[United States Statutes at Large, Volume 127, 113th Congress, 1st Session]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

 
PROCLAMATION 8943--MAR. 25, 2013

Proclamation 8943 of March 25, 2013

Establishment of the Harriet Tubman--Underground Railroad National
Monument
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
Harriet Tubman is an American hero. She was born enslaved, liberated
herself, and returned to the area of her birth many times to lead
family,


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friends, and other enslaved African Americans north to freedom.
Harriet Tubman fought tirelessly for the Union cause, for the rights of
enslaved people, for the rights of women, and for the rights of all. She
was a leader in the struggle for civil rights who was forever motivated
by her love of family and community and by her deep and abiding faith.
Born Araminta Ross in 1822 in Dorchester County, Maryland, on the
plantation where her parents were enslaved, she took the name
``Harriet'' at the time she married John Tubman, a free black man,
around 1844. Harriet Tubman lived and worked enslaved in this area from
her childhood until she escaped to freedom at age 27 in 1849. She
returned to Dorchester County approximately 13 times to free family,
friends, and other enslaved African Americans, becoming one of the most
prominent ``conductors'' on the Underground Railroad. In 1859, she
purchased a farm in Auburn, New York, and established a home for her
family and others, which anchored the remaining years of her life. In
the Civil War she supported the Union forces as a scout, spy, and nurse
to African-American soldiers on battlefields and later at Fort Monroe,
Virginia. After the war, she established the Harriet Tubman Home for the
Aged, which institutionalized a pattern of her life--caring for African
Americans in need.
In 1868, the great civil rights leader Frederick Douglass wrote to
Harriet Tubman:

I have had the applause of the crowd and the satisfaction that comes of
being approved by the multitude, while the most that you have done has
been witnessed by a few trembling, scarred, and foot-sore bondmen and
women, whom you have led out of the house of bondage, and whose
heartfelt ``God bless you'' has been your only reward. The midnight sky
and the silent stars have been the witnesses of your devotion to freedom
and of your heroism.

The ``midnight sky and the silent stars'' and the Dorchester County
landscape of Harriet Tubman's homeland remain much as they were in her
time there. If she were to return to this area today, Harriet Tubman
would recognize it.
It was in the flat, open fields, marsh, and thick woodlands of
Dorchester County that Tubman became physically and spiritually strong.
Many of the places in which she grew up and worked still remain.
Stewart's Canal at the western edge of this historic area was
constructed over 20 years by enslaved and free African Americans. This
8-mile long waterway, completed in the 1830s, connected Parsons Creek
and Blackwater River with Tobacco Stick Bay (known today as Madison Bay)
and opened up some of Dorchester's more remote territory for timber and
agricultural products to be shipped to Baltimore markets. Tubman lived
near here while working for John T. Stewart. The canal, the waterways it
opened to the Chesapeake Bay, and the Blackwater River were the means of
conveying goods, lumber, and those seeking freedom. And the small ports
were places for connecting the enslaved with the world outside the
Eastern Shore, places on the path north to freedom.
Near the canal is the Jacob Jackson Home Site, 480 acres of flat
farmland, woodland, and wetland that was the site of one of the first
safe houses along the Underground Railroad. Jackson was a free black man
to whom Tubman appealed for assistance in 1854 in attempting to re-


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trieve her brothers and who, because he was literate, would have been an
important link in the local communication network. The Jacob Jackson
Home Site has been donated to the United States.
Further reinforcing the historical significance and integrity of these
sites is their proximity to other important sites of Tubman's life and
work. She was born in the heart of this area at Peter's Neck at the end
of Harrisville Road, on the farm of Anthony Thompson. Nearby is the farm
that belonged to Edward Brodess, enslaver of Tubman's mother and her
children. The James Cook Home Site is where Tubman was hired out as a
child. She remembered the harsh treatment she received here, long
afterward recalling that even when ill, she was expected to wade into
swamps throughout the cold winter to haul muskrat traps. A few miles
from the James Cook Home Site is the Bucktown Crossroads, where a slave
overseer hit the 13-year-old Tubman with a heavy iron as she attempted
to protect a young fleeing slave, resulting in an injury that affected
Tubman for the rest of her life. A quarter mile to the north are Scotts
Chapel and the associated African-American graveyard. The church was
founded in 1812 as a Methodist congregation. Later, in the mid-19th
century, African Americans split off from the congregation and formed
Bazel Church. Across from Scotts Chapel is an African-American graveyard
with headstones dating to 1792. Bazel Church is located nearby on a 1-
acre clearing edged by the road and otherwise surrounded by cultivated
fields and forest. According to tradition, this is where African
Americans worshipped outdoors during Tubman's time.
The National Park Service has found this landscape in Dorchester County
to be nationally significant because of its deep association with Tubman
and the Underground Railroad. It is representative of the landscape of
this region in the early and mid-19th century when enslavers and
enslaved worked the farms and forests. This is the landscape where free
African Americans and the enslaved led a clandestine movement of people
out of slavery towards the North Star of freedom. These sites were
places where enslaved and free African Americans intermingled. Moreover,
these sites fostered an environment that enabled free individuals to
provide aid and guidance to those enslaved who were seeking freedom.
This landscape, including the towns, roads, and paths within it, and its
critical waterways, was the means for communication and the path to
freedom. The Underground Railroad was everywhere within it.
Much of the landscape in Dorchester County that is Harriet Tubman's
homeland, including a portion of Stewart's Canal, is now part of
Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge. The Refuge provides vital habitat
for migratory birds, fish, and wildlife that are components of this
historic landscape. Management of the Refuge by the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service has played an important role in the protection of much
of the historic landscape that was formative to Harriet Tubman's life
and experiences. The Refuge has helped to conserve the landscape since
1933 and will continue to conserve, manage, and restore this diverse
assemblage of wetlands, uplands, and aquatic habitats that play such an
important role in telling the story of the cultural history of the area.
In the midst of this landscape, the State of Maryland is developing the
Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad State Park on a 17-acre parcel. The
State of Maryland and the Federal Government will work closely

