Between 1793 and 1814, slave labor dug the twenty-three mile canal through the Great Dismal Swamp under grueling and brutal conditions amid dense underbrush, insects, venomous snakes, and bears. When a canal linking the Chesapeake Bay and the Albemarle Sound was judged good for business, it was also determined that enslaved laborers would do the work, often in boggy ground, deep in mud and water, cutting roots and bailing mud, living in crude camps without bedding, and receiving no pay except for work done beyond their assigned tasks. From about 1700 to the 1860s, generations of people lived undetected in the swamp, where harsh conditions still offered refuge from slavery and indenture. Maroons, Native Americans forcibly torn from their lands, enslaved canal company laborers, and outcast or criminalized Europeans became outliers in isolated or hidden settlements deep in the swamp. Researchers think that, although they mostly kept to themselves, some may have bartered goods and services with canal company laborers, creating a dynamic but hidden political economy across the swamp. Whole generations made the Dismal Swamp their home, and this area was also part of the Underground Railroad that helped African Americans make their way north to freedom.