steer by the compass or by any star." 



Nowhere was the magnitude of 

 African-American influence on mari- 

 time life greater than among the vast 

 sounds and estuaries that stretch 100 

 miles from the Outer Banks into the 

 interior of North Carolina. Between 

 1800 and 1860, blacks composed 

 about 45 percent of the total popula- 

 tion in the 19 tidewater counties. Their 

 importance in boating and shipping 

 surfaces again and again in newspa- 

 pers, plantation ledgers, personal 

 diaries, court records and travel ac- 

 counts of the day. By drawing on 

 those sources, we can see how fugitive 

 slaves and their collaborators, at sea 

 and ashore, created an oceangoing 

 route to freedom on the North Caro- 

 lina coast. 



Charting this clandestine corridor 

 up the Eastern Seaboard also reveals a 

 broader layer of tidewater culture long 

 concealed by popular images of 

 magnificent and tranquil plantations. 

 More than just black watermen com- 

 posed the Underground Railroad in 

 coastal North Carolina. Although 

 wealthy planters and merchants held 

 the reins of power, drafting and en- 

 forcing the punitive laws, lowly 

 watermen, slave stevedores, piney 

 woods squatters, reclusive swampers 

 and even slaveholders' wives and 

 children defied those laws and forged 

 a realm apart. This "underside of 

 slavery" sustained tenuous pathways 

 by which fugitives might pass from 

 land to sea. Their conspiratorial acts 

 represent a dramatic and untold chap- 

 ter in the history of North Carolina. 



W 



f T e are fortunate to know 

 anything about this "maritime Under- 

 ground Railroad." It was, after all, an 

 illicit undertaking, a potentially capital 

 crime that necessarily occurred only 

 on the fringes of society. Few dared to 

 leave written accounts of their in- 

 volvement; most who were appre- 

 hended had no day in court where 



their efforts might have been recorded. 

 Historical documents understandably 

 yield only the most oblique passages 

 about slave runaways and their sym- 

 pathizers. 



"I was to escape in a vessel," 

 wrote one ex-slave who had fled by 

 ship, "but I forebear to mention any 

 further particulars." 



Or like William Robinson, they 

 disclosed only enough details about 

 the Underground Railroad to hint at 

 its breadth and vitality, but deliber- 

 ately omitted specific names, routes 

 or ships. 



Runaway slave Harry Grimes stayed in hiding in North Carolina swamp forests 

 for 18 months before securing his passage to freedom on a ship in 1857. 

 Engraving taken from William Still, The Underground Railroad: A Record of 



Facts, Authentic Narratives, Letters, etc., Narrating the Hardships, Hair-Breadth 

 Escapes, and Death Struggles of the Slaves in Their Efforts for Freedom. 



Yet documents unveil several 

 dozen accounts of specific runaway 

 slaves who reached ships sailing out 

 of North Carolina ports between 1800 

 and 1861. 



Most North Carolina slaves who 

 tried to escape by ship traveled to the 

 busier harbors at Wilmington, New 

 Bern, Washington and Plymouth. 

 Relying on their own watercraft skills 



Continued 



COASTWATCH 1 



