A Great Escape From Slavery

Written By Jim Murphy

Henry Brown sends himself to Philly in a box

Henry (Box) Brown pops out of his shipping crate at the Anti-Slavery Office in Philadelphia. He really did think outside the box. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress. The resurrection of Henry Box Brown at Philadelphia, who escaped from Richmond Va. in a box 3 feet long 2 1/2 ft. deep and 2 ft wide.

Completely discouraged when his pregnant wife Nancy and their three children were sent from Virginia to a new slave owner miles away in North Carolina, Henry Brown — also enslaved — decided to escape to the north and become a free man.


His creative solution: to put himself in a box and be “expressed” to the Anti-Slavery Office in Philadelphia, part of a free state.

With the help of two guys named Smith, he pulled it off

Free Black James Caesar Anthony Smith Jr. and White neighbor Samuel A. Smith, who was sympathetic to Blacks, combined to help send Brown north from Richmond.

James Smith, a shoe dealer, addressed the package to Wm. H. Johnson, Arch Street, Philadelphia, marked “This side up with care,” says noted African-American abolitionist William Still, conductor and author of the book “The Underground Railroad.”

Samuel Smith, a bit of a gambler, agreed to help for $86 (equal to about $3,025 in 2022) … money that Brown paid out of his savings. Wikipedia says Samuel personally traveled to Philadelphia to discuss the escape with the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society Office there.

The Big Day: March 23, 1849

To get off work the day of his trip, Brown, then 33 years old, deliberately burned his hand with sulfuric acid or oil of vitriol. When the overseer saw the wound, he told Brown to go home and put a poultice of flax-meal on it. 

He did. He also got ready to roll. The next day, once Brown entered the box made to the dimensions he specified, it was nailed shut. The Great Escape had begun.

On the road to Philadelphia

During the 27-hour trip to Philadelphia, Brown traveled on wagons, railroads, steamboats, ferries and eventually on a delivery wagon that took him to the Anti-Slavery Society Office in Philadelphia.

It wasn’t an easy ride. The box was handled roughly and at one point, while it was being moved from the railroad to a steamer, Brown was on his head for about 90 minutes.

 He says: “I felt my eyes swelling as if they would burst from their sockets; and the veins on my temples were dreadfully distended with pressure of blood upon my head. In this position I attempted to lift my hand to my face but I had no power to move it.”

Fortunately for him, Brown heard a man complaining that he had been standing there for two hours and needed to sit down. Suddenly, Brown’s box was thrown down and both men sat on it. Brown says, “I was thus relieved from a state of agony which may be more imagined than described.”

Brown also had a sense of humor

While the two men sat on Brown’s box before it was loaded aboard the steamer, they talked about what might be inside. “His companied replied he guessed it was ‘THE MAIL.’ I too thought it was a mail but not such a mail as he supposed it to be,” Brown says. (I wonder if he meant to use the word “male” in those last two instances.)

Delayed arrival in Philadelphia

After the Anti-Slavery Society received a message to expect a box arriving on the 3 a.m. morning train from the South that “might contain a man,” James Miller McKim went to the depot at 2:30 a.m. It wasn’t there.

Later that day, he received a telegram saying: “Your case of goods is shipped and will arrive to-morrow morning.”

Afraid of arousing suspicion at the Adams’ Express office by having a member of the committee go back again in the middle of the night to retrieve a box, McKim changed the plan. He decided to have the express bring it directly to the Anti-Slavery Office.

McKim arranged for E.M. Davis, a long-time abolitionist and son-in-law of well-known Quakers James and Lucretia Mott — who also dealt with Adams Express frequently — to handle the revised delivery.

Would they find a dead man?

The box arrived on time the next morning. Waiting expectantly were four members of the society, who dreaded finding a dead man in the box. 

After locking the door, Mr. McKim rapped on the lid of the box and called out, “All right.” Instantly came the answer from within, “All right, sir!”

Still says, “Rising up in his box, he reached out his hand, saying, “How do you do, gentlemen?” He then said he had selected an arrival hymn (if he lived), and recited a Psalm: I waited patiently for the Lord. and he heard my prayer.”

He couldn’t keep his feat a secret

Brown’s personality would not let him keep his box escape a secret. He became known as Henry “Box” Brown, published several autobiographies, put on shows portraying his escape, and was a well-known speaker at the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society.

 But after the U.S. Congress passed a harsher Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which required citizen cooperation to return escaped slaves even from free states, Brown moved to England to avoid being captured. 

Later he acted in several plays and also performed as a magician, mesmerist and conjurer.

The rest of the story

  • The two Smiths who helped Henry “Box” Brown escape tried the same approach again … and both got caught, says Dr. Bryan Walls. James, the choir-member, was released after a trial could not come to a decision. 

  • Samuel, on the other hand, tried it with two people in two boxes the second time, and was tripped up by an untimely telegram. He spent seven years in jail.

  • Wikimedia refers to a book by Jeffrey Ruggles, “The Unboxing of Henry Brown,” for this story, which it says the abolitionist community tried to keep quiet. “The year of his escape, Brown was contacted by his wife’s new owner, who offered to sell his family to him. Brown declined the offer.”

FAST FACTS

Date Box Sent: March 23, 1849

Length of Time in the Box: 27 hours

Box Size: 3 feet long, 2 feet wide and 2 feet, 8 inches deep, lined with baize

Brown’s provisions: A bladder of water, a few biscuits and a gimlet to make air holes.

Secured with: Nails and then tied with five hickory hoops

Box Marking: “This side up with care.”

Addressed to: Wm. H. Johnson, Arch Street, Philadelphia

Expressed to: Adams’ Express Office, Philadelphia

Time Samuel A. Smith Spent in Jail: Over 7 years

Image from “Narrative of the Life of Henry Box Brown”

Frontispiece of the Narrative of Henry Box Brown Who Escaped From Slavery, Enclosed In A Box Three Feet Long, Two Wide and Two And A Half High. Written From A Statement of Facts Made By Himself With Remarks Upon The Remedy For Slavery By Charles Stearns.

Jim Murphy
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