My funky padlet by Chanda Allen

1. She was born ‘Araminta Ross’

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Sometime between 1820 and 1821 Tubman was born into slavery in Buckland, Eastern Maryland. Araminta Ross was the daughter of Ben Ross, a skilled woodsman, and Harriet ‘Rit’ Green. Tubman worked from the age of six, as a maidservant and later in the fields, enduring brutal conditions and inhumane treatment.

2. She suffered a severe head injury as an adolescent

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n overseer threw a 2 pound weight at a fellow field hand as they attempted to flee, it struck Harriet instead, and in her words “broke my skull”.

She experienced life-long headaches, seizures and vivid dreams. Tubman interpreted those visions as revelations from God, informing her deep religiosity and a passionate faith that helped guide her on many rescue trips to lead other slaves to a beer life.

3. She escaped slavery in 1849

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The death of her owner, Brodess, increased the likelihood that Tubman would be sold and her family broken apart. An initial attempt to escape in September 1849 led to capture and the return of Tubman and two of her brothers, with $100 rewarded to slave catchers for each of their returns.

4. Nicknamed ‘Moses’, she never lost a single one of the many slaves she guided to freedom

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Her work as a “conductor” of the Underground Railroad was extremely dangerous; in 1850 Congress enacted the Fugitive Slave Act, severely punishing those who assisted runaway slaves, and the bounty on Tubman’s head was at least $12,000, equivalent to $330,000 today.

5. She was the first woman to lead an armed assault in the Civil War

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tubman saw Union victory in the Civil War as a crucial step towards abolition and joined the war effort as scout, a nurse, a cook and a spy to Federal troops.

In June 1863, Tubman worked alongside Colonel James Montogomery to assault plantations along the Combahee River. Using intelligent from escaped slaves, she guided Union riverboats through Confederate torpedo traps. At least 750 slaves were freed in the mission.

6. She helped find a cure for dysentry

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Tubman worked as a nurse during the war, healing the sick and wounded. Many people in the hospital died from dysentery, a disease associated with terrible diarrhea. She was sure she could help cure the sickness if she could find some of the same roots and herbs that grew in Maryland.

7. She worked with many leading abolitionists, including John Brown

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From her arrival in Philadelphia, Tubman joined the city’s active abolitionist movement. In April 1858, she was introduced to John Brown, an insurgent who sought the destruction of slavery by violent means. “General Tubman”, as Brown knew her, assisted in recruiting supporters for an attack on slave holders.

8. She was an active proponent of women’s suffrage

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Tubman worked alongside women suffragettes such as Susan B Anthony and Emily Howland. She travelled to New York, Boston and Washington speaking about her actions during the Civil War, and highlighting the sacrifices of countless women throughout modern history to forward the cause of women’s voting rights.

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After the traumatic experience in her childhood, when she was struck by a 2 pound weight thrown by an overseer, Tubman lived throughout much of her life experiencing severe migraines and seizures. By the late 1890s, the pain in her head had affected her ability to sleep, and she found a doctor in Boston willing to operate on her brain. Instead of receiving anesthesia while the doctor cut open her skull and performed the surgery, she chose to bite on a bullet — something she had seen soldiers do during the Civil War when they suffered pain on the battlefield. It is unclear whether the surgery improved her condition.

10. She died in relat

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A contemporary biography by Sarah Hopkins Bradford in 1869 brought impoverished Tubman around $1,200 in income. Tubman died, aged 91, in the Home for Aged she had founded herself and was buried with full military honours at Fort Hill Cemetery in New York 1913.