William Parker’s War on Slave Catchers

Summary

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HISTORY This Week: "William Parker’s War on Slave Catchers"

Original Air Date: March 30, 2026
Host: Sally Helm | The HISTORY® Channel | Back Pocket Studios

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Episode Overview

This episode delves into the extraordinary story of William Parker, an escaped slave who became a key figure in organized Black self-defense against slave catchers in pre-Civil War America. Centering on the 1851 Christiana Resistance in Pennsylvania, the episode explores Parker's journey from enslavement to freedom, his formation of the Lancaster Black Self Protection Society, and the pivotal confrontation that pushed the country closer to civil war. Through first-person accounts, expert commentary, and historical context, listeners learn how Parker and his allies fought for their liberty and, in doing so, shifted the national conversation on slavery.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Threat of the Fugitive Slave Act (00:00–07:09)

• Setting the Stage: The episode opens in 1851 Boston, illuminating the constant peril faced by escaped slaves like Thomas Sims, especially after Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.
• The law made it easier for slaveholders to recapture fleeing enslaved people, overruling personal liberty laws in free states and obligating ordinary Northerners to aid in the process.
• Key Moment: Thomas Sims’ arrest and forced return to Savannah, where he is brutally punished, exemplifies the tangible dangers and the galvanizing effect these laws had on communities and abolitionists.
  • “I’m in the hands of the kidnappers.” —Thomas Sims, as he’s arrested (04:28)

2. William Parker’s Early Life and Escape from Slavery (07:09–16:51)

• Childhood in Maryland: Parker’s formative years are marked by trauma—the constant threat of family separation and slave auctions, described as “a form of death” (08:03, Kelly Carter Jackson).
• At age 10, Parker vows with a friend to find freedom, reflecting a strong sense of agency even in childhood.
  • “This is not what I want for myself.” —Christy Coleman on Parker’s decision at age ten (09:33)
• Defining Moment: At seventeen, Parker refuses to work, fights back against his master, and escapes into the woods.
  • “I was now on the high road to liberty. I felt as light as a feather and seemed to be helped onward by an irresistible force.” —William Parker (10:39)
• Journey North: Parker and his friend Charles evade patrols using ruses like disguising themselves with brick dust, bravely fending off violent confrontations along the way (13:43–15:26).

3. Building a Free Life in Pennsylvania (16:51–18:59)

• Life in Lancaster: For the first time, Parker experiences true freedom but remains wary: “the other shoe could drop at any moment.”
  • “Instead of the darkness of slavery, my eyes were almost blinded by the light of freedom.” —William Parker (16:42)
• Ongoing Threat: Even in free states, bounty hunters and slave catchers invade Black communities, incentivized by financial rewards and able to act with near impunity.
  • “They did not hesitate to break open doors and to enter without ceremony…” —William Parker (17:28)

4. Community Defense: The Lancaster Black Self Protection Society (18:33–22:18)

• Organized Resistance: Parker and others, both Black and white, form a mutual aid society to protect their neighbors “at the risk of our own lives.”
  • “Slavery starts with violence. Slavery is sustained with violence. Slavery will only be overthrown with violence.” —Kelly Carter Jackson (19:06)
• Memorable Incidents: The society staves off kidnappers multiple times—using bricks, sticks, and, when necessary, firearms. Parker repeatedly escapes arrest, gaining a reputation as the “lion of Lancaster.”
  • “Bricks, stones and sticks fell in shops. We fought across the road and back again... My friends now said I got myself into a bad difficulty… In this, they were mistaken.” —William Parker (19:40)

5. The Escalation: The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 (22:18–24:05)

• Nationwide Impact: The act shifts Pennsylvania from a relative haven into a hostile “hunting ground for their human prey.” White and Black communities feel a new urgency to defend themselves.
  • “The old state of Pennsylvania… [has become] a common hunting ground for their human prey.” —William Parker (23:43)

