Nathaniel Booth (slave) facts for kids
Nathaniel Booth (born 1826, died 1901 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) was a brave African American man. He escaped from slavery to find freedom.
Escaping to Freedom
Nathaniel Booth was born into slavery in February 1826 on a large farm in Virginia. When he was 17 years old, Booth made a daring escape. He traveled north, hoping to find freedom.
Around 1844, he arrived in Lowell, Massachusetts. There, he started a new life and opened his own barbershop. In 1849, another man named Edwin Moore, who had also escaped slavery, joined Booth in his business.
Many African American barbers and hairdressers in New England were involved in abolitionism. This was a movement to end slavery. Their shops often became meeting places for people who wanted to stop slavery. Both Black and white abolitionists would gather there. They worked together to raise money, organize talks against slavery, and help other people who had escaped.
Facing Danger: Slave Catchers
In 1850, a new law called the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was passed. This law made it easier for slave owners to find and capture people who had escaped. Soon after, "slave catchers" were seen in Lowell. These were people hired to find and return escaped slaves.
Because of this danger, Nathaniel Booth had to flee again, this time to Canada. But the local Free Soil Party, a group against slavery, publicly asked Booth to come back to Lowell. They promised to protect him fully. One member even said he would "suffer death" rather than let an escaped slave be caught.
Booth returned to Lowell and stayed with the Walker Lewis Family. They were a free African American family who also worked to end slavery and were part of the Underground Railroad. The Underground Railroad was a secret network of safe houses and routes that helped slaves escape to freedom.
A year later, in 1851, slave catchers returned to Lowell. They found Booth and demanded he be sent back to his former owner. But Linus Child, a local mill manager, stepped in. He negotiated the price for Booth's freedom, lowering it from $1,500 to $750. Child then raised the money from the community to buy Nathaniel Booth's freedom.
As a free man, Booth continued to live and work in Lowell. In 1855, Massachusetts passed new Personal liberty laws. These laws made it very difficult to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act in the state. This action increased the tension between the northern and southern states.
Life After Freedom
In the late 1850s, Nathaniel Booth moved to Boston, Massachusetts. On a trip to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he met Frances 'Fanny' LeCount Johnson. She came from a well-known African American family.
Nathaniel and Fanny married in Philadelphia on August 24, 1858. In 1859, he returned to Boston with his wife and continued to run a barbershop. While living in Boston, Booth also provided a home for the Henry Williams' Family, who had escaped from slavery in Virginia.
After the Civil War ended, Nathaniel, Fanny, and their three oldest daughters moved back to Philadelphia. In Philadelphia, they had seven more children. Nathaniel Booth lived a full life as a free man and passed away in 1901.
See also
- History of slavery in Massachusetts
- List of African-American abolitionists
- List of enslaved people
- Caroline LeCount
