To Free a Family: The Journey of Mary Walker

Sydney Nathans

2012

Harvard University Press

To Free a Family: The Journey of Mary Walker

Nathans, history professor emeritus, tells the remarkable story of Mary Walker, who in August 1848 fled her owner for refuge in the North and spent the next seventeen years trying to recover her son and daughter. Her freedom, like that of thousands who escaped from bondage, came at a great price—remorse at parting without a word and a fear for her family's fate.