S TR AW B ERRY D N H R O IL C L N 25 R O GREAT MEADOWS 26 D C . BA R P P N H E E R S HILL T T PA E S ER’S E PET C R M 28 O S 4 O 2 T P N R T I approx. 1/4 mile 31 . LIBERTY ST. U N R D M D L R G D. MIL LO E R S N 29 UNDERGROUND ETT W R T RAILROAD STOPS BAR E L L S R T D . 30 Incorporated 1635 Incorporated 33 4 TO 341 VIRGINIA ROAD THOREAU BIRTHPLACE HOUSE BEDFORD ST.27 1 3 2 5 . RT. 2 32 7 6 23 MAIN ST 9 10 15 8 10 ELM ST. MAIN ST. 22 14 11 . 21 16 L N RD 18 EX INGTO IN EX H 19 17 GT L . ON RD. A T W S . D 12 T T H N S O AI STOW ST. O 4 0 TO M O 13 W R DAMON N Y E MILL E CONCORD TPK. H SUDBURY RD. CAMBRIDGE TPK. L N . HUBBARD ST. RD THOREAU ST. O O R WALDEN ST. BO L L D R A R EVERETT ST. M O D A RT. 2 L D LAUREL ST. O K T OO O TOWN FOREST BR ’S N 20 N I A N G U E FAIRYLAND A D 38 POND C I E N R G N E IN JE R C SP O ’S R R E N T IS E R 9 NUT MEADOW R 3 34 B CROSSING SUDBURY RD. FAIRHAVEN RD. 35 JENNIE DUGAN BRISTERS HILL RD. RD. CONCORD TPK. HORE T AU’S PATH POWD RT. 2 ERMILL RD. 37 THOREAU’S R T CABIN . 1 2 36 WHITE 6 POND WALDEN POND CONCORD VILLAGE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD STOPS No 1 TOWN CENTER No 2 LEXINGTON ROAD 5 John Jack’s Grave - Old Burying Ground, Monument Square (1635) Born in Africa, John Jack was enslaved until his early forties, when 1 Town Hall - Monument Square his owner died. John Jack worked various jobs saving enough money 8 Robertson James House - 70 Lexington Rd. The first Europeans transported enslaved persons with them to buy 8.5 acres of land. He was the first former enslaved person to In 1860, author Henry James’ teenage brothers Garth when they incorporated Concord in 1635. Bills of sale of Africans purchase land in Concord (see #25). Before his death in 1773, John Wilkinson “Wilky” and Robertson “Bob” James were sent were also accessible in town records. These records are currently Jack bequeathed land to his female partner, who was forced to turn to Frank Sanborn’s school, where they were influenced by housed in Special Collections at the Concord Free Public Library. the land over to her white master. Daniel Bliss, Esq., a local Tory from Sanborn’s ardent abolitionism. Two years later, Wilky served 2 Old Jail site a slaveholding family composed an epitaph for John Jack that in the 54th regiment and Bob enlisted in the 55th regiment Thoreau spent the night in jail for failure to pay a poll tax in castigated local Patriots for calling themselves Britain’s slaves even – the 2 black Civil War regiments in Massachusetts. In 1892, protest against the war with Mexico and the potential spread as they, themselves, were slaveholders. artist Roberston James returned to Concord where he used of slavery. He later wrote the book Civil Disobedience. 6 Concord Art Association/Owned by Jonas Lee, State this home as a studio, and died here in 1910. Wayside - 455 Lexington Rd. (ca. 1714) 3 Mary Rice House - 44 Bedford St. (ca. 1840) Representative in early 19th C. - 37 Lexington Rd. 9 Home to Samuel Whitney, muster master of the Concord Mary Rice was a station master on the Underground Railroad Has been recognized as an official stop on the Underground Railroad. Minutemen in 1775, and his enslaved man Casey Feen. In who helped replace and regularly put flowers on John Jack’s You can see a closet inside believed to have been used to hide the woods to the left of the Wayside, Casey’s plaque states, grave. Along with Mary Peabody Mann, Mary Rice gathered enslaved people on their way to freedom, with a displayed fork and candle snuffer found in the closet. In the backyard, on the right, is “In 1775, Casey was Samuel Whitney’s enslaved person. 195 school children’s signatures on a petition to President When the Revolutionary war came, he ran away to war, Lincoln, asking him to free slave children. Copies of this petition the opening to a tunnel or hiding place also thought to have been used by escaped slaves. fighting for the colonies, and returned to Concord a free and Lincoln’s response now hang in Concord’s 3 public man.” When the Alcotts lived here from 1845-48, according elementary schools. 