Letter from Thomas H. Jones to Daniel Foster, July 15, 1852

Thomas H. Jones to Daniel Foster, 15 July 1852

Thomas H. Jones

FROM C. Peter Ripley et al., eds., The Black Abolitionist Papers, vol. 2, Canada, 1830-1865 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1986), 212-4. Reproduced by permission of the publisher.
This letter originally appeared in The Liberator, 13 August 1852.

Flights to freedom frequently separated fugitive slaves from their families. After reaching safety, many refugees went about the difficult task of freeing those left behind. Some fugitives returned south to spirit away their loved ones, thereby enlarging the mystique of the underground railroad. Others tried to purchase the freedom of their family members and sought the assistance of the abolitionist community with that process. Thomas H. Jones's 15 July 1852 letter informed Massachusetts abolitionist Daniel Foster, his friend and benefactor, about his efforts to purchase his son out of slavery. Jones had left Edward, his eldest son, behind when he escaped from slavery in North Carolina in 1849. During early 1852, Edward's owner informed Mary Jones, Thomas's wife, that the son could be purchased for $850 if the money could be raised quickly. Mary Jones immediately sought funds in the Boston area, while Thomas Jones solicited contributions in the Maritime Provinces. By the time that Jones wrote to Foster, they had collected $324. But subsequent contributions came in slowly. Thomas Jones considered a fund-raising tour of England that never materialized; he continued to collect donations in the Maritimes and New England through 1854, selling copies of his slave narrative, The Experience of Thomas Jones (1854), as part of the effort. Sources: Jones The Experience of Thomas Jones, 33-43 [8:0551-56]; Lib [The Liberator], 18 August 1854.

Scholarly and bibliographic notes from The Black Abolitionist Papers.

Some bibliographic citations reference the microform edition of the The Black Abolitionist Papers which was published by Microfilming Corporation of America. Square brackets contain the reel number, a colon, and then the frame number, of the microfilm edition where there citation can be found: [reel #: frame #]

1. Jones refers to Robert F. Walcutt (1797-1884), who was born on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, and educated at Harvard, where he was a member of the famous "abolition class" of 1817. Walcutt briefly served as pastor to a Cape Cod Unitarian congregation but was dismissed for his antislavery views. A lifelong friend and associate of William Lloyd Garrison, Walcutt joined the New England and American antislavery societies and adopted Garrison's nonresistance and anti-Sabbatarian views. From 1846 until 1865, Walcutt was the general agent for the Liberator, a position that made him one of antislavery's most important administrators. Wendell Phillips Garrison and Francis Jackson Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison, 1805-1879: The Story of His Life, 4 vols. (New York:N.Y., 1885-89), 1:213, 2:209, 236-37, 422, 3: 221, 353, 481, 4: 58, 137, 306; Merrill and Ruchames, Letters of William Lloyd Garrison, 3:342-43, 516, 531-32, 598, 4:37, 64, 199, 206, 263, 275, 305, 433.

Thomas H. Jones to Daniel Foster, 15 July 1852

Thomas H. Jones

FROM C. Peter Ripley et al., eds., The Black Abolitionist Papers, vol. 2, Canada, 1830-1865 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1986), 212-4. Reproduced by permission of the publisher.This letter originally appeared in The Liberator, 13 August 1852.

Scholarly and bibliographic notes from The Black Abolitionist Papers.

Titles by Thomas H. Jones

FROM C. Peter Ripley et al., eds., The Black Abolitionist Papers, vol. 2, Canada, 1830-1865 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1986), 212-4. Reproduced by permission of the publisher.
This letter originally appeared in The Liberator, 13 August 1852.