The character arc of Harriet Tubman
Born about March 1822 in Dorchester County, Maryland; the date was never recorded, as it was not for most enslaved people. Died 10 March 1913 in Auburn, New York, in the home she built for others. Between the two sit a wound that marked her for life, a ninety mile run to freedom, about thirteen trips back for some seventy people, and a wartime raid that freed ten times that in one night. The line below draws that whole life in order.
Tap the line to pluck it. Hover or tap any mark for its card. Drawn from the public record of her life; the sources are at the foot of the page.
Who was Harriet Tubman?
Freed herself, then went back thirteen times.
At about thirteen she stepped between an overseer and a fleeing field hand, and the iron weight he threw struck her head. The injury marked the rest of her life with sudden sleeps and visions; she treated the visions as instructions. In September 1849, hearing she was about to be sold south, she walked off the Eastern Shore alone, about ninety miles by night, and crossed into Pennsylvania a free woman.
Then she turned around. Over the next decade she went back about thirteen times and led some seventy people out, family first, then anyone ready, by night, in winter, armed, and she said afterwards that she never lost a passenger. The reasoning she gave was simple: freedom that ended at her own feet was not freedom.
In the war she scouted for the Union, and on the night of 2 June 1863 she guided the Combahee River raid that freed more than seven hundred people, the first armed American raid led by a woman. She spent the last decades in Auburn, New York, campaigning for the vote she never got to cast, and building the home for the aged where her own line ended. It is worth reading for one rule, hers: keep going.
The moments
Harriet Tubman's timeline.
The 1830s
The iron weight
Setback, and it changed everything. She stepped between an overseer and a fleeing man; the thrown weight struck her head and marked her life.
The 1840s
Married John Tubman
Everyday. A free Black man; she took his name and, later, her mother's first name, Harriet.
Ran for freedom
Milestone, and it changed everything. About ninety miles by night to Pennsylvania. She said she looked at her hands to see if she was the same person.
The 1850s
Stay free, or go back
Crossroads, decided.
The paths laid out: go back for the others, taken, or stay north and stay free. Freedom that ended at her own feet was not freedom, she reasoned, and she went back thirteen times.
The first trip back
Milestone, and it changed her direction. Her niece was on the auction block in Cambridge; the sale was interrupted from the inside.
Went back for John
Everyday. Her husband had remarried and would not come. She took a group of strangers north instead.
Christmas rescue of her brothers
Milestone. Three brothers, out on Christmas night, while the sale notice waited for the day after.
Brought her parents north
Milestone. Her parents were in their seventies; she drove them out in a makeshift wagon, in daylight.
Counsel with John Brown
Everyday. Brown called her General Tubman. She helped him plan and recruit, and illness kept her from Harpers Ferry.
The 1860s
The last trip out
Milestone. About thirteen missions in eleven years, some seventy people, and, as she said, never a passenger lost.
Led the Combahee raid
Milestone, and it changed her direction. She guided the gunboats past the mines; more than seven hundred people came aboard free.
Married Nelson Davis
Everyday. A Union veteran, in Auburn, in the house that anchored the rest of her life.
The 1890s
Bought the land next door
Milestone. Twenty five acres at auction, bid for on borrowed nerve, for a home for the aged and poor.
The 1900s
Opened the Home
Milestone, and it changed her direction. The home opened in her name; five years later she was cared for inside it.
The line ends 10 Mar 1913, in the home she built for others. What it set moving has not ended: the road she walked in the dark is walked in daylight now, and her rule still holds for every hard crossing: keep going.
Your turn
Every story draws a unique line.
Hers took ninety one years and thirteen trips back. Yours is already further along than you think, and drawing it takes about three minutes.
Sources
- Kate Clifford Larson, Bound for the Promised Land: Harriet Tubman, Portrait of an American Hero, 2004.
- Sarah Bradford, Scenes in the Life of Harriet Tubman, 1869.
- The Combahee River raid record, June 1863.
- The Harriet Tubman Home records, Auburn, New York.
- The Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Historical Park, National Park Service.