Josiah Henson

After escaping from slavery in Kentucky to Upper Canada, the Reverend Josiah Henson became a conductor on the Underground Railroad and a force in the abolition movement. He founded the Black settlement of Dawn, worked as an entrepreneur, and established a school, the British-American Institute. His fame grew after Harriet Beecher Stowe said that his memoirs, published in 1849, had provided “conceptions and incidents” for her extraordinarily popular novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Henson’s celebrity raised international awareness of Canada as a haven for refugees from slavery.

Ontario · Canada