6. The Christiana Resistance: September 11, 1851 (24:05–33:32)

• Prelude to Conflict:
  • Maryland slaveholder Edward Gorsuch, empowered by the fugitive law, arrives with a posse and federal marshal to retake former slaves from Parker's household in Christiana, PA.
  • Parker and his wife Eliza, alerted, prepare to resist. Eliza, instrumental in the defense, sounds the alarm horn to summon allies (29:16).
    • “My wife went down on her knees… blew blast after blast while the shots poured thick and fast around her.” —William Parker (29:16)
• Showdown: Quaker neighbors (Elijah Lewis and Kastner Hanway) refuse to assist the slave catchers—breaking the law but standing with their Black neighbors.
  • “We don’t take kindly to kidnappers here.” —Elijah Lewis, recalled by Christy Coleman (31:00)
• Violence Erupts: Verbal threats turn to gunfire; Parker and his group fight back. Edward Gorsuch is killed, and his son and others wounded. No defenders are killed.
  • “The riot, so called, was now entirely ended. The elder Gorsuch was dead…” —William Parker (33:32)

7. National Aftermath and Repercussions (33:47–39:27)

• Parker’s Flight: With help from Frederick Douglass, Parker escapes to Canada, gifting Douglass the pistol he took from Gorsuch as a symbol of the resistance (35:18–35:42).
• National Fallout: President Fillmore sends in the Marines. Dozens are arrested; 41 face charges of treason (including Quaker allies).
  • “President Fillmore calls out the Marines. They terrorize the entire area…” —Sally Helm (34:41)
• The Christiana Trial: Prosecutors fixate on white conspirators, unable to accept Black resistance as self-directed organization (37:10).
  • “There's no way these inferior beings could have come up with such an ingenious plan. It had to be this white man.” —Iris Leigh Barnes (37:10)
• Courtroom Defiance: Black defendants wear identical scarves, thwarting identification; the first trial ends in acquittal after just 15 minutes.
• Cultural Impact: The resistance undermines stereotypes of Black passivity and shows the Fugitive Slave Act is unworkable, radicalizing both sides.
  • “This business of the Fugitive Slave Law—it could get you killed.” —Kelly Carter Jackson (34:27)
• Lingering Legacy: The violence and failed prosecution influence future actors—including John Wilkes Booth—demonstrating the wide historical ripple effects (38:55).

8. William Parker’s New Life and Legacy (39:27–End)

• In Canada: Parker’s family settles in Buxton, Ontario, continuing to support the Underground Railroad and later working for Frederick Douglass’s North Star newspaper.
• Memoir & Reflection: Upon writing his memoir, Parker closes with gratitude and faith:
  • “I would return thanks to the almighty God for the many mercies and favors… delivering me out of the hands of slaveholders and placing me in a land of liberty...” —William Parker (40:14)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “No punishment was so much dreaded by the refractory slave as selling… parents and children, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, were separated to meet no more on earth.” —William Parker (07:44)
• “I told them all not to be afraid nor give up to any slaveholder, but to fight until death.” —William Parker (27:32)
• “Slavery will only be overthrown with violence.” —Kelly Carter Jackson (19:06)
• “We don’t take kindly to kidnappers here.” —Elijah Lewis (31:00)
• “Let this be a token for the Battle of Christiana.” —Kelly Carter Jackson quoting Parker’s gift to Douglass (35:42)
• “It makes it so that Northerners can’t sit on the sidelines. They have to confront the question of slavery as neighbors are being taken from their homes.” —Sally Helm (End analysis)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:00–02:27 — Intro, content warning, setting the historical scene.
• 02:27–07:09 — Fugitive Slave Act’s impact, Thomas Sims case.
• 07:09–16:51 — William Parker’s childhood, escape, journey north.
• 16:51–18:59 — Life in free Pennsylvania, persistent dangers.
• 18:33–22:18 — Formation of the Lancaster Black Self Protection Society, early resistance.
• 22:18–24:05 — Fugitive Slave Act upends “safe” states.
• 24:05–33:32 — The Christiana Resistance: buildup, battle, and aftermath.
• 33:47–39:27 — Aftermath: trials, national consequences, impact on John Wilkes Booth.
• 39:27–40:50 — Parker’s later life, memoir, and legacy.

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Expert Guests

• Dr. Iris Leigh Barnes: Director, Hosanna School Museum
• Christy Coleman: Public historian and museum executive
• Kelly Carter Jackson: Chair, Africana Studies, Wellesley College

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Conclusion

“William Parker’s War on Slave Catchers” highlights a turning point in the fight against slavery—a story of agency, communal self-defense, and national reckoning with the violent realities of the Fugitive Slave Act. William Parker's courage and leadership not only impacted his own community but also contributed to the intensifying conflict leading up to the Civil War, shattering myths and shifting the tide of history.