7 First Parish Church - 20 Lexington Rd. to the plaque to the right of the house, “The Wayside 4 Sleepy Hollow Cemetery - Bedford St. (1823) Commonly used for public discourse on slavery in the 1800’s. Many sheltered two self-emancipated slaves during the winter Both Peter Hutchinson (descendent of former slaves) and famous self-emancipated enslaved persons, such as Harriet Tubman of 1846-47 as they fled north to freedom in Canada. A young Prudence Ward (abolitionist) are buried here. The Thoreaus, and Frederick Douglass, gave speeches there. Many Middlesex County Louisa May Alcott learned first hand lessons about slavery Emersons and Alcotts are buried on Author’s Ridge. Antislavery Society meetings were held at the church. here that would influence her life and writing.” 10 Alcott ‘Orchard’ House - 399 Lexington Rd. The Alcotts were dedicated abolitionists. It’s possible that o they hid escaped enslaved people at the Orchard house, N 3 ABOLITIONISTS NEIGHBORHOOD where they lived from 1857-77. They held antislavery meetings here, hosted a huge reception for John Brown the raid on Harper’s Ferry. Sanborn ran a school with Mary Mann and the “regular anti-slavery set”, gave John Brown’s 2 15 Concord Free Public Library - 129 Main St. (also an abolitionist, see #3), and after Brown was hanged for the daughters a home after John was hanged for his raid on Repository of the original documents telling of Concord’s Harper’s Ferry raid, Brown’s daughters moved to Concord in 1860 Harper’s Ferry, and the Alcott girls organized a play to raise antislavery efforts and earliest African and African American and attended Sanborn’s school. money for the Concord Antislavery Society. residents. Original site of Mary Merrick Brook’s House (see #17). 20 Abiel Heywood Wheeler House - 387 Sudbury Rd. (ca.1829-35) 11 Benjamin Barron House - 245/249 Lexington Rd. 16 Bigelow/Shadrach Minkins House - 19 Sudbury Rd. (ca. 1840-50) Abiel Heywood Wheeler transported escaping slaves to train Here the enslaved person John Jack purchased his freedom An important haven on the Underground Railroad: one enslaved connections. as a shoemaker. His epitaph in the Old Hill Burying Ground man the Bigelows assisted was Shadrick Minkins, an escaped 21 Thoreau House - 255 Main St. (ca. 1820) is world famous (see #5). slave working in Boston who was captured for return to Virginia The entire Thoreau family was instrumental in the antislavery 12 Concord Museum - 200 Lexington Rd. after the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act. Vigilance Committee member movement. It was here that Thoreau wrote about lodging Through original artifacts associated with Thoreau, Emerson Lewis Hayden lead the crowd that rescued Minkins from his self-emancipated slave Henry Williams and putting him on a train to and other antislavery activists, the Museum galleries hearing in Boston, and brought him to the Bigelows at 3 am on Canada in his Journal, 10/1/1851. examine the concept of liberty and the ability of individuals February 16, 1851, on his way to Canada, where Minkins became 22 Col. William Whiting House - 169 Main St. (ca. 1800-10) to affect change. a restaurant owner and barber. Col. Whiting was vice president of the state Antislavery Society, and 13 Emerson House - 28 Cambridge Turnpike 17 Brooks House - 45 Hubbard St. (ca. 1740) sheltered runaway enslaved people as an active participant in the Ralph Waldo Emerson was an abolitionist who was A slave-owner’s daughter, Mary Merrick Brooks was Underground Railroad. Abolitionists William Lloyd Garrison (who persuaded to speak out publicly by his wife Lydia, his Aunt undoubtedly Concord’s leading abolitionist, and sold her published the antislavery newspaper The Liberator), Wendell Phillips Mary and his friend Mary Brooks. He supported the signature ‘Brooks Cake’ to raise money for the cause. Her house and John Brown were all guests in this house. controversial abolitionist John Brown. was moved 23 Samuel Hoar House - 158 Main St. (ca. 1810/1819) 14 Reuben Brown House - 77 Lexington Rd. from the Concord Free Public Library site to 45 Hubbard Street One of Concord’s leading politicians and chair of the Free Soil Party When Ralph Waldo Emerson had too many visitors to fit in in 1872, and was originally the Black Horse Tavern. (opposed to expansion of slavery into western territories), Samuel his home, he put them up at the Reuben Brown House. In 1857, one such visitor was the fiery abolitionist John Brown. Trinitarian Congregational Church - 54 Walden St. Hoar was a moderate senator sent to South Carolina to protest the 18 Two years later John Brown led the attack on the federal Reverend John Wilder regularly invited abolitionists to speak arrest of Massachusetts African American seamen who were jailed arsenal at Harper’s Ferry.