ED]' BOARD OH/0 1/ALLEY 1-ORIAI. H/.7'ORY STAFF Compton Allyn Christine L..Heyrman joseph R Reidy Cilicimial,Mitset, Ce,iter University of Delatiwre Howard University Editors in Hist<,ry Advisciry Board Wayne K. Durrill 1. Blaine Hudson Steven J. Ross Christopher Phillips Stephen Arcm Umveysity f I,oliiSttlle University of Solitbeni Department of History University of alifornia(: alif)r),ta R. Douglas j [ Uitiversity of Cinci,inali at Los Anee/es urt ivt: Shite Unit, ersity Harry N. Scheiber Joan E. Cashi„ University of California Managing Editors james C. Klotter Berkeley Jennifer Reiss Obio Slate University it Filst),Historic,11 Sticiely j'be. 1 Andrew R. 1..Cayton Steven M. Stowe Bruce Levine Miami Unit,ersity Imbiia Uitiyersffy Ruby Rogers University of California Center Cilicinnati Mliseum R. David lidmunds tt Salita Crut Roger D. Tate University rif Texas D,dias Somerset Con,jilifitity at Zane L. Miller Editorial Assistant College Kelly Wright Ellen T. Eslinger University of C.inciniliti DePaill University joe W. Trotter,Jr. Depaytment of History Elizabeth A. Perkins Uiliversity of Cincinnati Pri,exie Mellon Univenity Craig T Friend Ck,/tre College Universityf <, entral(: Florida Altina Waller james A. Ramage U„ii,eysily f<)Collnectielft Nortber„Kentlicky University THI: Fll, HISTORIC: CINCINNATI Mus'EUM CENTER SON A[ SOC'[ BOARD DIRECTORS BoARD OF TRUSTEES 1 1-Y OF Chair Helen Black Laura Long President Ted Steinbock H. C:.Buck Niehoff David Bohl Steven R. I.ove Dr.It. Ronald Brown D. Craig Maier President Past Chair Vice- Otto M. Budig,Jr. Kevin W.Mooney Valerie [..Newell Emily S. Bingham Brian Carley Slicn:in R Murphy Vice Chairs Richard 0. C:oleman Scott Robertson Secretary-Treasurer Keli [. Ormsby owe Bob Coughlin Elizabeth York Schiff Henry Greg Kenny Diane l..Dewbrey Steve C. Steinman Director Ronald 7'ysoe Martind R. Dunn Merrie Stewart Stillpass Mark V. Wetherington Jane Garvey Jane (; lohn T.Taylor arvey furney P.Berry 77 Charles 1.[-Gerhardt, III james L.Turner easurer Sandra A. Frazier Dee Gettler H. Vincent William C. Porrman. Ill corge Michael N. Harreld Leslie Hardy Charles Westheimer Secretary J. Blaine Hudson R. Keith Ilarrison Jennifer R Mooney Daniel H. Jones John W. Hauck Margaret Barr Kulp President and CF.0 Mark J. [I. iuser Thomas T. Noland, Jr. McDonald illglass W. Timothy 1 Hoberg Barbara Rodes Robinson Rober[ E Kis[inger Vice President of Museums Nicholas X. Simon John E. Fleming J. Walker Stites,III Dace Brown Stubbs David Y.Wood Ronald R. Van Stockum, Jr. bio Valley History (ISSN Society, 1.31(}S. Third Street. Department o!1 11!tory, subscriprion To Ohio Valley of Cincinnari. Himiry. Back issues 8.00. 746-3472) is published in ILouisville, Kentucky·,40208. University are $ Cenwrand For information „ Cinchin.iti. Ohio. and Editorial Oifices located ar Cincinnari Museum more n 1.ouisville, Kennicky,by the Universiry of Cincinnati. The Filson I hstc,rical Society.are Cincinnati Museum Center, Cincinnici Museum Center alid Cincinnati, Ohio,45211-0373. privare non-profit organizations including membership,visit The FAson Historical Society. Contact the editorial offices ar suppixted almost entirely by www,cincymliseum.orK or call gifts, mhips, 513-287-7000 1-800-7.33-2077. PeriO lical( postage paid at [email protected] or grants, spons< or durrilwk@ 2 1. edu. admission and membership fees. 1:or more information on 1-he Cincinnati. Ohio,with ali eiii.3 Lic. Obio Valley History is Memberships of Cincinnati Filson 111:corical Society, additim.il entrl Lc,Liisville, a of - including membership.visit Kentucky. collaboration 1-he Filson Hist<,ry Museum al ltici!( inati IPostmaster send addres. Historical Society.Cincinnati Museum Ccnrcr or Thc Fils(in www.filsonhistorical. org or call and the Historical Socierv include 502-635.5083. changes to Thc Filson Hisrorical Museum inte( a Tbe 9„cicty 2003. © C In<-: in,1,71& Mlise,im inter(.' i,/,„ Fi/s,;n Histon<,1/ . OHIO VA I. 1..EY HISTORY OHIO VALLEY HISTORY Volume 3, Number 2, Summer 2003 A Journal of the History and Culture of the Ohio Valley and the Upper South, published in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Louisville, Kentucky,by Cincinnati Museum Center and The Filson Historical Society,Inc. Contents Beyond the Quest for the Real" Eliza Harris": Fugitive Slave Women in the Ohio Valley Keith Griffler 3 Family Ties, Party Realities, and Political Ideology: George Hunt Pendleton and Partisanship in Antebellum Cincinnati Thomas Macb 17 Christ Unchained: African American Conversions during the Civil War Era Dan Fountain 31 Liberty on the Border: A Civil War Exhibit James Ramage 47 Cover: Cincinnati from The Zoar Community: A Review of Ohio Covington,Kentucky, an Historical Site ca.1851, by Robert S. Mitchell Snay 51 Ducanson Oil( on canvas An). African American artist, Ducanson painted this Reviews 55 impressive panorama from an illustration, changing two of tbe Upcoming Events 66 white figures in tbe