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Transcript

[Narrator/Advertiser]

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[Sally Helm]

Original Podcast Just a note before we start this episode contains depictions of racist language and violence from the era of American slavery. These elements are presented in their historical context. History this week, April 3rd, 1851 I'm Sally Helm. As he moves around the city of Boston, Thomas Sims is on high alert. He arrived here just a few Weeks ago, he escaped from slavery down in Georgia. He'd been laboring as a bricklayer, forced to hand over all his wages to rice planter and enslaver James Potter. But Sims stowed away on a ship and made it here to the North. Massachusetts doesn't have slavery anymore, but that doesn't mean that Thomas Sims is safe. Late last summer, in an attempt to keep the country from falling into civil war, Congress passed a very controversial the Fugitive Slave act of 1850. It was already legal for Southern enslavers to send bounty hunters up north to try to kidnap the people who had fled to freedom. But many Northern states had enacted personal liberty laws to protect these freedom seekers. Now the new federal Fugitive Slave Law tries to make these state laws irrelevant. The new law makes it much easier for a black person to be sent south on just a slaveholder's word with the help of U.S. marshals. And the law also requires individual Northerners to cooperate. It's creating a new sense of danger all across the north. And today, April 3rd, Thomas Sims is the latest person to be caught. James Potter has gotten wind that Sims is in Boston and had a warrant drawn up for his arrest. And now two Boston police officers see him on the street. They approach him and try to pull him into a carriage. He's got a knife, and he resists. But he's overpowered. As he's thrown into the carriage, he yells out, I'm in the hands of the kidnappers. Scenes like this have been playing out all across the North. But also all across the north, people are resisting. From New York to Philadelphia to Cleveland, people have long been organized in clandestine groups to trade information and protect black men and women from slave catchers. Here in Boston, just a few weeks ago, people aligned with a group called the Boston Vigilance Committee stormed the courthouse and rescued a fugitive slave named Shadrach Mencken. In fact, the Boston authorities are so worried that someone will rescue Thomas Sims that after they lock him up in the courthouse, they wrap the entire building in chains. After more than a week of court proceedings and abolitionist protests, Sims is marched back to the docks flanked by hundreds of guards. Back in Savannah, he's whipped in the public square. It's nearly fatal. This kind of incident is having the exact opposite effect that the legislators had intended. The Fugitive Slave act was part of a compromise that was supposed to keep the country from falling into civil war. But it seems to be making all of the tensions worse. And a few months later, those tensions will flare again in a major way. At the center of it all will be a black man who is running one of those clandestine support groups. This time in Pennsylvania, he's known as the lion of Lancaster. His name is William Parker. Today, William Parker takes on the slave hunters. How does Parker find freedom and free form an armed resistance against those who want to take it away? And when things explode, how does America react?

[William Parker]

I was born opposite to Queen Anne in Anne Arundel county in the state of Maryland on a plantation called Rodin. My master was Major Wood. William.

[Sally Helm]

Those are the words of William Parker. He published an account of his life in the Atlantic magazine in 1866. The plantation in Maryland where he grew up was actually not too far from the plantation where famous abolitionist Frederick Douglass grew up. They knew each other. And William Parker, like all enslaved people, grew up facing terrible violence and fear.

[William Parker]

No punishment was. Was so much dreaded by the refractory slave as selling

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

slave auctions were a form of death.

[Sally Helm]

That's Kelly Carter Jackson, chair of the Africana Studies department at Wellesley College.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

They were noted as being called the Weeping Time. People weren't even allowed to say goodbye. You know, you might be in the field and someone's telling you, hey, they're. They're selling your wife right now, or your daughter's in the wagon, she's headed south.

[William Parker]

Without a word of warning and for no fault of their own, parents and children, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, were separated to meet no more on earth.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

That was their biggest fear. It wasn't if they got food or if they had shoes or if they got whipped. Their biggest fear was separating families.

[Sally Helm]

Dr. Iris Ley Barnes, director of the Hosanna School Museum, said that at a young age, 10 years old, William Parker and his friend hear that one of these horrifying auctions is upon them.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

Everyone's whispering and they know something's about to happen. Somebody's about to be sold. So they run and hide up in the trees so no one can find them.

