“Sailing Away to Freedom”

“Sailing Away to Freedom”. Gilpin Point. , Gilpin’s Point was one of the busiest wharves along the Choptank River in Caroline County where steamboats and sailing vessels transported people, timber, agricultural products, and seafood. It sat just upriver from Dr. Anthony C. Thompson’s plantation where Harriet Tubman’s parents lived and where Tubman herself conducted several of her most famous escapes. , Forty-year-old Joseph Cornish, a blacksmith and minister, was enslaved by Capt. Samuel W. LeCompte, USN, who worked him very hard. Joseph was married to a free woman and the father of five children. His struggle for freedom came at great personal cost. On December 8, 1855, Cornish most likely knew about the Underground Railroad network Harriet Tubman relied upon in Philadelphia and New York, when he started out from Cambridge on “foot for Gilpin’s Point, where he had heard there was a vessel about to sail.”, Joseph Cornish “worked his passage” to Baltimore, and then he made his way to UGRR agent William Still in Philadelphia on Christmas Day. From there, Cornish was rushed to agent Sydney H. Gay in New York City, who forwarded Cornish to St. Catherines, Ontario, Canada, where Harriet Tubman, and many others from Maryland’s Eastern Shore were cherishing their newfound freedom. , The Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Byway follows the Choptank River to Delmarva. Explore the 125-mile road and follow Tubman and others in their quest for freedom. Learn more about the byway at www.HarrietTubmanByway.org. Freedom Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Byway.