Harriet Tubman: They called her Moses (2018) | Full Movie | Dr. Eric Lewis Williams

slave a person who is the legal property of another and is forced to obey them this is the dictionary definition describing the condition of hundreds of thousands of men women and children brought from overseas against their will to be sold bought auctioned and forced to labor without pay considered mere commodities many slave owners did not hesitate to rip families apart if they felt the need warranted it husbands were taken from their lives mothers from their children and the agony of these enslaved people grew in the midst of this suffering and deprivation some slaves began to look for a way out their god-given dignity aching for the right to be free and like the enslaved children of Israel they prayed for a deliverer someone who could lead them to the promised land and God heard the children of Israel that Moses and the slaves of the southern United States God sent a woman Harriet Tubman was born Araminta Ross the fifth of nine children to a slave couple property of Anthony Thompson in Dorchester County on the Eastern Shore of Maryland the exact date of her birth is unknown some consider it to be 1820 or 18 21 but Araminta or Harriet as she was eventually called was born a slave so the date of her birth was of little importance to her owners and no records were kept [Music] it was the case that we were seen as animals not people and you buy horses you buy mules you back tractors you buy things to do your farm work to do laboring to lift heavy weights to cook food to plow fields to pick cotton to pick tobacco well black people were seen as the tools in 1800s my mother who looked like an Italian would have been taken out of here immediately and so taken to New Orleans and so to house of prostitution my dad since he was so smart would have been sold to somebody in New Orleans to be a bookkeeper and a cotton brokerage because dad was good with numbers black people did a variety of things based on their skills and their skills then impacted the value that allowed them to be sold away Harriet's mother was to be set free upon the death of her master but she was never informed so the slave family was taken over by a mr. Broaddus who owned a tobacco plantation [Music] the question arises how did Harriet Tubman and her parents live in Maryland we're now inside the James Webb cabin and based on the description in her biographies this cabin is almost exactly like the cabin that she lived in with her parents it's built of logs it has two doors a fireplace and a single window while her parents worked little Harriet was made to care for her younger siblings as well as the children of other slaves life was hard and unpredictable I had two sisters carried away and a chain gang one of them left two children we were always uneasy [Music] Harriet never forgot her sisters cries as they were being taken away never to be heard from again it wasn't long before her turn came when Harriet was five years old she was suddenly sent away Harriet was hired out to help a man sent Muskrat traps in the icy River but she got so sick as a result that he sent her back useless he complained she gets sick too often no sooner was she nursed back to health and she was hired out again Harriet's job was to clean house and make sure her mistress's baby did not cry when the baby did Harriet was whipped on one occasion as she waited on her mistress Harriet caught sight of a temptation a bowl of sugar I never had anything good no sweet no sugar and that sugar right by me did look so nice and my mistress's back was turned to me why she was fighting with her husband so I just put my singles in the bowl to take one lumpy sea and maybe she heard me for she turned and saw me and the next minute she had rawhide down [Music] unable to endure the punishment Harriette ran away and hid in a pigpen but after five days she was so hungry that she had little choice but to come back I had nowhere else to go even though I knew what was coming the cruel whipping she endured during that time resulted in physical scars that she bore her entire life so she was sent back to her master unable to hire her out again she was put to work in the fields it was a hard life for one so young Harriet was taught that regardless of her circumstances there was a savior that had died for her he was alive and was as near to her as prayer Perry believed that and would talk to God as naturally as she would her own parents as she got older her faith also grew [Music] Christianity was a major force in the lives of the enslaved Africans it was believed by the enslavers that Christianity made the the Africans more docile but for the enslaved Christianity was for them a source of empowerment a source of comfort a source of strength revolutionary hope that would allow them to to endure the the long night of slavery and oppression they would have these clandestine meetings after the slave masters went to sleep after the workday was over they were often meet in fields for these worship services so there was the official Church which was presided over by the enslavers or sometimes they would provide the the enslaved Africans with a with a preacher but then there were these secret services that happen in the field at night and one scholar Albert