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together in managing these special places within their respective jurisdictions
to preserve this critically important era in American history.
Harriet Tubman is revered by many as a freedom seeker and leader of the
Underground Railroad. Although Harriet Tubman is known widely, no
Federal commemorative site has heretofore been established in her honor,
despite the magnitude of her contributions and her national and
international stature.
WHEREAS members of the Congress, the Governor of Maryland, the City of
Cambridge, and other State, local, and private interests have expressed
support for the timely establishment of a national monument in
Dorchester County commemorating Harriet Tubman and the Underground
Railroad to protect the integrity of the evocative landscape and
preserve its historic features;
WHEREAS section 2 of the Act of June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225, 16 U.S.C.
431) (the ``Antiquities Act''), authorizes the President, in his
discretion, to declare by public proclamation historic landmarks,
historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or
scientific interest that are situated upon the lands owned or controlled
by the Government of the United States to be national monuments, and to
reserve as a part thereof parcels of land, the limits of which in all
cases shall be confined to the smallest area compatible with the proper
care and management of the objects to be protected;
WHEREAS it is in the public interest to preserve and protect the objects
of historic and scientific interest associated with Harriet Tubman and
the Underground Railroad in Dorchester County, Maryland;
NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of
America, by the authority vested in me by section 2 of the Antiquities
Act, hereby proclaim, set apart, and reserve as the Harriet Tubman--
Underground Railroad National Monument (monument), the objects
identified above and all lands and interests in lands owned or
controlled by the Government of the United States within the boundaries
described on the accompanying map, which is attached to and forms a part
of this proclamation, for the purpose of protecting those objects. These
reserved Federal lands and interests in lands encompass approximately
11,750 acres, which is the smallest area compatible with the proper care
and management of the objects to be protected.
All Federal lands and interests in lands within the boundaries of this
monument are hereby appropriated and withdrawn from all forms of entry,
location, selection, sale, leasing, or other disposition under the
public land laws, including withdrawal from location, entry, and patent
under the mining laws, and from disposition under all laws relating to
mineral and geothermal leasing.
The establishment of this monument is subject to valid existing rights.
Lands and interests in lands within the boundaries of the monument that
are not owned or controlled by the United States shall be reserved as
part of the monument upon acquisition of ownership or control by the
United States.
The Secretary of the Interior (Secretary) shall manage the monument
through the National Park Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service, pursuant to their respective applicable legal authorities, to
implement the purposes of this proclamation. The National Park Service
shall have the general responsibility for administration of the
monu-


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ment, including the Jacob Jackson Home Site, subject to the
responsibility and jurisdiction of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to
administer the portions of the national monument that are within the
National Wildlife Refuge System. When any additional lands and interests
in lands are hereafter acquired by the United States within the monument
boundaries, the Secretary shall determine whether such lands will be
administered as part of the National Park System or the National
Wildlife Refuge System. Hunting and fishing within the National Wildlife
Refuge System shall continue to be administered by the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service in accordance with the provisions of the National
Wildlife Refuge System Administration Act and other applicable laws.
Consistent with applicable laws, the National Park Service and the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service shall enter into appropriate arrangements to
share resources and services necessary to properly manage the monument.
Consistent with applicable laws, the National Park Service shall offer
to enter into appropriate arrangements with the State of Maryland for
the efficient and effective cooperative management of the monument and
the Harriet Tubman--Underground Railroad State Park.
The Secretary shall prepare a management plan for the monument, with
full public involvement, within 3 years of the date of this
proclamation. The management plan shall ensure that the monument
fulfills the following purposes for the benefit of present and future
generations: (1) to preserve the historic and scientific resources
identified above, (2) to commemorate the life and work of Harriet
Tubman, and (3) to interpret the story of the Underground Railroad and
its significance to the region and the Nation as a whole. The management
plan shall set forth, among other provisions, the desired relationship
of the monument to other related resources, programs, and organizations
in the region and elsewhere.
Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to revoke any existing
withdrawal, reservation, or appropriation; however, the monument shall
be the dominant reservation.
Warning is hereby given to all unauthorized persons not to appropriate,
injure, destroy, or remove any feature of the monument and not to locate
or settle upon any of the lands thereof.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-fifth day of
March, in the year of our Lord two thousand thirteen, and of the
Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-
seventh.
BARACK OBAMA


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