Black women who fought the fight: Harriet Tubman!

 "And then we saw the lightning

and that was the guns.

 And then we heard the thunder

and that was the big guns.

 And then we heard the rain falling

and that was the drops of blood falling.

 And when we came to get the crops

it was dead men that we reaped."

Harriet's description of the war.

Harriet Tubman: A humanitarian activist, an abolitionist, an armed spy of the union Army.(1820 to 1913).

Tubman was born into slavery by her slave parents. She later escaped from the plantation where she served as a slave. She began on a mission rescuing more than 70 slaves using the antislavery network.
In 1849, she escaped to Philadelphia. She later returned to Maryland to rescue her family and relatives one after another. Tubman eventually led dozens other slaves to freedom. When the fugitive slave law was passed by the southern dominated congress in 1850, ordering law officials to help recapture slaves, Tubman, led the run away slaves further into Canada where slavery had been prohibited.

During the American civil war, Harriet Tubman employed by Edward Brodess worked  as a cook and nurse, then as an armed Scout and spy for the Union Army. Making her the first woman to lead an armed expedition in the war. During this time, Tubman helped in an operation that led to the liberation of more than 700 more slaves in South Carolina.

Harriet also known as Moses, was actively involved in The women's suffrage movement in New York. She travelled severally to Boston and places to speak out  for the voting rights of women. She sited her efforts and services, with sacrifices of other women during and after the war as an evidence of women's equality with men.

At her retirement, she headed home to Auburn New York to care for her aged parents.  Until 1899, Tubman did not receive any pensions for her services keeping her in a state of poverty, coupled with her not receiving a regular salary during her service time. Due to her unofficial status, it became extremely difficult to have her services documented and the US government was no better.They were slow in recognising their debts to her. At some point, she had to sell a cow to buy ticket for her travel to an event organised in her honour in recognition of her services to the nation.

Towards the end of her life, she lived in a home for the African- American women which she was a co-founder. She later died on the 10th of March,1913 at the age of 93. Cause of her death was said to be pneumonia. PEARLWOMAN!


For more on Tubman: http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/bradford/menu.html,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_North_Carolina_at_Chapel_Hill,
http://www.tubmanmuseum.com/