[Sally Helm]

Parker and his friend go into the woods and climb up a pine tree. And that day, Parker makes a promise to his friend and to himself that someday they will escape. Here's historian Christy Coleman.

[Christy Coleman]

There's a certain sense of agency that he employs by saying, even at 10, this is not what I want from myself.

[Sally Helm]

Years go by as he waits for his moment.

[William Parker]

How old I was then, I do not know. But from what the neighbors told me, I must have been about 17.

[Sally Helm]

One morning, Parker simply decides he won't go out to the fields to work. His master confronts him, but Parker won't

[William Parker]

relent he then picked up a stick used for an ox gad and said, if I did not go to work, he will whip me as sure as there was a God in heaven. Then he struck at me, but I caught the stick and we grappled and handled each other roughly for a time. When he called for assistance, he was badly hurt. I let go my hold, bade him goodbye, and ran for the woods. I was now on the high road to liberty. I felt as light as a feather and seemed to be helped onward by an irresistible force.

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[Sally Helm]

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[William Parker]

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[Sally Helm]

of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent to $15 per month required intro rate first 3 months only then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra. See full [e-mail] William Parker knows his first stop Baltimore. He's traveling with his friend Charles, who has also escaped.

[William Parker]

We reached Baltimore on the following evening between 7 and 8 o'. Clock. When we neared the city, the patrols were out and the difficulty was to pass them unseen or unsuspected.

[Sally Helm]

Patrols Slave catchers. This is the late 1830s, well before the Enhanced Fugitive Slave Law is passed, but the laws already on the books are plenty dangerous. There are free black people working in Baltimore, but Maryland is not a free state. William and Charles need a disguise.

[William Parker]

I learned of a brickyard at the entrance to the city, and thither we went at once took brick dust and threw it upon our clothes, hats and boots, and then walked on. By this ruse we reached quiet quarters without arrest or suspicion.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

But of course somebody confronts them.

[Sally Helm]

They're heading north from Baltimore when three white men stop them on the road late at night.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

So where you coming from? Why you out this late?

[William Parker]

See here, said he, you are the fellows that this advertisement calls for. At the same time taking the paper out of his pocket and reading it to us.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

Oftentimes the descriptions were very vague, or they could describe a hundred people.

[Sally Helm]

This wanted poster may have described Parker, or maybe not. But either way he has to avoid capture. He's holding a stick to defend himself when one of the white men moves to draw a gun.

[William Parker]

He then reached forward when I stepped back and struck him a heavy blow on the arm. It fell as if it was broken. I think it was.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

It does require a great bit of courage to be able to stand up for yourself in a way that says, you will not take my life. You will not steal me. You will not apprehend me. So when you get to someone like, well, did you have to break his arm? To me, that just feels like the most trivial thing because it's like he is trying to survive.

[Christy Coleman]

He

[Sally Helm]

Parker does survive. He and Charles eventually part ways and in the summer of 1839, William Parker reaches Lancaster, Pennsylvania. This is Quaker country and the Quakers are by and large opposed to slavery. So it's a pro abolitionist region in a free state. Parker gets a job working for a white abolitionist and he sees his old acquaintance Frederick Douglass again. Douglass is becoming immersed in the anti slavery movement.

[William Parker]

I had formerly known Mr. Douglass as a slave in Maryland. I was therefore not prepared for the progress he then showed, neither for his free spoken and manly language against slavery.

[Sally Helm]

For the first time in his life, Parker is experiencing freedom.

[William Parker]

I felt like a bird on a pleasant May morning. Instead of the darkness of slavery, my eyes were almost blinded by the light of freedom.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

I struggled to come up with an anecdote or a metaphor that kind of would compare to that kind of liberation. But it's also a feeling in which you were like the other shoe could drop at any moment.

[Sally Helm]

Even in a free state like Pennsylvania, slave catching bounty hunters are on the prowl.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

They're armed to the teeth. You're outnumbered. No questions are being asked or answered. Who knows who's hiring them, who knows who's paying them, who knows how much they're paying them? And they're being incentivized to break into your home.