rabbito in a book that he wrote entitled slave religion he uses the language of the invisible institution to talk about the church the Church of the enslaved Africans as an institution that was invisible to the slave master [Music] and so they could talk to Christ they could they could speaks and they could they could tell they could tell I'm in fact in some of the spirituals I must tell Jesus all of my troubles this idea of being able to to have access to God through prayer at any time you're in trouble when you're weary when you're weak that when you experience joy you could offer a prayer of thanksgiving so prayer was a way of being in the world it was not just an event it was something that was always possible something that was very close because God was was near every so often news trickled and about an escaped slave sometimes they were caught and it would real bad for them but other times it was rumored that a slave made it to the north to freedom [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] it was around 1830 4:35 when Harriet was about 13 years old that something happened that would affect her for the rest of her life as they gathered to shuck corn one of the slaves made a run for once the guard spotted him they ordered Harriet and some of the other slaves to help catch him running for his life the escaped slave ran into a store only to be cornered by a guard and all of a sudden all over he was yelling and screaming outside so they run to the doors and windows thinking what is going on out there and when they do a sleepwear runs in and behind that slave boy runs a man named Thomas Barnett and Thomas Barnett tells Mindy to hold the boy while he whips a Araminta meaning defender she did just what her mother had named her to do she let him have it she let him have it so forcefully and so loud and she was so angry that he had asked her to do that that that slave boy started doing this I don't know what she was saying but I do know what he was thinking he's inching out that the one he's thinking dear God come in T if I can just get to that door I know and get away I know I can and he's almost to that door when all the sudden Thomas Barnett sees that shadow me move and being an overseer he knows that that boy is bolting he grabs up the closest thing he can find which is a two-pound counterweight grabs that weight hurls it at the boy and accidentally hits Mindy in the forehead for the rest of her life Harriet would suffer seizures and fainting spells that would come upon her without warning years later Harriet told a friend I want to work again and there I'll work with the blood and sweat rolling down my face till I couldn't see despite her injury Harriet's workload did not diminish and she became more dependable sensing an opportunity her master gave permission for Harriet to hire herself out as long as she paid him $60 from her wages hoping to save enough to someday purchase her own freedom Harriet jumped at the chance but no matter how much money she saved her master was unwilling to let her go soon after when Harriet was 23 she fell in love with a man named John Tubman a free man about five years her senior John Tubman was born free because his mother was free the the status of the child was based on the status of the mother she was free then the child was free another way that they got free was they could be manumitted that was freed by a slave owner he would go to the courthouse and he would file a certificate that showed that they were free people Harriet Tubman's parents had been freed in that manner and finally they could be purchased by members of the black community in Caroline County we had a large free black community and they actually went out and purchased from slave owners the members of their family and freed them some of us a significant number of us were biological children of the owner okay that quite often motivated the owner to give us freedom then there were others of us who would do extra work and earn money and bit by bit it would take years but we would buy our freedom and even buy the freedom of our children and of all our wives didn't happen all the time but it happened and it happened with regularity though Harriet was contented her new situation it still wasn't enough she was still not a free woman she was still property so marriage was complicated a complicated affair because in the context of slavery sometimes families would be separated and so you might marry someone but then they'll sell you to another they'll sell your wife to another another plantation and they had what they call abroad marriages where sometimes you you could be on this plantation your wife could be on that plantation and it would allow you to be married and to see each other sometimes but you never knew I mean you never knew when you would see your your wife or your children for the last time [Music] then in 18-49 her master Edward Brodus died leaving his estate with heavy debt rumor had it that she and her brothers may be sold this was the catalyst that Harry had needed to make an important decision I had reasoned this out of my mind there was one of two things I had a right to Liberty or death if I could not have one I would have the other and then she went back to get her husband and the turkey would not run he