What were the routes of the Underground Railroad?

There were many well-used routes stretching west through Ohio to Indiana and Iowa. Others headed north through Pennsylvania and into New England or through Detroit on their way to Canada.



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In the 1700 and 1800s, major rivers were known as Freedom Roads, and if you explore the Roanoke River in Halifax County, you'll find pieces of the Underground Railroad's history still standing today.

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While most of the buildings in the Village of Mt. Pleasant Historic District are private, the Mt. Pleasant Historical Society offers Underground Railroad walking tours which include tours of several houses within the district.

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Contrary to popular belief, the Underground Railroad was not a series of underground tunnels! While some people did have secret rooms in their houses or carriages, the vast majority of the Underground Railroad was people, like Harriet Tubman, secretly helping enslaved people seeking freedom however they could.

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The Underground Railroad was the network used by enslaved black Americans to obtain their freedom in the 30 years before the Civil War (1860-1865). The “railroad” used many routes from states in the South, which supported slavery, to “free” states in the North and Canada.

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The world's first underground railway opened in London in 1863, as a way of reducing street congestion.

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7 Facts About the Underground Railroad
  • The Underground Railroad was neither underground nor a railroad. ...
  • People used train-themed codewords on the Underground Railroad. ...
  • The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 made it harder for enslaved people to escape. ...
  • Harriet Tubman helped many people escape on the Underground Railroad.


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That honor instead goes to Haiti, the first nation to permanently ban slavery and the slave trade from the first day of its existence.

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Did Colson Whitehead base The Underground Railroad on a true story? In Whitehead's own words, his novel seeks to convey “the truth of things, not the facts.” His characters are all fictional, and the book's plot, while grounded in historical truths, is similarly imagined in episodic form.

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