Who Actually Started the Underground Railroad - Book Give Away!

Guest post by Lyn Cote, and she's graciously giving away one of her ebooks!

In the three decades before the Civil War, Ohio simmered and at times boiled as a hotbed of conflict and activism over the issue of abolition. However, usually in Ohio, the turmoil took place behind doors and within secret rooms within walls, only rarely breaking forth into race riots. The Underground Railroad started spontaneously many say with John Rankin, Presbyterian minister, who moved to Ripley, Ohio in 1822. When Harriet Beecher Stowe was asked after the end of the Civil War, “Who abolished slavery?,” she answered, “Reverend John Rankin and his sons did.”

Actually, the Underground Railroad was not any one man or woman’s idea. It was a spontaneous uncoordinated response to the plight of runaway slaves. It began with free blacks in Ohio. There were several black settlements in Ohio, some groups of them were slaves freed and resettled by their former owners. These settlements consciously saw themselves as havens for runaways. John Parker, Henry Bibb, Charles Langston and many more free blacks in Ohio sheltered and then moved escaped slaves toward Canada.

However, because of the Black Laws of Ohio (1807), people of color had no legal status and could not testify in court or vote. White abolitionists came forward to stand up for and assist their black cohorts in these situations and also with funds. Keith Griffler states in his landmark study, Front Line of Freedom: African Americans and the Forging of the Underground Railroad in the Ohio Valley (Ohio River Valley Series): (page 60-61) 

The movement that came to be called the Underground Railroad would never have gotten off the ground without the dedicated group of whites who hailed from the South, providing the African-Americans engaged in the life-and-death struggle with American slavery indispensable allies in their frontline struggle. If the South had bequeathed to Ohio Valley much of this proslavery animus it also ironically supplied it with some of its most ardent and militant anti-slavery white activists willing to risk their reputations, their fortunes, their freedom, and even their lives. It might not be too much to say that the Underground Railroad in the region would’ve taken much longer to initiate without the zeal they brought to the cause they espoused. Their fervor was equal to that with which the love of slavery inspired in leaders of the South. Having witnessed--and learn to hate--slavery at close quarters, they brought not only passion but also the willingness and desire to work closely with the African-American communities whose existence on the northern bank of Ohio defied both Northern and Southern public opinion.

So it appears that it wasn’t just one man and his sons who started the Underground Railroad but a combined effort between white activists and free blacks in Ohio and then in other Midwest states. It’s an interesting side note that Canada did not abolish slavery until the early 1830’s. In the aftermath of the conflict of 1812, Canada welcomed runaway American slaves as a way to cause trouble to the US.An interesting irony.

Lyn Cote is graciously giving away an ebook copy of Meant for Me.

Lyn's latest series, “The Carlyle Women,” features a Maryland family--both branches--the white and the black and the changes in women’s status and civil rights in the 20th century.

Meant for Me, Book One--Chloe Carlyle was raised to be the perfect Southern lady. But when a handsome stranger about to leave for war proposes an elopement, Chloe breaks free. America has just entered WWI. In New York City Chloe is swept up in the heady tides of change. The NAACP moves forward in the midst of race riots, women’s fight to gain the vote is at its peak. Chloe and her maid Minnie become the independent women they never thought possible.
USA Today bestselling author, Lyn Cote has written over 45 books. An award-winning author, Lyn writes contemporary romance, romantic suspense and historical novels. No matter which kind of story, her brand “Strong Women, Brave Stories” comes through. Holding a Masters Degree in American History, she lives in a lakeside cottage the northwoods of Wisconsin with her comfy husband and two maddening cats. Visit her website: www.LynCote.com 

BOOK DAY!

The Perfect Bride

by Debbie Lynne Costello

Avice Touchet has always dreamed of marrying for love and that love would be her best friend, Philip Greslet. She’s waited five years for him to see her as the woman she’s become but when a visiting lord arrives with secrets that could put her father in prison, Avice must consider a sacrificial marriage.
Philip Greslet has worked his whole life for one thing—to be a castellan—and now it is finally in his grasp. But when Avice rebuffs his new lord’s attentions, Philip must convince his best friend to marry the lord against his heart’s inclination to have her as his own.

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Ranchero's Love

by Nancy J. Farrier

Rosalinda knows she will never escape her past, both the choices forced on her and the mistakes she’s made. She longs to find a place to live in peace—where she can learn to mother her children and where Lucio Armenta won’t be a constant reminder of the love she can never have. Lucio wants to marry. However, Rosalinda, the only woman he’s ever been attracted to, doesn’t meet the ideals he’s set for his future wife. When he discovers she, and her adorable brood, are accompanying him to his sister and brother-in-law’s, he objects. An objection that is overruled. When secrets from Lucio’s past are exposed, and Rosalinda faces choices no woman should have to make, will their growing love, and their faith, survive? 

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The Anonymous Bride

by Vickie Mcdonough

Luke Davis tells his cousins he'd get married if the right woman ever came along, never imagining the mayhem such a remark would make. For a month later, three mail-order brides arrive, courtesy of his well-meaning, scheming cousins. How will he decide which one is right for him? Widowed boardinghouse owner Rachel Hamilton still loves Luke but never worked up the courage to tell him. Now that three brides have shown up, vying for his hand, Rachel is totally unnerved. What will she do if Luke marries someone else? Will he ever realize that sometimes love is right in front of you?

