Jersey City’s Underground Railroad
Jersey City’s Underground Railroad
It is said of the 100,000 former slaves and enslaved African Americans that traveled the Underground Railroad, between 50,000 - 70,000 came through Jersey City; the location where all routes converged providing access to freedom via New York City, New England, and Canada.
They were driven, hidden in wagons, to the Jersey City waterfront at the Morris Canal basin where abolitionists hired ferry boats and coal boats to take the fleeing slaves across the Hudson River, called the "River Jordan,".
Although so many came through Jersey City, the truth is that most of them continued elsewhere. The majority of Jersey City residents at the time were against the abolitionist movement, influenced by wealthy business owners and politicians - one very such man, an owner of a profitable slave-trading business. In fact, New Jersey was the last state in the North to abolish slavery and was commonly referred to as a piece of the south up north.
Jersey City’s Underground Railroad Safe Houses
It was the “stations” or safe houses scattered throughout Jersey City that helped usher former slaves to safety by way of the Hudson River. They traveled by foot and by covered wagon, moving under the cover of night. They sought refuge in cellars, and they relied on strangers for support.
For fear of arrest, safe houses were kept completely secret and prevented many from coming forward. While we’ll never know how many safe houses there actually were throughout Jersey City, we’re honoring the ones we know-
Dr. Henry D. Holt, a physician, former clerk of the Common Council of Jersey City, and an Editor of the Jersey City Advertiser and Bergen Republican who's home at 134 Washington St. on the Morris Canal Basin was a depot on the Underground Railroad. Holt wrote articles decrying the inhumanity of slavery.
Thomas Vreeland Jackson and John Vreeland Jackson were slaves on the estate of the Vreeland family in Greenville. They were freed between 1828 and 1830 and became oystermen on the Hudson River. In 1831, they bought land in the Greenville area on Newark Bay, the same year the Morris Canal Company purchased a portion of their land to construct the canal. From their home that served as a station, they helped numerous slaves escape. The Hudson Bergen Light Railroad, on Martin Luther King Drive, was renamed in their honor -Jackson Square.
Located in Bergen-Lafayette, the Hilton-Holden House at 59 or 79 Clifton Place, is the only safe house that still standing today. Professor Edward Holden was a colonel in the US Army and trained Union soldiers in the area for the Civil War. A director of the Lick Observatory and the Washington Observatory, Edward Holden installed an observatory on the top of his home for his work and lager used it as a way to signal when it was safe to pass. The cellar of his mansion was a refuge for fugitive slaves. Holden served as president of the Board of Education and as an alderman under John Hilton the first mayor of the City of Bergen, now Jersey City.
