an inspiration for Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom
Josiah Henson and his family risked starvation, exposure, and recapture and walked from Kentucky to Ohio. Native Americans assisted the struggling family, as did sympathetic boatmen who ferried them safely across Lake Erie. Once in Ontario, Canada, Henson took an active role in organizing a self-sufficient community. His story helped alert his contemporaries to the horrors and heartbreak of slavery. His story was originally published in 1849.
