, and the Underground Railroad are suggested.
Independence Hall Association
U.s. History: The Underground Railroad
A brief look at the Underground Railroad and how it operated. Find some of the code words used to help runaway slaves find their way, and read about some of the "conductors" who led slaves along the routes to the North.
Independence Hall Association
U.s. History: Rebellions on and Off the Plantation
Slaves resisted their bondage in many ways. Read about the revolts planned and executed by Denmark Vesey and Nat Turner, the southern reactions to those revolts, and the ways slaves individually resisted their enslavement.
The History Cat
The History Cat: Countdown to Civil War
Describes the events leading up to the start of the American Civil War. Looks at clashes between pro- and anti-slavery groups, the Missouri Compromise of 1820, the fight over California, the Compromise of 1850, the Fugitive Slave Act,...