Title: Autograph letter, signed giving a first-hand account of Christiana "Slave Riot"
Author: Fogle, David H. and Elizabeth A. Fogle
Description: 3 pp. + stampless leaf.To their brother, Jacob S. Fogle, Perry Township, Franklin County, Columbus Post Office [Ohio]: “…you may see it in your newspaper, it is called the Cristiana tregeday…5 or 6 weeks ago…" a party of slave holders came to the house where Isaac Morgan usto live"…" had a free black man living in the house, one or two others made there homes there, the[y] come to the place about Daylight, surrounded the house, got in and the blacks blowed horn, made alarm and some 75 or 100 collected some whites to see if lagel attority the[y] were ordered to asinst in taking them, the[y] refused to have anything to do with it but the blacks gathered thick they rushed on them and shot the slaveholder dead, his son vary bad and some other slightly, severls of the blacks was badly shot by the slaveholders party but the blacks clared the ground of all that could go. Edward Gorshck and son lay on the road, old man dead, son has recovered. the[y] have"…Casmer Hangway…in jail in Phillad.to stand the charge of treason…some men is out on bail of the same charge, the[y] made a read out of blacks, the[y] caught all the[y] could the rest has slide off…the[y] had a tried in Lancaster to see if guilty or not, there was over 2 hundred persons n the courthouse…" I was there the[y] sent a sumens for me in a letter by the post. I did not get it so"…" I was roused out of bed before day light by the authority of the comonweth. We had a yellow man living with us about aleaven months and the[y] have him along with the rest in"…" jail of the same charge, he was in my employ part of the time of that day but he left to go see the scrape when his wife sent for him"…you may think them going about taking up every coulerd man the[y] could find, dragging them to Cristiana there to be judged by a Marshel that swe[a]red to all that is brought before him. He is one of those that cannot degrade him self anymore, he is fit for the station he holds. You can see it in your papers…but the half is not true that…" nor the half is not told that is known"…” Sympathetic (if semi-literate) first-hand account of the “Christiana Riot” in Pennsylvania north of the Maryland border, an Underground Railroad stronghold where many fugitive slaves found refuge. Learning that Maryland slave-owner Edward Gorsuch was pursuing one of his slaves with a Federal warrant to “recover his property” by force, local residents, white and Black, took up guns to defend the slave. In the ensuing “battle”, Gorsuch was killed. Southerners demanded that all those responsible be hanged for treason and armed rebellion. 38 men were indicted and jailed, but only one, Castner Hanway, a white man, was brought to trial on November 15. After 15 minutes jury deliberation, he was acquitted, the government then dropping the case against the other defendants – hailed by Abolitionists as the first nationally-prominent challenge to the Fugitive Slave Law.
Heading: Place Published: Bart Township, Lancaster County, PA
Publisher:
Date Published: October 27, 1851

Mild to moderate yellowing and yellow spots, tiny tears at edges or folds; very good.