- Slave catcher
Fugitive slave catchers were people who returned escaped slaves to their owners in the
United States in the mid-19th century.Slaves who managed to free themselves from their owners had yet another worry: fugitive slave catchers. The
Compromise of 1850 and the "Fugitive Slave Law " created the Fugitive Slave.A fugitive slave was a slave who had run away or abandoned his owner. By the Compromise of 1850 and the "Fugitive Slave Law" this was a criminal act and the title "Fugitive Slave" was born. Fugitive slave catchers were people (usually white men) who returned a slave that had run away from his or her owner. Federal and state laws guaranteed the right of southern slave holders to pursue and recover their property on Northern soil.
At the time of Fugitive Slave catchers the North was moving more in the direction of abolition. The South wanted runaway slaves caught and brought back to their owners and they activated this by means of Fugitive Slave catchers. The Fugitive Slave Law stated that every citizen was responsible for helping to recover, punish, and return fugitive slaves; so any white person from the North or South could be, and were expected to be, a fugitive slave catcher.
The Northern states however began giving more freedom and rights to Blacks, as a result many slaves from the south fled north where they thought they could live with more opportunity for freedom. It was possible for Black people to be citizens, and not live as slaves in the North. This created even more of a need for fugitive slave catchers in the eyes of Southerners.
White
abolitionists from the North and anyone else aiding in freedom or hiding of slaves were punished for their efforts. One account of drastic measures that fugitve slave catching went to was some 200 marine soldiers escorting one fugitive slave back into the custody of his owner. There were countless more extreme situations happening in both the north and the south. With the North becoming increasingly opposed to the idea of fugitive slave catchers they adopted "anti-southern" views. Several northern states passed new personal liberty laws in defiance of the South's efforts to have slaves captured and returned. The new laws in the North did not make it impossible to catch fugitive slaves but it became so difficult, expensive and time consuming that the fugitive slave catchers and the owners stopped trying.ource
Murrin, Johnson & McPherson, Gerstle Rosenburg; "Liberty, Equality, Power; A History of The American People: Volume 1: to 1877" (4th edition) Thomas/ Wadsworth 2006ISBN - 0006437885
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