Rebecca Meyer
US 1 Honors
Mrs. Charest
February 14th
Rebellion methods used by slaves
During the time of slavery, slaves were often beaten and mistreated for the smallest of offenses. Although slaves were treated horribly by their masters, they learned to accommodate to their conditions to formulate a better life. Slaves rebelled in many ways; often, covert or public methods were used, but all efforts to rebel inspired change and impacted many people around the world. Some of the most common methods of rebellion used by slaves were covert; this was both one of the safest and most potentially dangerous categories of rebellion. The most well-known method was escape; no matter where slaves were or what part of the transport journey they were on, numbers of them always tried to escape. The fleeing of
…show more content…
When slaves ran away, they were extra cautious, as the punishment for slaves attempting to escape could leave them at the very edge of death. In order to create a safer path for slaves, the Underground Railroad was created. The Underground Railroad offered checkpoints or safe houses along a slave's road to freedom. People known as "conductors" helped guide the slaves to stations operated by stationmasters. Participants on the Underground Railroad risked serious punishment or even death if they were caught. The high stakes required the utmost secrecy from all members; there were no records of safehouse directors or the locations; all knowledge was spread by word of mouth or code. Christian songs written by African Americans recurrently contained codes on the whereabouts of safe houses. In the Americas, African slaves would sometimes braid their hair into intricate patterns that encoded messages and maps regarding