About Hudson Historical Underground Railroad Site

The Underground Railroad was not really an actual railroad but a network used by black Americans who were enslaved in the 30 years before the Civil War (1860-1865) to obtain their freedom. The network used many routes and sometimes, the routes were organized by people who opposed slavery (abolitionists). The underground railroad network was a series of small, individual actions done to help fugitive enslaved persons. They made use of railroad terminologies. “Pilots” were the people who went south to find enslaved people seeking freedom, “conductors” were the people who guided enslaved people to safety and freedom, “passengers” were the enslaved people, and finally “stations” were the homes or businesses of people where fugitive passengers and conductors could safely hide. As ownership of the house changed, stations were added or removed. Conductors and passengers were forced to find a new station whenever a new owner supported slavery, or the site was discovered to be a station. To protect homeowners and the fugitives who needed help, only very few people kept records about this secret activity. This is because passengers would be forced to return to slavery, if they are caught and people aiding the passengers would face arrest and jail.

David Hudson, the founder of Hudson town used his home as a station on the Underground Railroad as early as 1826. Owen Brown, an early settler in Hudson, was an Abolitionist and Underground Railroad stationmaster, and even his son John Brown, who lived in Hudson for twenty years, was also an abolitionist. Several private homes, churches and Quaker meeting houses in Hudson are also documented as part of the underground railroad network stations. Historians, however, believe that there was another mode of transportation — above-water steamships on the Hudson River. All these contributed to making Hudson a historical underground railroad site.