Harriet tubman family

HARRIET TUBMAN:I'm going to tell you something about my life.

HARRIET TUBMAN:My name is Harriet Tubman.

HARRIET TUBMAN:I was born in the United States of America in the year 1820.

HARRIET TUBMAN:My story starts when I was just a child.

HARRIET TUBMAN:I was born into a family of slaves.

HARRIET TUBMAN:My mother and father were from Africa,

HARRIET TUBMAN:but they were snatched up from their homes and brought to America on a ship, to work for a rich landowner.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Being a slave meant that we were owned by our master and he got to decide everything we did. And most of what we did was working in his cotton fields.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'The seasons turned, one into the next, and every year it was the same.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'We hoed the field to sow the seed, to pick the cotton. Then hoed the field to sow the seed to pick the cotton. Over and over. Till our hands were raw, our backs ached, our spirits worn down by the endless toil.

HARRIET TUBMAN:From the age of six, my job was to carry buckets of water out to the field.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'The bucket was heavy, and sometimes I could barely lift it off the ground.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'We got no money.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'We were given just about enough food to keep us from starving.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'The landowner lived in a giant house on the hill, with a view over all his land.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'We slept in a small hut in the forest.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'We had no furniture, and we slept on the floor, lined up like sardines.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'But still I loved the hut. Loved us all lined up together keeping each other warm.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'My father snored loudest, but it was so familiar it helped me sleep.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Sometimes, my father would take me into the forest that surrounded our hut and tell me things.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'He told me how moss always grew on the north side of a tree.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'How birds made their nests.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I loved watching the birds.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I tried to imagine what it would feel like to fly anywhere you felt like. High above the treetops. Looking down on everything.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'And that's how I grew up, knowing only the small world of the forest around our hut and the field we worked in.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'As soon as I was old enough, I was put to work alongside the other slaves in the field. I spent years that way.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Until my hands were raw, my back ached, and my spirit was worn down by the endless toil. Still I watched the birds.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'The slave master could keep my back bent towards the earth, but he couldn't stop me from imagining what it might feel like to be free.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Then one day we were working in the field like every other day,

HARRIET TUBMAN:'and all of a sudden, one of the slaves made a run for it.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'The slave master bid me go after him, but I just stood still and watched, admiring how brave he was. Willing him to magically take flight and leave the ground. The master was furious.'

HARRIET TUBMAN:From that day on, I had dizzy spells and would fall asleep without warning.

HARRIET TUBMAN:But the strange thing was, that that blow to the head also made something clear to me. Like I'd suddenly woken up.

HARRIET TUBMAN:I knew I had to escape.

HARRIET TUBMAN:I had to do more than just look at the birds and dream of being free.

HARRIET TUBMAN:In the moment that rock hit my head, I knew I just needed to be brave.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Early one morning, I woke before the others.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'The time had come.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I wrapped what little I had and a small amount of food into a shawl.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Then I took one last look at my family sleeping like sardines, and at the space where all these years I had slept between them, and I left.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I headed straight into the forest.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Soon, I had walked further and gone deeper into the forest than I had ever been before.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I headed north, knowing that way lay the border with Pennsylvania where there was no slavery. And where, if I could get there, I could be free.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'When night approached, and the forest grew dark, I remembered what my father had taught me. That moss always grows on the north side of the trees.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I wasn't afraid of the forest, or the dark, or the creatures that lived in the night,

HARRIET TUBMAN:'but I was afraid of the slave catchers.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Runaway slaves were worth money if they were caught.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'And there were slave-catchers out there who made it their business to hunt runaways like me down.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I had to keep my wits about me, I had to keep moving, stay quiet, and remember to be brave.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I trod carefully, and didn't stop to rest or sleep.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'After weeks of walking,

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I found myself at the border with Pennsylvania.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'A state where there was no slavery.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'A place where I could be something other than a slave.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person now I was free.

LAUGHS

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I felt my lungs fill with air, as if for the first time.'

CHEERS

CHEERS

HARRIET TUBMAN:I was free!

HARRIET TUBMAN:It was a feeling of such lightness.

HARRIET TUBMAN:I thought again of the birds I'd spent all that time dreaming about.

HARRIET TUBMAN:I chose where I walked, where I worked, I looked at the world around me with wide open eyes.

HARRIET TUBMAN:But I couldn't settle.

HARRIET TUBMAN:Less than a year after reaching freedom, I knew I had to go back.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I went back the way I had come.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'To the place where I was a wanted runaway with a price on my head.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'But I knew I had to return and lead my family to freedom.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Now I wasn't just responsible for myself.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'But I knew if they were scared, that I could be brave for them too.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I knew now that there was a network of people who wanted to help runaways like us escape.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Their homes were called safehouses.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'And they all had a sign they would hang outside to show that it was safe to call.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'It was a secret held dear by all those that helped.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'And to keep the secret safe, we called the network of safehouses the Underground Railroad.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'It was neither a railroad nor underground. But the runaways were called passengers, and the people who helped or took people in were called conductors.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'They would feed us and send us on our way.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'We travelled at night, trying to stay one step ahead of the slave catchers.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I wasn't afraid of the forest, or the dark, or the creatures that lived in the night.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I had to make sure we all made it to the border so that my family too would know the taste of freedom.

HARRIET TUBMAN:'Finally, after weeks in the forest, we reached the border with Pennsylvania.' CHEERING

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I felt a happiness even greater than the first time I crossed this State line.'

CHEERING

HARRIET TUBMAN:'I could imagine no greater joy than the joy I felt watching my family rejoice.'

HARRIET TUBMAN:When I saw what joy their freedom brought them

HARRIET TUBMAN:I knew then that I would have to go back. I knew then that this was what my life was for.

HARRIET TUBMAN:To help more slaves know what it was like to be free.

HARRIET TUBMAN:I went back time and time again.

HARRIET TUBMAN:And I led more than 70 slaves across the Underground Railroad to freedom.

HARRIET TUBMAN:Later, they said I was a hero.

HARRIET TUBMAN:That I had done great things.

HARRIET TUBMAN:But I knew all I needed to do was to be a little brave.