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"I prayed for freedom for 20 years, but received no answer until I prayed with my legs."
Frederick Douglass

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Harrison County, Indiana Newspaper Clippings
Contributed by Marsha Belty
April 2005

The Bell family assists runaway Slaves
A runaway slave making his way north to freedom in Canada could borrow a set of "freed papers" from another black to faciliate passage. Court records reveal litigation pertaining to runaway slaves and person who helped them escape on the Underground Railroad, hiding them by day and moving them by night.     One such incident that could have triggered the Civil War several years earlier involved the David Bell family of Harrison County. The Bells resided at Morvin Landing on the Ohio River, opposite Brandenburg, Ky. The Bells were supposed to have aided slaves in their escape from Meade County.          Urged on by irate Kentucky slave owners, Kentucky officials arrested David Bell and his son Charles and lodged them at the Bradenburg jail. The legal battle that ensued and the daring rescue of the prisoners by David'ss other sons Horace and John make exciting reading. This incident is covered in Volume I, pp. 78 to 91, of  "The Life of Walter Q. Gresham."
 

 

Report of Slaves Sold