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Hidden NYC Passage Reveals Underground Railroad Secret
12 Feb
Summary
- A secret opening under a dresser was found in a Manhattan house.
- The passage likely served as a route for enslaved people escaping South.
- This discovery offers rare physical proof of New York's abolitionist history.
A concealed opening, found beneath a dresser in a Manhattan row house, has emerged as significant evidence of New York City's role in the Underground Railroad.
The discovery was made within the Merchant's House Museum on East Fourth Street, a historic four-story building. Researchers uncovered the roughly cut, two-by-two-foot shaft in the floorboards, which leads to a vertical space with a ladder descending to the ground floor.
Architectural historian Patrick Ciccone noted that the design was intended to evade slave hunters and city marshals, highlighting the rarity of abolitionist sentiment among wealthy New Yorkers at the time. Joseph Brewster, the house's original builder in 1832, was an abolitionist.
Preservation attorney Michael Hiller described the find as a 'generational' discovery, underscoring its immense importance for historical preservation. City officials emphasize that this physical evidence illuminates New York's contribution to the fight against slavery, a part of history often overshadowed.
The Merchant's House, designated Manhattan's first landmarked building in 1965, now offers crucial insights into this vital, yet often forgotten, period of American history.
