Harriet Tubman, Moral Injury, and Black History
When learning about moral injury related to female veterans during my time with MISNS as an intern 2 years ago, I was pleased to know that the female chaplains offering counseling to servicewomen call themselves the Harriet Tubman Counseling Network. I knew that Harriet Tubman “carried” many slaves to freedom as a “Conductor” on the Underground Railroad. What I didn’t know was that she also served as a nurse, a spy, and a scout for the Union Army during the Civil War. She was the first woman in American history to lead a military expedition, as she led Black troops in a raid in South Carolina in 1863. Likened to the Biblical leader who brought his people out of slavery in Egypt into the Promised Land, she is called the “Moses of her people” (Michals, Harriet Tubman, womenshistory.org).
How did this petite (4’ 11”) Black woman become an icon of liberation and strength? Born 200 years ago into chattel slavery in Maryland, her life was one of struggle and hardship. By the age of ten she could cut wood, trap pests, and work in the fields, and was as strong as any man. (Harriet Tubman: Life, Liberty, and Legacy. https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/harriet-tubman.) At age twelve she intervened in a struggle between an overseer and a runaway slave. The overseer threw a heavy iron weight at her head, causing her to subsequently suffer intense headaches and narcolepsy (sudden attacks of sleep). She also experienced intense religious dreams and visions for the rest of her life.
Her vision of liberty was developed during this time. When she was eighteen her father’s owner set him free, and she discovered that the last will of her previous owner had set her entire family on her mother’s side free (her mother, her siblings, and Harriet herself). Her new owner would not accept this manumission, however, and her family remained in servitude. A few years later, Harriet and her two brothers escaped and headed north. Although her brothers soon lost heart and turned back, Harriet made it to Philadelphia with the help of the Underground Railroad, a network of routes and safe houses leading to the North (Harriet Tubman, Encyclopedia Britannica). Her compelling dream of following the North Star to freedom led her to make more than a dozen journeys over the Mason-Dixon line between 1850 and 1860, leading more than 70 slaves to freedom. These journeys became more dangerous, however, as the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 compelled northern law enforcement officers to capture free Black Americans and return them to the South. Harriet began carrying a gun for protection.
On one occasion some of her “passengers” lost heart and wanted to turn around and return to the plantation where they had lived and worked. Harriet knew that without being familiar with the route, their carelessness would imperil the mission, so she would not permit it. She pulled her gun from her skirts and said, “You’ll be free or die.” There could be no turning back.
I am in awe of this woman’s bravery and fortitude. We can certainly say that she experienced moral injury, as she had been enslaved, had been denied her freedom, and had been injured standing up for the rights of another slave. Yet her Christian faith undergirded her life. In an 1859 interview, she stated, God “set the North Star in the heavens; He gave me the strength in my limbs; He meant I should be free” (Harriet Tubman: Life, Liberty, and Legacy.https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/harriet-tubman.)
Sources
Editors, Encyclopaedia Britannica. “Harriet Tubman”. Encyclopedia Britannica, 19 Jan. 2024, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Harriet-Tubman. Accessed 10 February 2024.
Harriet Tubman: Life, Liberty, and Legacy. National Museum of African American History and Culture. https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/harriet-tubman. Accessed 10 February 2024.
Michals, D., ed. Harriet Tubman (ca.1820-1913). National Women’s History Museum. https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/harriet-tubman. Accessed 10 February 2024.