To the north lay freedom, or so many believed. Starvation, exposure to the

elements, and especially the threat of recapture still hung heavy over the

heads of those who had escaped bondage.

But what about escaping even further south?

This is two minute black history, what you didn't learn in school.

History is filled with the stories of people who escape their enslavers by fleeing to the north. The Underground Railroad is so well known that hundreds of books have been written about the paths and people behind it.

However, the formerly enslaved didn't just escape to the north.

Many went south.

The journey northward was arrowing and oftentimes carried too greater risk for those trying to escape, especially if they were in the deep south.

Help and escape came from unlikely sources, but when our ancestors wanted their freedom, they used their ingenuity to get it.

Still a Spanish colony at the time. Florida offered freedom and Spanish citizenship.

The enslaved from the Carolinas, Georgia and Alabama who feared the long journey north

found hope in Spanish Florida. Many settled in Cape Florida while others

sought to leave the United States entirely. Once they were free Spanish citizens, some Black Seminoles awaited passage to the British colonies in the Bahamas.

They face possible recapture and pirates, but once there, they found a home with

descendants of other formerly enslaved and free black people.

It may not be as well known as the Underground Railroad, but the Saltwater Railroad still managed to save

over 6,000 people between 1821 and the 1830s. Our ancestors use every avenue at their disposal to find freedom.

In order to move towards the future, you've got to look to the past.

This has been two minute black history, a podcast by Push Black.

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