wasn't a man he was not a man he wasn't anything he was a slave here he was a free man on paper but emotionally intellectually he wasn't all that he could be and he allowed his wife to pursue a natural inclination of all people and he backed away from it he accepted the comfort of being less than in reality Harriet needed to escape her husband would hear none of it and to Harriet's dismay he even threatened to report her should she try to despite the harsh realization Harriet decided she needed to try no doubt she had often talked with God about it and the news of people in the north wanting to help slaves escape had reached her ears Quakers were really instrumental in two ways first was by 1790 they had freed all of their enslaved people the other one was they believed that it was against the Word of God to have an enslaved person and then finally it becomes a prohibition it's voted on and it becomes a prohibition among the Quakers in this area because of this because they didn't have slaves they had abolished slavery Quakers played a very very important role in the Underground Railroad there were denominations that split over this matter of slavery bishops who wanted to maintain the institution because they did they didn't want to give up their slaves they were at odds with the teachings of Christ and so you have with the Quakers a number of them were theological II slavery was incompatible to their understanding of of the gospel it just it just didn't fit and because it didn't fit they chose to to stand on the side of Christ and to aid to do what they feel that Christ would have them to do and that was to help these people get from this situation of oppression to a place of liberation at some point harriet was approached by a Quaker woman coming to the plantation the woman was friendly and quiet about Harriet's car and then before leaving she told Harriet that if she ever needed help to come to her house and proceeded to describe it Harriet knew what the woman meant she was extending her help should Harriet ever want to escape it was her first encounter with someone from the railroad that the other slaves often whispered about the Underground Railroad if we'd have been in this meeting house is Tuckahoe neck meeting house in 1823 we could have witnessed the marriage of Hanna and Jacob Leverton they go on to become very important underground railroad agents in this region as a matter of fact Hanna is one of only a handful of documented female agents of the Underground Railroad Hannah is very important to Harriet Tubman in it she is the person that all of her scholars believe and I believe was the Quaker that helped Harriet Tubman to escape from Poplar Neck in Caroline County those whites that aided slaves in obtaining freedom they did so at a great risk of peril they could face criminal charges they could suffer harm they could be penalized but again their if their faith was strong enough that and if faith was ultimate concern it was it became for them a risk of faith it was time to make her move fearing her husband would try to stop her harried went to bed as usual but quietly slipped out of the cabin once he was asleep quickly she met up with two of her brothers and made for the woods but no sooner had they lost sight of the plantation that her brothers fearing what would happen should they be caught decided to turn back Harry had stood there watching them disappear into the night and most likely with great sorrow fled the plantation on her own to escape or to attempt to escape from enslavement was a very dangerous business you had these is cruel man who if they if they caught you you no telling what they would do to you we knew that they raped people they rape the slaves really there was seized dogs on people were on runaways you had the of course snakes and wolves and whatever that you could encounter in a forest setting it was just very it was very dangerous very costly Harry had made her way to the Quaker woman's house where she was given a change of clothes and information on how to get to Philadelphia this is the Jacob and Hannah Leverton house surrounding this house was 1,300 contiguous acres that were owned by documented agents of the Underground Railroad so it was like a refuge for people escaping on the Underground Railroad when someone would arrive the first thing that they would ask them was are you sure of what you're doing do you understand that you're going to Canada it's a different climate you'll never be able to see your family again you'll never be able to see the places that you grew up again and once they said yes they were committed then they taught them how to find the North Star they gave them provisions etc and they made arrangements to help them get to the next station she traveled by night keeping her eye on the northern star a visual guide than many escaping slaves depended upon she would have stayed hidden in the woods and then waded through the rivers where hounds would not pick up her scent Harriet Tubman was officially on the Underground Railroad and the minute they see you come in they tell all your address you're running and then they would have connections with white people who would help you get further north one of the places that freedom seekers on the Underground used to hide was in food pits a man