But like many northerners involved in the effort to help runaway slaves, known as the "Underground Railroad," he had never taken notes or kept records of those activities. His work for the Anti-Slavery Society had brought him into contact with fugitives before. William Still felt that he had discovered his life's calling. Tribute to Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad, by Sam Donovan, Philadelphia. Now here he was -Peter Still- meeting his youngest brother for the first time. The talented slave then made friends with two Jewish merchants who agreed to buy him, and secretly let him work for his freedom. One of them survived and was so bright and dependable that his owner hired him out to local shopkeepers. The boys were eventually sold to a plantation owner in Alabama. Still's parents were former slaves from Delaware who had been forced to leave behind two of their children when they managed to find freedom in New Jersey. But as William Still fidgeted impatiently behind his desk, he suddenly realized that the man sitting across from him was actually his brother. One excitable ex-slave from Alabama hardly compared to the importance of stopping the spread of slavery or preventing the passage of a new fugitive slave law. It was August 1850, and most anti-slavery activists were focused on the great national debate over slavery that was taking place in Congress. The older fugitive had an incredible story to tell, but the clerk was too busy to pay much attention. William Still was working as a clerk for the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society, when a former slave calling himself Peter Freedman turned up in his Philadelphia office. Front page of William Still’s The Underground Railroad, Philadelphia: Porter.
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