Lear Green’s Love Story
1850
With each step he took down the crowded city streets, James Noble’s anger increased. He was a man on a mission. His destination on that October day in 1850 was the newspaper office of the Baltimore Sun, where he intended to place an ad. When the residents of Baltimore, Maryland, picked up their newspapers, they would soon read:
$150 REWARD.
Ran away from the subscriber, on Sunday night, 27th inst., my NEGRO GIRL, Lear Green, about 18 years of age, black complexion, round-featured, good-looking and ordinary size; she had on and with her when she left, a tan-colored silk bonnet, a dark plaid silk dress, a light mouslin delaine, also one watered silk cape and one tan colored cape. I have reason to be confident that she was persuaded off by a negro man named Wm. Adams, black, quick spoken, 5 feet 10 inches high, a large scar on one side of his face, running down in a ridge by the corner of his mouth, about 4 inches long, barber by trade, but works mostly about taverns, opening oysters, &c. He has been missing about a week; he had been heard to say he was going to marry the above girl and ship to New York, where it is said his mother resides. The above reward will be paid if said girl is taken out of the State of Maryland and delivered to me; or fifty dollars if taken in the State of Maryland.
JAMES NOBLE,
No. 153 Broadway, Baltimore.
James Noble had inherited his slave girl, Lear Green, from his mother-in-law when she was quite young. Noble and his wife had practically raised her—a well-dressed young woman of polish and grace—and this was how their house servant repaid them? It was preposterous! Noble was a respected merchant in town, and he did not appreciate that his slave girl had just up and slipped away.
The Nobles had kept Lear Green as busy as possible, but Lear had apparently still found time to acquaint herself with the free man William Adams. James Noble later berated himself for not realizing that Adams was sweet on his Lear.
William Adams and Lear Green had indeed fallen in love. In fact, William had repeatedly proposed to Lear. But Lear had told him the same thing she had told her own mother: that she would never marry. Any children born to her while she was a slave would become slaves themselves, and she wouldn’t be able to abide that. Lear wanted her children to be born free.
William therefore had incentive to seek Lear’s freedom. Together they came up with an outlandish and dangerous plan—one that could only succeed with the cooperation of William’s mother, a free woman who lived in New York.
Mrs. Adams accepted her son’s invitation to visit him and traveled to Baltimore. There she learned about the escape plan to secret Lear Green out of town. Both William and Mrs. Adams had to be willing to risk their own free status to assist Lear. His mother agreed.
Mrs. Adams prepared for her journey back to New York aboard the Ericsson Line of steamers. An old sailor’s chest with leather straps was arranged with items for the trip home. Inside she put a pillow, a quilt, some clothes, water, food—and her future daughter-in-law, Lear Green. William fastened ropes around the chest and carefully lifted the trunk with its precious cargo onto a wagon. When they arrived at the wharf, Mrs. Adams presented her ticket and walked aboard the steamer.
By 1850 the passenger lists for all vessels were being inspected for fugitive slaves. Any ship caught smuggling slaves had to pay $500, to both the state and to the slave owner. Fortunately, no one opened the chest to inspect it before loading it onto the steamship.
Though Mrs. Adams was a free woman, discriminatory practices prohibited her from being seated with the white passengers. Blacks were relegated to the open deck of the ship in the luggage and cargo area, which was exactly where Mrs. Adam’s sailor’s chest had been placed.
The steamer pulled away from its dock in Baltimore. Packed tight inside the trunk, Lear Green could feel the rocking of the ship but could not partake in the beautiful Chesapeake Bay scenery. The ship headed northeast through the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, then up the Delaware River. Lear had begun her suffocating eighteen hours of confinement. If she were discovered, it would put not only her own life and safety in peril, but also those of her loved ones.
Mrs. Adams looked around on deck. When no one was nearby, she loosened the ropes and secretly lifted the lid a few times during the night. This allowed her to check on Lear’s welfare and provide her with some fresh air.
The ship docked in Philadelphia without any of the handlers questioning the contents of the trunk. Still confined, Lear and the sailor’s chest were delivered to friends of Mrs. Adams on Barley Street. From there it was forwarded by means of another jolting carriage ride to the office of the Anti-slavery Society in Philadelphia. William Still, chairman of the Vigilance Committee, opened the trunk, thankful to find Lear Green alive.
Lear remained at the Still residence for several days before being moved to her final destination, Elmira, New York. William Adams had successfully made his way from Baltimore without being caught and was anxiously waiting for Lear.
The young couple was soon married and lived in Elmira, where William’s mother resided. They enjoyed three years together. Sadly, Lear died of unknown causes at age twenty-one. If it was any consolation to her grieving husband, her last years were spent in freedom.
William Still so admired Lear Green for her courage and determination to seek freedom at all costs that he had a photo taken of her exiting the trunk and was said to have kept the sailor’s chest as a reminder of her valiant efforts. He later said of her that she had “won for herself a strong claim to a high place among the heroic women of the nineteenth century.”