illustration to slaves. Cincinnati Museum Center SUMMER 2003 1 Contributors KEITH GRIFFLER is Assistant Professor of African Arnerican History in the Department of African American Studies at the University of Cincinnati. His second book, Wade in tbe Water: Tbe Underground Railroad and African American Freedom in tbe Obio Valley, is forthcoming from the University Press of Kentucky. He is co-producer on a public television documentary of the same name,supported in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's National Black Programming Consortium. THOMAS S. MACH is Associate Professor of History at Cedarville University,specializing in U. S. nineteenth-century political history. He is currently completing a biography of Cincinnatian George Hunt Pendleton, the father of the first major federal civil service reform legislation in United States history. DAN FOUNTAIN teaches history at the Louisiana School for Math, Science, and the Arts. He earned his Ph.D. in early American history from the University of Mississippi where he completed his dissertation under the direction of Winthrop Jordan. JAMES A. RAMAGE is Regents Professor of History at Northern Kentucky University. He is the author of Rebel Raider:Tbe I.ife of General Jobn Hunt Morgan Lexington: University Press of Kentucky,1986) and Gray Ghost:The Life of Col.Jobn Singleton Mosby Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1999).He is currently writing a biography of Ulysses S. Grant. MITCHELL SNAY is Professor of History at Denison University. He is the author of Gospel of Disunion:Religion and Separatism in tbe Antebellum South New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993). HISTORY 2 OHIO VALLEY Beyond the Quest for the Real Eliza Harris": Fugitive Slave Women ill tbe Obio Valley KEITH GRIFFLER I was not that of Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, or Josiah Henson. that of Eliza fictional character HarrietfugitiveBeecherfromStowe'slavery It thenineteenth Harris,the best-known inof n was century, a story a s, Uncle Tom' Cabin. In s that runaway bestseller,the most widely read work of the abolitionist movement, a young enslaved woman named Eliza flees her Kentucky home on the southern shore of the Ohio River and makes a daring escape across the frozen surface, already broken up into floating cakes of ice, to Ohio, where abolitionists con- gained duet her to Canada. Millions of Americans and Europeans UNCLE TON'S CABIN; their introduction to the antebellum network for aiding fugitive slaves, the Underground Railroad,through Stowe's work. Eliza LIFE AMONG TILE LO\\'I.Y. Harris became something of a symbol for what was, in Victorian terms, labeled the panting" fugitive."' BY The of IIARRIET BEECIIER STOKE. success Uncle Tom's Cabin, though no doubt gratify- the conductors"" the Underground Railroad, might ing K4bb-#'- to on 'Sf,„T. AR- also have been just a little frustrating. The real heroes of the drama that played out north of slavery's border were all but un- known to a public that took so much interest in mere figments of Stowe's imagination. Left out of the memory of a clandestine operation that was on the way to achieving legendary propor- tions, they would be faced with the somewhat peculiar task of f.:4 VOL. IT. reclaiming a central role in an enterprise they had created and tr es*HUNDRED BOSTON:AND TnEX.,1.TlfCUSAN. - nourished.2 py JOHN P. JEWETT &COMPANY * Nothing better demonstrates this dominance of what the his- Clor CI, '-Ef,AN ])I t)1!It): torian Larry Gara has called the legend" of the Underground 0 Railroad"over the actual entity than the quest for the identity of the real"" Eliza Harris. Harriet Beecher Stowe herself inadvert- ently set off this strangest of historical preoccupations a couple Uncle Tom' Key Uncle Title page of s of after the publication of her classic with the follow-up to Cabin by Harriet Beecber Tom'yearsCabin. s Under attack by proslavery forces for inventing a caricature of stowe. Tbe Filson Historical Society slave life,she provided a detailed volume purporting to be the" original facts and documents under which the story is founded."Within the work, she included a reference to the Eliza Harris escape story as mirroring an actual SUMMER2003 BEYOND THE QUEST FOR THE "REAL ELIZA HARRIS" occurrence,and the search for the real"" Eliza was on. Given license by the author,such Underground Railroad notables as William Mitchell, Levi Cof- fin,John Parker,and a son of Rev.John Rankin would include her story in their memoirs, finding themselves compelled to claim insider knowledge of the real"" Eliza to prove their Underground Railroad mettle. ; Perhaps predictably,almost all of these com- mentators pretending to be in the know about 22 the real"" Eliza KEY TO UNCLE TOM'S CABIN. stuck to the details of her story dent which brought the original to her punch as he did so, yc" and her provided by Stowe, venient at all ints aloi person even notice may be simply narrated.