She was born free in Caroline County. He was born across the river in Talbot, enslaved.
They followed separate paths to Baltimore. Anna met Frederick for the first time at the city wharves. He was 19, she was 24.
Frederick was an enslaved shipbuilder. Anna had a day job and her own business. She had means. She told him he should escape his bondage and live free.
Anna would lose everything if caught aiding and abetting a slave’s escape. She gave him sailor’s clothes for disguise, money for the trip north, and contacts with the Underground Railroad.
Union Church is located a few miles northwest of Greensboro, MD. A grave marker still stands a few yards from the church door. The name on the stone is faded but still legible:
CORPL
Wm. H. Carney
Co I
38 U.S. C.I.
No date of birth or death is shown.
Corporal William H. Carney, Company I, US Colored Infantry
I knocked at the door and said, “Who lives here?” Father answered by saying, “Who is that?” I said, “Me.” Then mother said, “That’s Alexander”– showing a mother never forgets her child.
Who made you free, young Alexander? Your enslaved father?
Your freed mother?
How were you free, Alexander?
Free to sit beside the Tuckahoe,
read holy books and
toss pebbles into the water,
listen to Aunt Hester’s screams on the other side?
Free to walk away from the Tuckahoe and never return?
But you did return.
I remember there was a colored church in the woods down by the river. If you passed by on the road that takes you over Sandy Island Bridge into Delaware, you could hear them singing on the Sabbath. That was back in the ’70s.
They said, Rev. Noah C.W. Cannon is a dangerous man.
He preached at Denton on Sunday. And would preach at my father’s out in the country that week. He was admired by all who heard him.
But that night came the constable with other men from town and arrested him for the murder of women and children. Rev. Cannon told the Justice, Look at me. I am not that mulatto. (For he was a very dark man.) And the Justice released him. But he did not sleep well that night, thinking
it was time to get out of that place.Continue reading Do you still see white horses over in those dark woods?→
They wrote:
His color was black. His features were strong. His voice was commanding, deep. His white friends in Denton
always came out
to hear him preach. Like-wise Generals, Governors, and Presidents. Born on the Tuckahoe, 1821
(before Fred Bailey
across the river
escaped), Bishop Wayman died last week.