[William Parker]

They did not hesitate to break open doors and to enter without ceremony the houses of colored men. And when refused admission or when a manly in the determined spirit was shown, they will present pistols and strike and knock down men and women indiscriminately.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

They're saying no, you're making a mistake. They don't care. Families are left to wonder what happened to their loved ones. Sometimes it's a long time before they find out what happened.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

And there's not really a policing force that's going to sort of stop that or you know, put that at bay. And so these black communities really have to become their own policing forces.

[Sally Helm]

Freedom seekers from the south and free black people in the north are living together in places like Lancaster, putting down roots, working jobs, having families. But they know that they are not safe. They need to band together to protect themselves. And that's exactly what William Parker decides to do.

[William Parker]

A number of us had formed an organization for mutual protection against slaveholders and kidnappers and had resolved to prevent any of our brethren being taken back into slavery at the risk of our own lives.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

He starts the Lancaster Black Self Protection Society. The whole goal is to protect you from the violence of slavery, from the snare of the slave catcher.

[Sally Helm]

The Lancaster Black Self Protection Society. It's made up of men and women, white and black.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

Their rationale was simple. Slavery starts with violence. Slavery is sustained with violence. Slavery will only be overthrown with violence.

[Sally Helm]

The group wants to make sure that no one in Lancaster will be kidnapped and brought back to slavery. In the first big incident that Parker writes about, they hear that a man in the community has been arrested and is going to be sent south, leaving his wife and children behind. So they decide to show up at the courthouse and try to free him. It's a fight.

[William Parker]

Bricks, stones and sticks fell in shops. We fought across the road and back again, and I thought our brains would be knocked. When the whites, who were too numerous for us, commenced making arrests. They got me fast several times, but I succeeded in getting away. My friends now said that I got myself into a bad difficulty and that my arrest would follow. In this, they were mistaken.

[Sally Helm]

The man that they've been trying to protect is eventually saved. And William Parker is not arrested because the authorities don't know who he is. He's just known as the lion of Lancaster.

[Christy Coleman]

Yeah, he's Batman. But they're keeping the secret, right? They're keeping the secret.

[Sally Helm]

All through the 1840s, the lion of Lancaster is busy. He's protecting his community by whatever means necessary. One night, Parker is at a friend's home when three slave catchers barge in trying to arrest him or seemingly any black person they could find.

[William Parker]

After bandying a few words, he drew his pistol upon me. Before he could bring the weapon to bear, I seized a pair of heavy tongs and struck him a violent blow across the face and neck, which knocked him down. He lay for a few minutes, senseless, but afterwards rose and walked out of the house without a word.

[Sally Helm]

Sometime later, Parker and six men are in hot pursuit of a group of kidnappers. They find out which tavern they're staying in and knock on the front door.

[William Parker]

The landlord demanded to know if we were white or colored. I told him colored. He then told us to be gone or he would blow out our brains.

[Sally Helm]

They decide to knock on the door again.

[William Parker]

I pretended that we wanted something to drink. He put his head out the window and threatened again to shoot us.

[Sally Helm]

Parker is not deterred. He breaks down the door.

[William Parker]

As soon as the door flew open, a kidnapper shot at us and the ball lodged in my ankle, bringing me to the ground. But I soon rose and my comrade. Then firing on them, they took to their heels. The next day, my ankle was very painful. With a knife, I extracted the ball, but kept the wound a secret as long before we learned that for our own security, it was best not to let such things be generally known.

[Sally Helm]

The lion of Lancaster makes it through the 1840s without being found out. He also meets his wife Eliza. She too escaped slavery in Maryland and she becomes a key member of the self protection society. And not long after they marry, they get word about a new crackdown from a new law. The Fugitive slave Act of 1850. It's signed by President Millard Fillmore and it's part of this whole group of laws that is known as the Compromise of 1850. Congress can see that the country is breaking apart and this compromise is their attempt to fix that. And southerners are angry that escaped freedom seeking slaves can find refuge in the North. Hence this law. It makes it so that a group of federal commissioners can really easily send anyone accused of being a fugitive slave back to the South. You don't get to go before a jury. Sworn statements from two men are all the evidence that's needed. And there's also a financial incentive. The person deciding the case gets double the money if they decide to send someone back to slavery rather than declaring them free. And if any free northerners refuse to help with slave catching operations, they will be arrested. States like Pennsylvania had felt relatively safe, but this law changes that.

