Читать книгу Quest Biographies Bundle — Books 31–35 - Rosemary Sadlier - Страница 13

Certainly the military was pleased with the efforts that Harriet Tubman had displayed. Her skillful teaching so that local women could learn a new trade in order to become self-sufficient; her nursing to keep the soldiers at their best and readiest; her recruitment of Confederate-owned enslaved Africans; her scouting so that not only key areas were destroyed, but also good use made of their stores of supplies. Then, in 1865, she was appointed to deal with some problems that arose in Washington, D.C. hospitals. At Fort Monroe, Virginia, she was appointed matron of the hospital. Her contribution was without a doubt useful and selfless. Harriet was so concerned about how others were feeling that she even gave up her stipend lest others feel she was being given special treatment. But it was not special treatment — she gave up her regular rations that she was entitled to as a soldier to avert any hostile or jealous feelings from others. This was what led her to bake pies and make ginger beer in the evenings so that these items could be sold by others while she continued to work on behalf of the government.

However, Harriet did accept the offer of good rates on the trains as supported in this letter from the Charles Wood collection:

From General Hunter, Headq’rs Dept’t of the South, Hilton Head, Port Royal, S.C.

Feb. 19, 1863

Pass the bearer, Harriet Tubman, to Beaufort, and back to this place, and wherever she wishes to go, and give her passage at all times on all Government transports. Harriet was sent to me from Boston, by Gov. Andrew, of Mass., and is a valuable woman. She has permission, as a warrant of the Government, to purchase such provisions from the commissary as she may need.

Harriet Tubman wanted to see her family, so with her government pass entitling her to pay half fare on the train, she retired from the hospital and headed for Auburn. Even though she had paid for a seat, her presence offended some of the other paying passengers. Her credibility was doubted — how could a black person have a government pass? The ticket taker and several men insulted Harriet, grabbed her, and threw her into the baggage compartment, badly hurting her arm. Harriet had survived the war only to receive her war injury on her way home. Her injury was to her person but also to her income, and considering that she had been a commander of about eight men in preparation for and during the battle on the Combahee, that she was fired upon and that she then performed more typical women’s work on top of that, she was entitled to a reasonable bit of compensation and respect. However, unknown to Harriet, at about the same time that she was being abused, William Lloyd Garrison, a white anti-slavery worker, was receiving $30,000 for his abolition work. Clearly, despite the 13th Amendment freeing the slaves in Union territory, the treatment and experience of blacks was still not fair or equitable.

Harriet Tubman’s derelict Auburn, New York, home, circa 1947.

Photograph by Ruth Putter.

In one example that was close to Harriet, her estranged husband, John, had an argument in 1867 with a white man named Rob Vincent in Dorchester County over some ashes. Rob threatened to kill John, and when the two happened to meet later in the day, Rob stopped his wagon, turned, and deliberately fired at and killed John before driving off. Two witnesses saw what occurred, one being John Tubman’s thirteen-year-old son. Rob was tried and found not guilty.

After her arrival in Auburn, Harriet tried to raise money for two freedmen’s schools in North Carolina, and asked wealthy supporters for donations, gave passionate presentations at meetings, and gave parties in order to help. To support herself, Harriet worked as a nurse, cooked, took care of children, raised chickens, grew vegetables for sale, and relied on the people of Auburn for ad hoc supplies. She would not have been in this position if she had fewer people living with her to care for. Her reputation was such that after the war, the injured, the impoverished, and the elderly, would show up at her home looking for assistance. Not willing to turn them away, she welcomed them, expanded her vegetable garden, and tried harder to seek donations from the wealthier class in town. She cared for up to twenty people, including her parents, her brother William Henry, Mary Ann’s son Harkless Bowley, and a grand-niece Eva Stewart.

Had Harriet received what she was entitled to for her work with the government, which she estimated to be $18,000 (blacks routinely were paid half of what whites would expect to receive), plus an additional amount for recruiting, she would have lived much more comfortably. Later, Harriet did receive some money from the sale of the Bradford book.

Harriet was surprised to meet Nelson Davis at her door one day. He claimed to have met Harriet in 1864 while he was a member of the 8th Coloured Infantry. He greatly admired Harriet, and though he was twenty years younger than Harriet and healthy looking, Nelson was unable to work because he had contracted tuberculosis. Harriet had a commitment to help her people and may have been flattered by his admiration or felt a need to protect him because he was sick. Maybe the two just fell in love. In any event, they were wed in Central Church, Auburn, on March 18, 1869. They lived together until Nelson finally succumbed to his tuberculosis and died in 1888.

