Nichols, Rodney Lee

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underground RR PA King Mann FB171105LN Enterprise

20171105 RVA-
Lanny Nunn?Coudersport Remember When
12 hrs · 20171105
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book, "The Underground Railroad in Pennsylvania" by Charles L. Bockson, curator of the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection at Temple Universitay, Philadelphia.

- Coudersport - John S. Mann
- Sala Stevens
- Eulalia twp - Nelson Clark
- Millport - Joseph Mann
- Rodney Nichols
- Ceres, PA -John King

Routes through Pennsylvania led to freedom, by JOE MARREN
Times Herald Staff Writer
COUDERSPORT -
...
"Several operators in Coudersport harbored runaway slaves. So the fugitive slave might have felt relatively safe once he made it to Coudersport," Mr. Blockson said.
In his book, Mr. Blockson lists a man named John S. Mann as an Underground Railroad agent living in Coudersport. An "agent" was a code word for someone who helped plot the course of escape for fugitive slaves.
"John Mann ran an important site on the Underground Railroad because he forwarded runaway slaves from Coudersport to his brother Joseph and his brother's partner, Rodney Nichols, in Millport," Mr. Blockson said.
Millport, tucked into the northwest corner of the county, is near the New York state border. From there, Mr. Blockson wrote, people may have been directed to an agent named John King in Ceres, McKean County. Mr. King, in turn, got them to Niagara Falls, NY or Buffalo, NY and someone else took them across the Niagara River into Canada.
ROBERT CURRIN, president of the Potter County Historical Society Museum in Coudersport, said several area Quaker families of the time were active in the Underground Railroad.
"The King family was one of the first to settle in Ceres. Actually they were among the first to settle in this whole area. And Mrs. Mann was a King." Mr. Currin said by phone recently.
Mr. Mann's home on Main Street, where he reportedly hid escaping slaves on the second floor, is now the site of the post office building, Mr. Currin said.
The Mann family store, farther down Main Street, is also gone, burned down in a fire of 1880, he added.
"It would be difficult to find any physical evidence of the Underground Railroad around here."
Buldings from the period that still survive may or may not have had a connection with the Underground Railroad, but no one knows for sure.
That's largely because of a voluntary code of silence by participants. The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 proscribed prison terms and hefty fines for those found guilty of harboring or aiding runaway slaves.
"They didn't exactly talk a lot about what they were doing," Mr. Currin said.

MR. BLOCKSON said another probable agent in Potter County was a Nelson Clark of Eulalia Township. Sala Stevens of Coudersport may also have been involved- Mr. Currin.
Another underground Railroad route went through Smethport aroun 1827, Mr. Blockson said. From there, the escaped slaves probably went through Eldred to Olean and eventually Buffalo.
Cameron County, he wrote in his book has no documented evidence of station routes.
For the runaway slave, dreedom meant the North. After the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act was passed, freedom meant Canada. Runaway slaves already in the North and those bound for Canada probably traveled through Pennsylvania to reach Canada, where freedom was just a reiver's breadth away from western New York.

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