[William Parker]

Under the pretext of enforcing the Fugitive Slave Law, the slaveholders did not hesitate to violate all other laws made for the good government and protection of society and converted the old state of Pennsylvania so long the hope of fleeing bondmen wearied and heartbroken into a common hunting ground for their human prey.

[Sally Helm]

Southern slaveholders are ready to use this new law to their advantage. Take Edward Gorsuch. He has been trying to recapture four men who escaped from his plantation in Maryland. He's been trying to track them down himself, but now he has the power of the federal government behind him. And then Gorsuch learns that the four men are staying in the town of Christiana, Pennsylvania. They're sheltering in the home of someone named William Parker. She loves it hot, he loves it cold. However you sleep, the pod by Eight Sleep adapts to you. Get up to $350. Off with code deep [e-mail] your little one grew three inches overnight.

[William Parker]

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[Sally Helm]

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[William Parker]

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[Sally Helm]

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[Christy Coleman]

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[William Parker]

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[Sally Helm]

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[Christy Coleman]

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[William Parker]

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[Sally Helm]

Quick pause this might help you getting into gardening. TikTok has simple tips that actually workplanting, pruning, fixing common problems. Real advice from real gardeners. Download TikTok now. Edward Gorsuch, MD, plantation owner and enslaver, goes to Philadelphia to get a warrant and enlist a U.S. marshal so that he can track down these four men.

[Christy Coleman]

He knows where he's going, who he's looking for, and they put together a little posse and they think, oh, this is going to be no big deal when I get there. I'll just talk them out of it. They'll come along peacefully, no big deal.

[Sally Helm]

Gorsuch sets off along with his son, a U.S. marshal named Henry Klein, and a few other neighbors and relatives. Meanwhile, the lion of Lancaster has gotten word that they're coming. September 11, 1851. Gorsuch and his posse arrive in Christiana.

[Christy Coleman]

They show up that morning, knock on the door, we're here. We have a warrant for the capture of these people. And Parker is like, sorry, doesn't mean anything to me.

[William Parker]

I then told him to take another step and I'll break his neck. He again said, I am the United States Marshal. I told him I didn't care for him or the United States.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

William throws him off and says, I don't care about that. I have no country. This is what we believe and this is what we do. If you do this, this is what's going to happen.

[Sally Helm]

Two of the four men that Gorsuch is looking for are inside the house. So is Parker's wife, Eliza, plus her sister and her sister's husband, along with other members of the Self Protection Society.

[William Parker]

I told them all not to be afraid nor give up to any slaveholder, but to fight until death.

[Sally Helm]

Gorsuch and Klein barge into the house and Parker addresses them from the top of his staircase. The men they seek are on the second floor.

[William Parker]

Mr. Gorsuch then said, you have my property. To which I replied, go in the room down there and see if there's anything there belonging to you. There are beds and a bureau, chairs and other things. Then go out to the barn. There you'll find a cow and some hogs. See if any of them are yours.

[Sally Helm]

At some point in the ensuing argument, Parker throws a fishing gig down the stairs. It's a kind of pitchfork. And Gorsuch and Klein run out of the house.

[Christy Coleman]

Parker then barricades the door. And everybody takes positions at windows around the house, including his wife.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

And she's like, you know, bait. You want me to sound the alarm? I will sound the alarm. Like, I think we should sound the alarm.

[Sally Helm]

The alarm. The society members have a pre established signal for danger. It's a horn, maybe a ram's horn. Eliza Parker takes her position at the window and blows.

[William Parker]

When the horn sounded from the garret window, one of the ruffians asked the others what it meant. And Klein said to me, what do you mean by blowing that horn? I did not answer.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

They're like, what's going on? What's going on? They start shooting at the window, laying out all their bullets into the window.

[William Parker]

My wife then went down on her knees and drawing her head and body below the range of the window, the horn resting on the seal blew blast after blast while the shots pour thick and fast around her.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

The only thing that saves Eliza is that it's a stone house and she is hiding beneath the windowsill so that she won't get hit.

[Sally Helm]

Then Gorsuch and his posse turned their attention back to William Parker.

[William Parker]

While I was leaning out the window, Cline fired a pistol at me, but the shot went too high. The ball broke the glass just above my head.

[Sally Helm]

Parker fires back and grazes Gorsuch's shoulder.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

Then of course, the marshal says, we're going to get 100 men here, thinking it's really going to scare them, but he's making it up. They're like not 100 people in miles from here. We know that.