Harriet Tubman received a letter from her old friend, Frederick Douglass, dated August 28, 1868. In this letter he acknowledges the lifelong nature of her sacrifice and work:

The difference between us is very marked. Most that I have done and suffered in the service of our cause has been in public, and I have received much encouragement at every step of the way. You, on the other hand, have labored in a private way. I have wrought in the day — you the night. I have had the applause of the crowd and the satisfaction of being approved by the multitude, while the most that you have done has been witnessed by a few trembling, scared, and foot-sore bondmen and women, whom you have led out of the house of bondage, and whose heartfelt “God bless you” has been your only reward. The midnight sky and the silent stars have been the witness of your devotion to freedom.

Harriet was able to purchase another property, 26 acres in 1896, adjacent to her Auburn home from the donations received from Auburn residents and from some of the proceeds of the Bradford book. It had two buildings already erected on it, was valued at $6,000, and had a mortgage of $1,700. Initially, Harriet had wanted to clear the property of debt and to open a home for girls, but as time passed, she hoped to be able to leave the property as a home for the aged. Harriet later deeded the property to the AME Zion Church of Auburn for this purpose. The Harriet Tubman Home for Aged and Indigent Colored People was incorporated in 1903 and formally opened in 1908. Harriet herself lived there for the last two years of her life. Currently, the AME Zion Church is still hoping to keep Harriet’s dream of a home for the aged and a meeting place for the young alive through public support.

In 1888, Congress passed an act giving the widows of Civil War veterans a pension of $8 a month. Harriet, now a widow, resubmitted her petition with the support of Secretary of State William Seward, Colonel T. W. Higginson, and General Rufus for payment for her three years of service as a nurse, cook, and scout commander, and received $20 per month, but she was still denied a full military pension of her own. Even to this day she remains the only woman and the only black woman to have planned and carried out an armed military action against enemy forces. Mr. F.B. Sanborn, secretary of the Massachusetts Board of State Charities and supporter of John Brown said, “… she has accomplished her purposes with a coolness, foresight, patience and wisdom, which in a white man would have raised him to the highest pitch of reputation.”

Her good reputation was once taken advantage of by men who wanted to profit at her expense. Harriet’s brother told her about a money-making plan he had heard about and hoped that with the influential contacts that Harriet had, a profitable venture could be undertaken. Harriet’s interest in doing as much as she could for the well-being of others was well known. Two black men claimed that they had been digging around a plantation and that they had found gold that had been hidden to keep it from being confiscated during the Civil War. It was a well known fact that valuables did have to be buried to keep them safe during the war. They wished to convert the gold into money and promised Harriet that she would receive a sizable portion for her aid. Harriet’s credibility was high, and she was quickly able to convince her supporters of the plan’s worth. She received $2,000 from Anthony Shimer and other Auburn contributors. At the appointed time, she set out with two others to exchange the money for the gold that was “understandably” too awkward to convert in the south where it had been found. Harriet was attacked, becoming separated from the others, and was forcibly bound and gagged. After all of this, neither gold nor money remained. Her dream of opening a home for black people seemed to be lost and her desperation to have adequate and surplus funds made her a victim for this unfortunate scheme.

Perhaps this incident reminded her of her own poverty and mortality, as Harriet Tubman had her last will and testament drawn up, and also met with the local authorities to again try to have her finances improved through her status as a widow. In her statement to C.G. Adams, clerk of the County Court of Cayuga County, New York, she said that she was now the widow of Nelson Davis. She indicated that they were married by Reverend Henry Fowler on March 18, 1869. She also said, “I never had any children nor child by the soldier nor by John Tubman.” She went on to indicate that “He [Nelson Davis] never had any other wife but me.” The affidavit, sworn by Harriet Tubman on November 10, 1894, was created at a time in Tubman’s life when she had been a widow for six years and was likely growing weary of trying to pull funds together all the time.

Harriet still remained active in the community. At over seventy-eight years of age, she was supporting the growth of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, though attending the white Central Church. She attended the National Association of Colored Women’s Conference and was invited to celebrate Queen Victoria’s 1897 birthday party in England. Harriet received a medal and a silk shawl from the Queen, which she treasured. A benefit party was given for her by the suffragettes of Boston, and Harriet used the money raised there, plus the proceeds from the sale of the second edition of her book and money from the citizens of Auburn, to purchase the lot of land next to her house. This became the Harriet Tubman Home for Aged and Indigent Negroes in 1908.