Susan Viney (b. circa 1822 - d. ?)
MSA SC 5496-8030
Fled from slavery, Dorchester County, Maryland, 1857
Biography:
Susan Viney escaped from her master, Samuel Pattison, on October 24, 1857, along with twenty-eight other slaves from the Cambridge District in Dorchester County. Immediately after Susan ran away, Pattison placed an ad in the Cambridge Democrat for Susan and the other fourteen slaves that had escaped from him the same night. She was accompanied her husband, Joseph and their four children, of whom the youngest was only 9 months old at the time.
Pattison lived in close proximity to the other affected owners. On November 4, 1857, the Easton Star reported that slaves belonging to Pattison and two other slave owners, Reuben E. Phillips and William Brannock, escaped on the same night. The newspaper also noted that a total of about forty slaves had run away from the neighborhood within a three-week period. It is possible that the members of the "Cambridge Party" used information passed along from the famous Underground Railroad agent, Harriet Tubman. Tubman had previously assisted Joseph Cornish, a possible relative of fellow Cambridge fugitive Aaron Cornish, in a successful flight to freedom in 1855. Joseph Cornish was owned by Samuel LeCompte, who also owned Caroline Stanly and family, also among the 28 that escaped in October.
Despite numerous impediments to their progress, the large party were able to reach supportive agents in Philiadelphia, who recorded some details of the significant arrival. Susan's husband asserted that Samuel Pattison "drank pretty freely," and had recently sold two of her brothers. It was such actions that likely motivated the Vineys to flee, though they faced the obvious difficulties of traveling with several young children. They were ultimately forwarded to St. Catharine's, Ontario, where at least five of the family members were settled by 1871.
Return to Susan Viney's Introductory Page
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