[William Parker]

I said, see here, when you go to lancaster, don't bring 100 men, bring 500. It'll take all the men in Lancaster to change our purpose or take us alive.

[Sally Helm]

It's now around 6, 7am and more and more people are showing up, some to support the marshal and some responding to Eliza's signal.

[Christy Coleman]

They describe the mist rising up out of the valley. So you've got people emerging from the crowd surrounding the house and surrounding the Gorsuch party.

[Sally Helm]

The first men to engage Gorsuch and his party are Quakers, white men who live side by side with the formerly enslaved people in the region. Elijah Lewis and Kastner Hanway.

[Christy Coleman]

And Kastner Hanway was like, why are you here? Elijah Lewis is, we don't take kindly to kidnappers here. Klein then shows his warrant. Kastner Hanway reads it and then turns, you know, basically says, I'm not here

[Sally Helm]

to help you remember. According to the new fugitive slave law, U.S. citizens are legally required to to Help capture escaped slaves when asked. But these two Quakers refuse.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

Marshall tries to deputize him, and they're like, look, you know what? You should not be messing with these people. You gonna get hurt.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

Edward Gorsuch is still emphatic. He's still like, no, I'm entitled. The law says. The state says these are my proper.

[William Parker]

I then walked up to where he stood, his arms resting on the gate, trembling as if afflicted by palsy, and laid my hand on his shoulder, saying, I have seen pistols before today.

[Sally Helm]

Gorsuch's son, standing nearby, decides to taunt Parker with a slur. And Parker says he'll knock the man's teeth down his throat.

[William Parker]

At this, he fired upon me, and I ran up to him and knocked the pistol out of his hand. When he let the other one fall and ran in the field, William Parker's

[Sally Helm]

brother in law shoots at Gorsuch's son as he runs. Then Samuel Thompson, one of the men that Gorsuch had enslaved, joins the confrontation.

[William Parker]

Old man, you better go home to Maryland, said Samuel. You had better give up and come home with me, said the old man.

[Sally Helm]

Thompson smacks Gorsuch with the butt of

[William Parker]

his gun and brought him to his knees. Gorsuch rolls a signal to his men,

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

and then it all pops off.

[William Parker]

At this time, all the white men opened fire and we rushed upon them when they turned, threw down their guns and ran away.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

Edward Gorsuch is being beaten up by his enslaved property. These four mandates pounce on him. They overtake him.

[William Parker]

I saw as many as three at a time fighting with him. Sometimes he was on his knees, then his back, and again his feet would be where his head should be.

[Christy Coleman]

It doesn't take long. It's maybe 15, 20 minutes before everything stops.

[William Parker]

The riot, so called, was now entirely ended. The elder Gorsuch was dead, and his son and nephew were both wounded. And I have reason to believe others were. How many? It would be difficult to say.

[Sally Helm]

Nobody from Parker's side is killed. And at first, Parker doesn't want to leave Lancaster. He thinks maybe he'll just hide, evade capture like he's always done.

[Christy Coleman]

It is his friends and neighbors who say, no, dude, you need to get out of here. We need to get you out.

[William Parker]

The great trial now was to leave my wife and family uncertain as to the result of the journey. I felt I would rather die than be separated from them. It had to be done, however, and we went forth with heavy hearts. Outcasts for the sake of liberty.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

This is national news because a slaveholder has died. And it is really one of the first times that's public where it's like, oh, this business of the Fugitive Slave Law, it could get you killed.

[Sally Helm]

President Fillmore calls out the Marines. They terrorize the entire area, along with hired slave catchers and dozens of police.

[Christy Coleman]

They're literally going from door to door arresting people. Anybody that they think that was involved by rumor or by truth.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

It's like, we have to shut this thing down. We want to scare the bejesus out of them so that they do not think to do this again.

[Sally Helm]

Meanwhile, William Parker is headed north. He meets Frederick Douglass in Rochester. Douglass is going to help him secure passage across the border to Canada.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

And William Parker says to Douglas, hey, Freddie, I want to give you a gift for helping us out. And he gives to him the pistol

[Sally Helm]

that fell from Edward Gorsuch's hand.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

And he says, let this be a

[Sally Helm]

token for the Battle of Christiana. Twelve days after the Christiana Resistance, William Parker makes it across Lake Ontario to Toronto. Eliza and their family will join him soon after. Back in the U.S. news of the Christiana resistance, or riot, depending on who you ask, is rippling throughout the country.

