Henry Box Brown

Henry Brown was born into slavery around 1815 or 1816 in Louisa County, Virginia, and grew up to become a skilled worker in a Richmond tobacco factory. In August 1848 his wife, Nancy, and their children were sold and sent out of the state, and with nothing left to keep him in Richmond, he resolved to escape.

With the help of a free Black dentist, James C. A. Smith, and a white shoemaker, Samuel A. Smith, he devised an extraordinary plan: to ship himself north as cargo. In late March 1849 he was sealed into a wooden crate, about three feet long and two feet wide, marked 'dry goods' and 'this side up with care', and sent by the Adams Express Company to the office of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society in Philadelphia. Sources give the date as either 23 or 29 March.

The journey took about 26 hours by wagon, train and boat, and at times the box was turned upside down. When it was opened in Philadelphia, abolitionists found him alive. One of those present recalled that his first words were a polite 'How do you do, gentlemen?' He then sang a hymn he had composed in thanks.

Brown became a celebrity of the anti-slavery movement. He was nicknamed 'Box' at a Boston convention in May 1849, helped publish his Narrative that year, and in 1850 opened a moving panorama called Mirror of Slavery in Boston. After the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 made the North unsafe, he moved to England, where he lectured and performed for many years.

In his later life Brown worked as a performer, including as a magician and mesmerist, and eventually returned to the United States. He died in 1897. His friend Samuel Smith was arrested and convicted for trying to ship other people to freedom, a reminder of the risks his helpers took. Brown's escape remains among the best-known stories of the Underground Railroad, and today the Henry Box Brown story is commemorated in festivals, songs and art.