Underground Railroad

           The Underground Railroad was a system organized by mostly blacks to help slaves escape to freedom. Although it sounds like an easy way out, it was anything but for the slaves. It was tremendously hard for the slaves to escape from their owner's house and to know who to trust. A conductor(key people who helped with the Underground Railroad) might pose as a slave in order to enter a plantation and give slaves their lines (travel route). They mainly traveled at night to avoid getting caught. They would generally travel between 10 and 20 miles to the next station using boats, trains wagons and on foot, where they would rest and eat whatever they could find along the way, hiding in barns and other out-of-the-way places. While they waited, a message would be sent to the next station to alert its stationmaster. Sometimes, clever slaves use disguises to help them escapes them to the South. Of course, a secret system also consists of a secret language. Here are just a few: escaped slaves are called cargo or passengers; stopping places are called stations; and key people that helped with the Underground Railroad are called conductors. The Railroad system helped more than 100 thousand slaves to freedom from 1810 to 1850.