Runaway plan

 

Alarming—A well formed and extensive plan to aid the negroes in running away from their masters, was detected in Boone county, Kentucky, Thursday of last week.—It appears that some abolitionists from Cincinnati had visited the negroes in the fields, and induced them to enter into an agreement that they would runaway from their masters on Saturday night last—the abolitionists promising to receive them on the other side of the river, and send them to Canada.

A negro woman near Florence, who was taken sick on Thursday, and who was fearful her husband would go without her, told her master of the arrangement, and informed him that all the negroes between Florence and Covington, had agreed to run away on Saturday night. The alarm was immediately given, and thus the intentions of the negroes where defeated, and the plans of their wicked advisers, the abolitionists, frustrated. Six negroes however, whose master lives off the road between Florence and Covington, and who did not hear of the plat, made their escape, and are probably ere this in Canada.

On searching the negro quarters in the neighborhoods around, it appears every preparation had been made for their journey. Stolen goods were found packed up with their clothes, and other things were brought to light which showed that the plan was well arranged and extensively entered into, and would have been effectually carried into execution had it not been fortunately divulged by the sick negro woman.

The wicked machinations of the abolitionists have in this instance been defeated; but this defeat will not discourage them it will but stimulate them to renewed exertions and more desperate attempts. We would seriously advise all to be on their guard—to keep a sharp look out, and closely observe the movements of the negroes. If one of them gets across the river and reaches Cincinnati, it is impossible to recover him. The abolitionists there have every convenience for secreting him and for sending him to Canada.

 

from the Warsaw Patriot, Nov. 2, as reprinted in Paris’s Western Citizen, November 16, 1838