Louisiana Democrat [Alexandria, LA], January 18, 1860
A writer in the Philadelphia Free Press, after personal inspection of the condition of fugitive slaves in Canada, says:
I have recently returned from a month’s sojourn in Chatham, and can speak from personal observation. Every one knows that this town, lying on the flats between Lakes Erie and St. Clair, about fifty miles from Detroit, is the headquarters of the negroes who arrive by the Underground Railroad. Here some thousands are congregated, in every grade of wretchedness. A more worthless emigration can no where be found. Trained to no self-reliance, able only to perform one branch of industry, they are totally unfit to be thrown on the wide world without a guide, and they suffer all manner of hardships. Ill-fed, ill-clad and ill-housed, they are ready victims to the ague of that district, and disease impairs the little energy originally possessed by these children of a milder clime.