Advance Praise for One More River to Cross:
“Once again, Bryan Prince hits the mark. In One More River to Cross, Prince gives us one more great story of an unsung hero. He is the consummate historian, continually uncovering exciting adventures of international connections of people of African descent.
“His thirty-year unquenchable thirst for answers to his ancestors is amazing. The number of sources Prince used, the number of experts he consulted, the geography he covered sleuthing out the story, and the years spent researching Isaac Brown is astounding.
“Whereas historians and genealogists are always looking for sources, following Prince’s journey through archives in Canada and the U.S. reveal the voluminous sources that are available after continuously hitting brick walls and dead ends. With all the original sources that have not been digitized, Bryan’s journey continually reminds me of the fallacy of the ‘end of the paper trail.’”
— Tony Burroughs, Fellow of the Utah Genealogical Society (FUGA) and author of the bestselling Black Roots: A Beginner’s Guide to Tracing the African-American Family Tree
“Once again, Bryan Prince, intrepid historian and masterful storyteller, brings to vibrant life the long-forgotten story of Isaac Brown, a hunted fugitive slave and family man whose battle for freedom brought international attention to the injustices of an unbridled slave power. The husband of a free woman and the father of their eleven children, Brown’s sudden arrest for the attempted murder of his master — a crime he did not commit — his sale to New Orleans, his escape and later capture in Philadelphia, drew the ire of Pennsylvania’s anti-slavery vanguard.
“Marshalling the support of some of the most powerful abolitionists and brilliant legal minds in the United States at the time, Brown was cunningly liberated and secretly whisked to freedom in Canada. Constantly vigilant against the possibility that the long reach of his master and the pro-slavery governor of Maryland, determined to seek his re-enslavement, would find him, Brown changed his name to Russell and struggled to support his family. Drifting into obscurity in his later years, the legacy of Brown and his family’s pursuit of liberty and self-determination in the face of extreme opposition is an inspiration and a reminder of the struggles of those who came before us, and whose memory we should never forget.”
— Kate Clifford Larson, Ph.D., author of Bound for the Promised Land: Harriet Tubman, Portrait of an American Hero and The Assassin’s Accomplice: Mary Surratt and the Plot to Kill Abraham Lincoln
“This heart-rending story of Isaac Brown’s separation from family through the horrors and tribulations of slavery and his reunion with his wife, Susannah, follows their odyssey on the Underground Railroad.… Bryan Prince takes us through a personal discovery of the struggle for freedom and dignity of his own ancestors and their eventual settlement in Buxton.”
— Paul Lovejoy, Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and director of Harriet Tubman Institute, York University