named Josiah baling who Harriet Tubman helped to escape to Canada said that during his trip he spent more time under the ground than above the ground and what he was talking about he was talking about hiding in food pits some of these food pits are outside but some of them like in this web Cap'n are inside the building below the floor and their concealed very easily a rug pulled over this compartment here the compartment cannot be seen but inside in the floor pit you could put four or five minutes finally the day came when Harriet reached Pennsylvania and tasted freedom for the very first time in her life I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person that was such glory over everyday Sun came up like gold do the cheese and I felt I was in heaven Harriet worked as a domestic a job she didn't much like as it reminded her too much of slave work but she was able to keep all her money and that was certainly different still her family was always on her mind there was no one to welcome me to the land of freedom I was a stranger in a strange land and my home after all was down in Maryland because my father my mother my brothers and sisters and friends were there but I was free and day should be free too William still was an underground railroad agent that was up in Philadelphia he was also a stationmaster he became the secretary of the Underground Railroad and in that capacity he recorded the stories of about 600 freedom seekers who came through Philadelphia so he talked with hundreds of freedom seekers and dozens of Underground Railroad agents in that capacity and what William Sill said was this that Harriet Tubman's courage her shrewdness and her exertions on behalf of freedom seekers were second to none he never met a person that he saw that had the same measure of courage shrewdness and exertions on behalf of the enslaved when news reached Harriet that some of her family was to be sold she didn't hesitate she made plans to go rescue them immediately even though she wasn't sure how she would go about it concerned for her safety Williams still tried to convince her otherwise but Harriet was adamant trusting that God would lead her was it meat was the Lord I always told him how just you I don't know where to go or what to do but I expect you to meet him and he always did marry one of Harriet's sisters and her children had been brought to slave auction to be sold now Mary's husband was a free man so Harriet and her Quaker friends got work to him about a plan come noon the auktioner stepped out for lunch leaving the slaves with a guard it was then that Mary's husband showed up carrying an envelope with a message sitting that Mary's owner had found a buyer and she was to come immediately thinking the note was legitimate the guard led Mary and her children leave messenger no doubt their hearts were pounding as Mary and her husband walked their family from the auction market to a specified house of a Quaker in broad daylight there they hid till the evening then eventually by means of the underground railway they met up with Harriet it took more harrowing days and nights of travel until Harriet was able to get them safely to the north it was Harriet's first time as a conductor on the Underground Express she had helped to free some of her family and it wasn't long before she made up her mind to take another trip but now there was an even greater obstacle The Fugitive Slave Act there were two one in 1793 but the hammer was 1850 and it not only empowered the slave owner to come after you or send someone after you but it obligated anyone that the sheriff or the marshal asked to help take you into custody and then it had onerous fines and property confiscation if you helped me it was an effort to stop the growing tide of black people on the run harried was no longer safe in the northern United States and now she would need to take escaping slaves all the way to Canada it was a dangerous and daunting task but Harriet did what she was accustomed to when in great difficulty I prayed to God to make me strong and able to fight and that's what I've always prayed for ever since Harriet devised a plan she worked in hotels and chopping wood in order to make enough money to rent a house in Canada then during the winter months she would venture out to the south bring back more slaves and helped give them a new start in her home escapes from the plantations were always planned for Saturday night allowing them to nights and one days head start before the slaves were found missing Monday morning she never traveled the same route twice and she could always count on the help of the Underground Railroad for assistance there was something else Harriet did which surprised many of her slaves she helped Harriet carried a gun but it wasn't just for protection on more than one occasion some of the slaves lost their nerve and wanted to go back Harry could not allow it letting someone go back could mean endangering the rest of the group situations like that required desperate measures and Harriet had no qualms about using the strong influence of a gun to help a frightened slave stay on course thankfully she never had to fire it it wasn't long before she became somewhat of a legend among her people the talk among the slaves was that Moses had been sent to deliver