Silent Footsteps, Bold Strategies: Harriet Tubman's Leadership by Talin

Harriet Tubman is a well-known freedom fighter from Maryland. She is the conductor of the Underground Railroad, transporting three hundred enslaved to freedom. It is said that she never lost a passenger. Harriet Tubman did not just fight for freedom, she organized it. She used special skills and tactics to get to freedom.

Harriet Tubman used clandestine tactics to avoid detection. She disguised as an elderly person to avoid suspicion. To do this, she pretended to limp and wore hair bonnets low to cover her well-known face. This avoided the overseers’ attention, and so she was not caught.

Not only did Harriet Tubman use clandestine tactics but she was also strategic. She would only travel during the winter to avoid capture. She outsmarted dogs, slave owners, and slave catchers. Dogs could not detect scents in the snow and were unable to chase the enslaved. Also in the winter, it was difficult to sustain slave catching because it was cold and hard to find food.

Harriet Tubman strategically used the winter and also she was resourceful in developing techniques that would help her group remain undetected. For example, when babies started crying, she would do the sugar “tit” trick to calm babies down and probably put them to sleep so they could carry on. The sugar “tit” trick is a cloth dunked into sugar water or brandy for babies to suckle on. Brandy is an alcoholic beverage. The babies were so drowsy after, so they went to sleep fast. They could sleep for a long time and avoid detection from slave catchers.

Harriet was young, just like you, but when she got older, she did all of this. She encourages us to be brave, careful, and intelligent just like her. Someday, you will create solutions to reach your goals just like she did.