Anna Maria Weems

Photograph of Anna Maria Weems taken in November 1855 when she stayed at the home of Mrs. and Mr. William Still, a noted author of slave escape experiences and conductor on the Underground Railroad, of Philadelphia.[1]

Anna Maria Weems, also Ann Maria Weems (ca. 1840 – after 1863), whose aliases included "Ellen Capron" and "Joe Wright,"[2] was an American woman known for escaping slavery by disguising herself as a male carriage driver and escaping to British North America, where her family was settled with other slave fugitives.[3]

She and her younger sister were separated from her family at the age of seven, and her mother and brothers were sold in Alabama. Within a few months, her mother and two of her youngest brothers were manumitted and settled with their father in Washington, D.C. Then freedom for her sister, Catherine, was negotiated. The Weems had attained the money to pay ransoms through abolitionists in England and the United States, but were unable to purchase Anna Maria Weems' freedom. At age 15, she ran away from her slaveholder in Rockville, Maryland and traveled through Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Brooklyn, New York before arriving in Dresden, Canada West, British North America. The journey, made more treacherous due to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, occurred over two months, six weeks of which she was in hiding and most of which she was dressed as a young man.

Three books have been written about Weems and her family member's struggle for freedom, entitled A Shadow on the Household,[4] Stealing Freedom and The Underground Railroad: Anna Maria Weems.

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference Harrold was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Still, William (1886). Still's Underground Rail Road Records. William Still. p. 185–187. Retrieved 2021-03-23.
  3. ^ Snodgrass, Mary Ellen (2015-03-26). The Underground Railroad: An Encyclopedia of People, Places, and Operations. Routledge. ISBN 9781317454151.
  4. ^ Prince, Bryan (2010). A Shadow on the Household: One Enslaved Family's Incredible Struggle for Freedom. McClelland & Stewart. ISBN 978-0-7710-7126-3.