them and they began to devise codes that let them know when Harriet was coming around sometimes these work songs that they sang they would send messages meaning to 9 meeting tonight meeting at the old campground they were letting you know that we're gonna be having a service tonight at the old camera [Music] Harriet was becoming a threat and the plantation owners fought back a hefty reward was put out for her capture it described Harriet as an illiterate woman with a scar on her head so Harriet disguised herself as a man wearing an old hat and carrying a book she often sang songs as a means of signaling slaves and hiding altering the temple to signal when it was safe to come out over the next several years Harriet risked freedom and life to rescue others from a life of slavery we're standing on the edge of Marsh Creek which is the eastern boundary of poplar neck where Harriet Tubman lived one of the most frightening barriers that freedom seekers including Harriet Tubman would encounter or creeks if you had no time to find the waiting point and you had no way to gauge the depth of the water you were taking a step into the unknown Harriet Tubman will tell her biographer a story about a creek she's going down a road and God she says directs her off of the road to safety she encounters this deep creek she's with three men the men will not walk into the water because it's a unknown depth Harriet goes into the water it was up to her armpits and then she takes this one last step into the unknown something that must have required enormous courage and her foot comes down and she starts to come up again [Music] when harriet tubman travelled south she did not always have the luxury to plan a trip sometimes she had to leave immediately and upon arrival in the state of Maryland it could be daylight she could not wait until nightfall to start her trek to rescue someone so she would have to travel in the light of day and during these times you had to have a pass or papers to show that you were free Harriet did not have that because she was already free she freed herself so it was very dangerous to be traveling in the light of day but Harriet was very resourceful she literally hid in plain sight in other words she looked like she belong so one of the things that I asked school children is if you were travelling like Harriet Tubman racing down to rescue a family member would you take a gun or would you take a chicken and most children tell me a gun again but if you chose chicken you would have the right answer because what Harriet did was she walked with the chicken under her arm and she wore floppy hat down the main dirt road and sure enough at one point there were four horsemen came across a field over towards her but Harriet had a plan because she was very clever and what she did was she'd like drop the chicken and the chicken would start to run away and she flap her arms ago my chicken my chicken my Master's chicken I need to get my Master's chicken and she'd throw herself down to the ground to grab the chicken and of course he missed the chicken and it would flop away and she do this a few times as the men were slowly approaching her and then they sit on their horses and watch her and kind of laugh at this woman who's you know running around flopping her arms at a chicken and they really didn't stop to think where's your pass where is your permit or anything like that and they just sort of laughed at her watched her antics and rode off and left her following a premonition that her aged parents were in danger she returned to the old plantation and led them to freedom it was a harrowing ordeal as the poor couple had greater difficulty with the long trek but they tasted freedom and eventually died a free man and a free woman it's estimated that Harriet took 19 trips and rescued approximately 300 slaves she later recounted the details of many of those trips to her friend Sarah H Bradford who published him in a book Harriet Tubman the Moses of her people I was the conductor of the Underground Railroad for eight years and I can say what most conductors can't say I never ran my train off the track and I never lost a passenger but Harriet's efforts on behalf of freedom and her fellow men did not end with her courageous missions to rescue slaves in 1861 civil war broke out between the northern and the southern United States slavery was one of the reasons governor John Andrew of Massachusetts approached Harriet to work for the Union Army as a scout her knowledge of the territory they were fighting in was very useful and her courage and faith a boost to the morale of the soldiers black and white she comforted the sick and her knowledge of roots and herbs helped heal many a sick soldier one of the most impressive things about Harriet that struck me was that during the Civil War she went to South Carolina right outside of Beaufort she went with the US Navy and told the commander you let me off the boat at that landing and she went on this man's plantation and talked to the people and she convinced these people to run [Music] she would enter enemy territory and gather information from slaves who were with their masters in the southern army her work was instrumental to the Union Army yet she was not allowed pay or pension but had to support herself even in those