[Christy Coleman]

It's being viewed right away as a bold stand against the Fugitive Slave Act. You know, there's condemnation in some circles that, oh, no, people died. That's not. Not good. But the majority of the abolitionist community is like, this is the bold kind of stance that we need.

[Sally Helm]

The Fugitive Slave act was supposed to be a tool to placate Southern slaveholders. Instead, it's become a rallying cry for abolitionists. And now a trial is set to begin. 41 men in Christiana, 3 white, 38 black, have been charged with treason. President Fillmore wants them convicted and potentially executed to set an example. Don't get in the way of the Fugitive Slave Law again. The first person to stand trial is one of the Quakers who refused to help the U.S. marshal at the scene, Kastner Hanway. Prosecutors try to say that he was one of the masterminds of this resistance.

[Iris Leigh Barnes]

There's no way these inferior beings could have come up with such an ingenious plan. It had to be this white man.

[Sally Helm]

The federal marshal, Henry Klein, is a key witness. But the black defendants that he supposedly saw at the scene intentionally wear matching red, white, and blue scarves to court, and Klein can't tell them apart. One author calls it a racist myopia. In the end, the jury deliberates for just 15 minutes, and Kastner Hanway is found not guilty. The rest of the Men are never tried. Southern propaganda said that black people were inherently docile and intellectually incapable. And Parker's stand showed the entire country that wasn't true. The group was capable, brave, highly organized, and willing to use lethal force to defend their freedom. And the Fugitive Slave act ends up pushing the nation closer to civil war. It makes it so that Northerners can't sit on the sidelines. They have to confront the question of slavery as neighbors are being taken from their homes. Some historians would later argue that the Christiana Revolt was in some ways the first, first battle of the Civil War. There's another impact that happens more on the individual level. Back in Maryland, Edward Gorsuch and his family were close with another family just down the road, the Booths. Their son Edwin went on to become one of America's most famous actors. Their other son was a less famous actor, but he'd find notoriety through other means.

[Kelly Carter Jackson]

John Wilkes Booth was very close to the Gorsuch family. And when he realizes that there will be no accountability for Edward Gorsuch's death, when he realizes that they, they won, essentially, they escaped, they were never captured, he cannot accept that. He lives with this deep vendetta of how can he, like, get back at this loss that he feels?

[Sally Helm]

Edward Gorsuch's death radicalizes Lincoln's assassin, John Wilkes booth. At just 13 years old, he becomes obsessed. When the war does begin, Thomas Sims, who was arrested in Boston, escapes to the north again, for good this time. And William Parker and his family settle in Canada in a town called Buxton. During the war, he helps ferry escaped slaves across the Great Lakes region via the Underground Railroad. While in Canada, he starts working for Frederick Douglass newspaper, the North Star. And after the war ends, he writes his autobiographical manuscript. His editor, James R. Gilmore, notes that Parker required no editing.

[William Parker]

I have now to bring my narrative to a close, and in so doing, I would return. Thanks to the almighty God for the many mercies and favors he has bestowed upon me and especially for delivering me out of the hands of slaveholders and placing me in a land of liberty where I can worship God under my own vine and fig tree with none to molest or make me afraid.

[Sally Helm]

History this Week is a Back Pocket Studios production in partnership with the History Channel. To stay updated on all things History this week, Sign [e-mail] and follow us on Instagram History this Week podcast. If you have any thoughts or questions, send us an [e-mail] Special thanks to our guests, Dr. Iris Leigh Barnes, director of the Hosana School Museum Christy Coleman, public historian and museum executive and Kelly Carter Jackson, chair of the Africana Studies Department at Wellesley College. We would also like to thank Jamal Wimberley, who provided the voice of William Parker in this episode. This episode was produced and sound designed by Ben Dickstein. It was also produced by me, Sally Helm for Back Pocket Studios. Our executive producer is Ben Dickstein from the History Channel. Our executive producers are Eli Lehrer and Liv Fiddler. Don't forget to follow rate and review history this week, wherever you get your podcasts, and we'll see you next week.