Gateway to Freedom

The Hidden History of the Underground Railroad

By: Eric Foner

Narrated by: J. D. Jackson

The dramatic story of fugitive slaves and the antislavery activists who defied the law to help them reach freedom. They are little known to history: Sydney Howard Gay, an abolitionist newspaper editor; Louis Napoleon, a furniture polisher; Charles B. Ray, a black minister. At great risk they operated the Underground Railroad in New York, a city whose businesses, banks, and politics were deeply enmeshed in the slave economy.

In secret coordination with black dockworkers who alerted them to the arrival of fugitives and with counterparts in Norfolk, Wilmington, Philadelphia, Albany, and Syracuse, underground-railroad operatives in New York helped more than 3,000 fugitive slaves reach freedom between 1830 and 1860. Their defiance of the notorious Fugitive Slave Law inflamed the South. White and black, educated and illiterate, they were heroic figures in the ongoing struggle between slavery and freedom. Making brilliant use of fresh evidence - including the meticulous record of slave rescues secretly kept by Gay - Eric Foner elevates the underground railroad from folklore to sweeping history.

©2015 Original material published by arrangement with W.W. Norton & Company, Inc. (P)2015 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books

Critic reviews

"A masterwork [by] the preeminent historian of the Civil War era." ( Boston Globe)

"JD Jackson offers a solid, easy-on-the-ears narration of this reexamination of the Underground Railroad." (AudioFile)

its good if youre into that.

I fell asleep a lot to it and had to re-listen to it twice. The guys voice isnt boring, the writing is though.

Good but narrow focus

The book is about the Underground Rail Road in NYC specifically, not the rail road as a whole. extremely informational and the reading was very nice. just not what I had originally expected.

Required Reading at its Best!

Would you consider the audio edition of Gateway to Freedom to be better than the print version?

An excellent compendium

What did you like best about this story?

It is required reading; This is one of the most well-done historical accounts I've been assignmed.

fascinating book

This book by Eric Foner is full of surprises & revelations, it took the scales off my eyes regarding the underground railroad, on the one hand how small & balkanized it was, on the other how many dedicated, brave, money-starved idealists were involved in the work. It shows how few, when compared to the millions of slaves, were the successful escapes from the south, and how concentrated the escapes were in border states (and the rescues in the adjacent border states of the north. His focus on primary materials centered in New York City gives the whole thing an evidence that is not common in the usual, HS level treatments of the underground railroad. The book does get bogged down in a few spots by too much detail, but it is well-narrated & a good read for most of the way. Highly recommended (as are all of the Foner books available on Audible).

Could be a bit more focused

Slightly longer summary: A history of the loosely defined movement known as the Underground Railroad in and around New York City.

Eric Foner is one of the preeminent historians of the Reconstruction era. His book on Reconstruction and his book on the Constitutional Amendments passed during Reconstruction are both well worth reading. I would classify Gateway to Freedom as a less critical but still helpful book. There is a lot of mythology around the Underground Railroad. Gateway to Freedom is working to demythologize how organized it was (it wasn't very organized) while maintaining that the work that was done was dangerous, especially for Black people (whether free or formerly enslaved).

Gateway to Freedom concentrates on New York City. It may not be well known, but New York City broadly supported slavery. The mayor of NYC at the start of the Civil War floated the idea of joining the Confederacy, mainly because so much of the economy of NYC was centered on slavery or products derived from slavery. According to another book I am currently reading, while there were many Black residents of NYC, Philadelphia had the largest Black population of any city in the US until well after the Civil War.

Several books I have read this year overlap with Gateway to Freedom in part. A new biography of Sojourner Truth has a lot of overlap because Sojourner Truth was a slave in New York until she left her enslaver and she sued for the freedom of her child. And she remained in New York for years later. Christian Slavery discusses several of the exact same events, most importantly, a slave rebellion in NYC and the movement of Christians to evangelize those who were enslaved, especially through educational outreach in NYC. Until Justice Be Done is about the movement for civil rights between the US Revolution and the start of Reconstruction, which is precisely the same period as Gateway to Freedom. Both books touch on issues of transportation, fugitive slave laws, and citizenship rights. And the biography of Thaddeus Stevens, even though he was not ever a resident of NYC, his biography also touches on similar issues. The ability to get different nuances of overlapping issues is very helpful.

Similar to one of my observations from reading fairly widely about the 20th-century civil rights movement, many of the important figures are fairly unknown. Many people know at least the names of Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth. But names like William Still and Sydney Gay are unknown to almost anyone. Trying to help free the enslaved was dangerous, but part of the story is the investment of their own time and financial resources, which meant they could not use that time or resources for other purposes. Those who worked with the Underground Railroad were often on the edge of poverty (if not in significant poverty themselves) because they gave their time and money to those needing help instead of keeping it for themselves.

Another point that keeps coming up in histories of this era is that while many white figures did give time and money, they often still did not face the same potential for physical violence. Legal processes were just different between racial groups. Also, many abolitionists opposed slavery but not white superiority. Few wanted to mix socially, for instance. A final brief point is that legal representation matters. One of the problems of the fugitive slave laws was that there were no due process rules in many cases. This allowed many people to be kidnapped into slavery because the assumption was that all Black people were presumed to be former slaves, and the courts, especially after the Dred Scott decision, did not accept any testimony of Black people. That being said, white lawyers like the Jay family, who did represent those that were being accused of being runaway slaves or those that were being discriminated against on public transportation, were significantly crucial to changing laws and public opinion. The law has always been both important to maintaining slavery, segregation, and discrimination as well as important to bringing an end to them.

Excellent book,loved it

Love to listen to the narrative, explain the book,And really made it clear understanding about the condition of slavery and the times of that era.

Lincoln Rocky

Very informative and interesting. I would recommend this book to anyone I know who might be interested in the history of the United States.

Superb history

Excellent history that filled in many gaps in my knowledge. Superbly written, beautifully read. As more and more detailed information is assembled and published about the history of slavery in this country, American history itself comes into greater focus. I would know like to learn more about how the Underground Railroad functioned here in the Midwest.

A great look at an important period

Would you listen to Gateway to Freedom again? Why?

Yes. I think there were a lot of details that I'd like to know more about.

What did you like best about this story?

I had accepted the conventional wisdom which said that the Underground Railroad was really a white-run charity project. Foner reverses that point of view and clearly shows how much of liberation was run by black Americans. And of course he DESTROYS the myth of "states rights" as the causus belli for the Civil War. The South in fact wanted a strong federal government to enforce fugitive slave laws to stop Northern attempts to deprive them of their so-called property.

Which scene was your favorite?

I think all of the stories about the incredible lengths to which the black anti-slavery societies went to free individual slaves, from hiding them, to raising money to purchase their freedom, to the vast communication network that kept them in the know about the movements of fugitives.

Good but limited history

This is a history of the Underground Railroad and it’s relationship to NYC, thus it is not a general history. That being said it is excellent, as are all of Mr. Foner’s books and well read.