Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1886-04-08
JOURNEY IN A COFFIN.
How Job Yancey Reached Freedo

How Job Yancey Reached Freedom.
A Boston correspondent of The Ne1U
York Tribune writes: ''Do l remember
any incidents of the underground
railroad that haven't got into print9'
said an old abolitionist and slave
rescuer the other highs in response to
a question. swell, there is one story
that don't remember to have seen IN
the books or the papers. In 1859, just
in the height of the agitation, s..
our agent at Columbia, S. O., had
occasion to ticket middle aged negro
Job Yancey by name, through to
Providence. r. l. by the underground.
Job had sheltered a runaway in bis
cabin and had been betrayed by
another negro. He learned the situa-
ton and came into Columbia in the
middle of the night. There was no
hope Of concealing him. Our agent
had thought of new means of ship
ment that he had never tried. This
was his opportunity to try it. for Job
was clear grit, strong with the we'll
knit strength of middle age, and
patient as his namesake.
"S--got out a large coffin that he
kept for the emergency, and into this
coffin he put poor Job, and with him
quantity of crackers, cheese, dried
meat, and a rubber bag full of water.
A few gimblet holes admitted air. On
the first train in the morning Job
Yancey went off, shipped as corpse
to chosen address in Providence.
Trainmen were generally respectful
of the dead in those days. and Job
travelled comfortably for time. barr
ing the hours that he occasionally
lay on some depot platform in the
broillng southern sun. Travel was
slow, and sometimes the treatment
was little rough. Job after day
Or so began to get exceedingly lame
with the confinement and pressure,
his grim berth grew irksome, but it
was when the loud shouts and laugh.
ter of his own kind died away around
him, and when that and the sickening
chill came over him when they
dumped him one night on the stone
floor of a cold baggage room some
where told him that he was in the
north, that he began to suffer. The
mere consciousness that he was in the
north might have buoyed him up,
if 1t had hot been for one dreadful cir
cumstance.
''There was . sort of a faint glem
around him that told that it was day,
and he must have been in New York.
for he says that he knew that he had
been carried across some water by the
sensation of rising and falling that he
had felt. He had felt himself ratified
along in wagon, too, and the
wagon had brought up in a place
where he had heard the clatter and
the roar of trains again, his coffin was
dragged violently out of the wagon
and when his bearers put him down
they stood the coffin against wall =
on its head. Job began to feel the
blood rushing to his head. He felt
that he was lost. and would die, but
he dared not shout for help, as that
would mean discovery, a delivery TO
his owners, and worse than death.
Better die there; even horriable
death from tortare, than be carried
back to his masters plantation. He
chung to the determination, but at last
felt his weakened senses give way.
His consciousness, after minutes OF
agony, which seemed hours, was lost.
"When ne recovered Job had ac-
tually arrived at Providence and his
new-found friends better friends than
he had ever known-were using their
best endeavors to restore him. In a
few days he was able to step out into
the world, IN home In chosen vii
lage, a free maR."