Living in slavery's shadow
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Chris Lackner, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Saturday, June 24, 2006

RIPLEY, Ohio - Ripley's sleepy riverfront hardly looks like a place where men once walked armed with pistols and knives, either guiding fugitives to safety, hunting for runaway slaves or scanning the night shadows for enemies.

When Ripley's citizens stroll the historic stretch today, they seem far more inclined to arm themselves with ice cream cones than pistols. But, in the decades preceding the Civil War, nightfall brought the town's riverfront to life with clandestine meetings, daring escapes and violent clashes between slave-catchers and conductors.

Ripley's Underground Railroad conductors, both black and white, risked their reputations, fortunes and lives in order to stand against slavery. Situated on the Ohio River's northern shore, Ripley's anti-slavery reputation made it a magnet for fugitives. Kentucky's slave owners considered Ripley an "abolitionist hell-hole" -- a label in which many of the town's citizens still take pride.

With a bounty out on his life, Ripley conductor John Parker had reason to be cautious when he walked the streets. Parker avoided sidewalks because he feared the nearby alleyways concealed enemies. A former slave and successful foundry owner, Parker moved to Ripley around 1849 and soon began a double life helping fugitives across the Ohio River.

"I never thought of going uptown without a pistol in my pocket, a knife in my belt, and a blackjack handy," Parker wrote in his autobiography. "This was a period when men went armed with pistol and knife and used them at the least provocation. When, under cover of night, the uncertain steps of slaves were heard quietly seeking their friends. When the mornings brought strange rumours of secret encounters the night before, but daylight showed no evidence of the fray."

While the Underground Railroad has been romanticized through secret tunnels and trapdoors, it was conductors who formed the heart of the grassroots movement. They included white abolitionists, free blacks and even slaves.

"Most of your leading conductors along this riverbank were community leaders -- reverends, doctors, lawyers and businessmen," said Bob Campbell, a descendant of Alexander Campbell, one of Ripley's early anti-slavery activists and conductors. "If everyone involved in the Underground Railroad in this town was arrested, you couldn't have kept it running."

Ripley's two most famous conductors also demonstrated the movement's diversity.

Built on the hill overlooking Ripley, Reverend John Rankin's red brick home stood as a symbol of freedom to slaves on the Kentucky shore. A white Presbyterian preacher, Rankin railed against slavery from the pulpit. When slaves crossed the river and climbed the steps to his home, he'd shelter them and transport them to stations north of Ripley. Active conductors for over 40 years, Rankin and his family faced violent threats from Kentucky slave-owners and even some fellow citizens of Ohio.

Parker, in contrast, was more daring and proactive. He regularly crossed into Kentucky on a wooden skiff in search of runaways or to lure slaves away from nearby farms.
"If Parker had been captured by bounty hunters and convicted (for helping slaves), he would have spent at least six months in jail," said Betty Campbell, president of Ripley Heritage Inc. and John P. Parker Historical Society trustee. "What would have happened to his foundry business, or his wife and seven children? The Underground Railroad was about choices. People had to decide whether they were going to dirty their reputations, or risk their livelihoods, to get involved."

Ripley's anti-slavery history has a different meaning for Jim Settles, pastor at Beebe Chapel CME Church. His great-grandfather, Joseph Settles, fled slavery in Maysville, Kentucky, and later settled in Ripley.

"I have great respect for my great-grandfather for having the courage to run, but also a great respect for those who chose to remain in slavery," Rev. Settles told me during a gathering of Ripley Heritage members at the Rankin House.

While not taking away from the work of conductors, Rev. Settles' comments reminded me that the Underground Railroad's greatest risk-takers were the fugitives themselves.

Eliza Harris is the most famous fugitive to pass through Ripley. With slave-catchers on her tail in February 1833, she dashed across the frozen Ohio River, young son in her arms. Her actions were later fictionalized in Uncle Tom's Cabin, the famous anti-slavery novel by Harriet Beecher Stowe.

A plaque dedicated to Eliza stands on Ripley's waterfront. The marker is near the former home of conductor Thomas McCague, currently owned by journalist Ann Hagedorn. Ms. Hagedorn penned Beyond the River, the only in-depth examination of the Ripley Underground Railroad line.

Above all, Ms. Hagedorn told me, the Ripley line was about "choice and trust." Conductors chose to break the law, aid fugitives and trust one another; fugitives chose to flee slavery and put their faith in conductors.

"(Conductors) scared people because they were standing up against the popular current. They're heroes today, but they were the fringe back then.

"They teach us that we have to be vigilant in guarding our democracy. Their actions forced a dialogue on the issue of slavery.

"I used to sit up in my room looking across the river and ask myself, 'If there was a knock on the door in the middle of the night, would I have risked answering it?' "

On my last evening in Ripley, I gathered with members of Ripley Heritage and watched the sun set on the Ohio River from Rankin's Hill. Mr. Campbell, a balding, middle-aged man in a striped shirt and large, tinted glasses, stood side-by-side with Rev. Settles, the affable minister dressed conservatively in a white shirt and tie.

Fittingly, the first was the descendant of a local abolitionist, the latter the descendant of a fugitive slave who chose to make Ripley home. They personify both sides of Ripley's tale.

When we returned to the riverfront, the night was silent, with the exception of waves lapping gently on the Ohio shore.

Legions of fireflies danced in the street, their flickering lights the only activity on a starlit landscape once dominated by conductors, slaves and slave-catchers.

"They were all tough characters -- they had to be," Mr. Campbell said of the town's abolitionists. "They were breaking the law to do what they believed was right. I just don't know if we could stand up to the same pressures today."

- Wednesday: The Town Where Vigilantes Roamed Streets
© The Ottawa Citizen 2006
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