circumstances Harriet had premonitions all throughout her life on one occasion she had a dream about the end of slavery in the United States though others doubted she was certain that she would live to see that day and she did for On January 1st 1863 President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation declaring that all persons held as slaves within the rebellious states are and henceforth shall be free Harriet's childlike faith had her rejoicing three years before it actually happened there were thousands of a black men who had been enslaved who joined the Union Army in Beaufort South Carolina on the day of the Emancipation Proclamation the day it became official there were 1000 black soldiers dressed in American uniforms because they had run away in August and started drilling secretly with Union troops at the end of the war Harriet returned to New York only to find that her home was about to be sold as she was late on her payments she remarried and adopted a daughter named Gertie now Harriet was not about to retire she continued to work on behalf of the freed slaves helping them adjust and helping them start a new life she also became active in the struggle for women's rights working with such women as susan b anthony and respect for her only crew fellow abolitionist Thomas Guerin wrote I never met any person of any color who had more confidence than the voice of God I bring you one of the best and bravest persons on this continent general Tubman as we call her most that I have done and suffered in the service of our cause has been in public I have had the applause of the crowd and the satisfaction that comes of being approved by the multitude while the most you have done has been witnessed by view trembling hard and footsore bondsman and women whom you have laid out of the house of bondage and whose heartfelt god bless you has been your only reward because she knew the job wasn't done and it's still not done but you know she left us a memorial a monument that house in New York where she brought in other black people who weren't as fortunate as she even after the Civil War she was providing living spaces for homeless elderly black people and that place stands as a monument it's as a beacon to those of us who need inspiration to do something positive about our existence here that was her reward just being able to be the factor to be the negotiator to be the brains of efforts to get to a place of dignity so Harriet Tubman's hymnal and 39 of her artifacts or donated to the National Museum of african-american history and culture in Washington DC in the slavery to freedom gallery at the Museum you'll see the hymnal and use next to the shawl that was given to Harriet something by the Queen of England the hymnal is very interesting for the simple fact that Harriet Tubman was not able to read but yet there was a sense that these texts they contained the stories of a liberating God a God who liberates a God who delivers a God who hears a God who who heals God who cares and so on a number of levels though she could not read text like the Bible like a hymnal would have great deep religious meaning for her Harriet Tubman's spiritual legacy is important today for a number of reasons in our culture there is this kind of rugged and radical individualism that seeps into many kind of religious contexts where there is the sense that I have mine you have to figure out how you're gonna get yours but this kind of radical solidarity this kind of desire for others to be liberated for others to be able to experience freedom and putting putting forth the effort and risking your own life your own safety your own health or someone else could be free I think that Christianity means a little more that today and I think that she provides us a shining model of that kind of faith a robust faith that is not only concerned about its own success and its own freedom despite the respect and many honors she received Harriet Tubman spent her last days living in poverty but she was always thankful always thankful for her freedom having given much of her life and service to others Harriet Tubman died on March the tenth 1913 she was approximately 90 years old the former slave uneducated overworked and underpaid who served her owners then her fellow men and women and lastly her country was laid to rest with military honors she is buried in Fort Hill Cemetery in New York her life a beacon for generations to come God's time is always near he set the North Star in the heavens he gave me the strength in my limbs he meant I should be free [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Applause]

Channel: Vision Video

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Keywords: Christian Videos, Christian Films, Christian Movies, Religious Movies, Films, Movies, Entertainment, Harriet Tubman, underground railroad, African American, Dr. Eric Lewis Williams, Carl Westmoreland, freeing slaves, Harriet Tubman - They called her Moses Movie, Director Robert Fernandez, Harriet Tubman: They called her Moses 2018 Full Movie, Violence, sexuality, nudity, Harriet Tubman: They called her Moses Full Movie, Harriet Tubman: They called her Moses, They called her Moses

Id: HlXGK2wi5oM

Length: 45min 31sec (2731 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 26 2020