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The Backcountry Brides Collection

with Denise Weimer

Travel into Colonial America where nine women seek love, but they each know a future husband requires the necessary skills to survive in the backcountry. Living in areas exposed to nature’s ferocity, prone to Indian attack, and cut off from regular supplies, can hearts overcome the dangers to find lasting love?

Across Three Autumns by Denise Weimer: Fighting Loyalists and Indians, Jenny White settles for strength over love . . .until Scottish scout Caylan McIntosh leads her family on a harrowing exodus out of Georgia’s Revolutionary War “Hornet’s Nest.”

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The Miss Adventure Brides Collection

with Mary Davis

Love Is One of Life’s Greatest Adventures: Seven daring damsels don’t let the norms of their eras hold them back. Along the way these women attract the attention of men who admire their bravery and determination, but will they let love grow out of the adventures? “Zola’s Cross-Country Adventure” is Mary Davis’s novella in The MISSAdventure Brides Collection, releasing December 1, 2018. In 1904, Zola Calkin sets out on an adventure to be the first woman to drive across the country. Will the journalist tasked to report her presumed failure sabotage her efforts? Or will he steal her heart?

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Snow Angel 

by Davalynn Spencer

As a child, she lost something precious at Christmas. Twenty years later, she's about to lose her heart. Lena Carver works as her physician brother’s medical assistant, housekeeper, and cook despite her disfigurement from a childhood accident. Each year, the Christmas holidays come with contradictions—cherished memories of a mysterious encounter and painful recollections of a great loss. She lives with the belief that she is beyond love’s reach, until a dark-eyed cowboy arrives broken, bruised, and bent on changing her mind. Wil Bergman wakes in a stranger’s home with a busted leg, a bullet-creased scalp, and no horse. Trail-weary, robbed, and penniless, his dreams and plans for a future are suddenly unattainable. Forced to recuperate in the home of a country doctor, he finds himself at the mercy of a surgeon whose sister’s healing touch has power to stitch up his lonely heart and open his eyes to the impossible. 

 Releases Nov. 1, 2018

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The Widow of Rose Hill

by Michelle Shocklee

Widowed during the war, Natalie Ellis finds herself solely responsible for Rose Hill plantation. When Union troops arrive with a proclamation freeing the slaves, all seems lost. How can she run the plantation without slaves? In order to save her son’s inheritance she strikes a deal with the arrogant, albeit handsome, Colonel Maish. In exchange for use of her family’s property, the army will provide workers to bring in her cotton crop. But as her admiration for the colonel grows, a shocking secret is uncovered. Can she trust him with her heart and her young, fatherless son?

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Safe Refuge

by Pamela S Meyers

In two days, wealthy Chicagoan, Anna Hartwell, will wed a man she loathes. She would refuse this arranged marriage to Lyman Millard, but the Bible clearly says she is to honor her parents, and Anna would do most anything to please her father--even leaving her teaching job at a mission school and marrying a man she doesn't love. The Great Chicago Fire erupts, and Anna and her family escape with only the clothes on their backs and the wedding postponed. Father moves the family to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, where Anna reconnects with Rory Quinn, a handsome immigrant who worked at the mission school. Realizing she is in love with Rory, Anna prepares to break the marriage arrangement with Lyman until she learns a dark family secret that changes her life forever. 

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Redeeming Light

by Marilyn Turk

Cora Miller is a widow who moves with her young daughter to St. Augustine, Florida, to start life over as a single mother. She opens a millinery shop to court the tastes of the wealthy and become part of the town’s social elite. Wealthy tourist Daniel Worthington’s mother and sister prove to be customers she needs. But Daniel is more interested in the Indian captives at the fort than in frivolities like hats.

He sees Cora as shallow, especially when she shows an attraction to his reckless friend Sterling. But when Cora joins a women’s benevolence group who visits the Indians, his opinion of her begins to change. However, just when they are becoming friends, she is caught with missing jewelry, including his mother’s.

Will Cora’s reputation and business be ruined, or will someone come to her defense?

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The Great Lakes Lighthouse Brides Collection
with Kathy Rouser

The Great Lakes Lighthouse Brides Collection

Lighthouses have long been the symbol of salvation, warning sailors away from dangerous rocks and shallow waters.

Along the Great Lakes, America’s inland seas, lighthouses played a vital role in the growth of our nation. They shepherded settlers traveling by water to places that had no roads. These beacons of light required constant tending even in remote and often dangerous places. Brave men and women battled the elements and loneliness to keep the lights shining. Their sacrifice kept goods and immigrants moving. Seven romances set between 1883 and 1911 bring hope to these lonely keepers and love to weary hearts. The Last Memory is Kathleen Rouser's novella in this collection: Natalie Brooks loses her past to amnesia, and Cal Waterson, the lighthouse keeper who rescues her, didn’t bargain on risking his heart—when her past might change everything.

Releases November 1, 2018

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The Swaddling Clothes
by Amber Schamel

Through the ages, many stories have been told about Mary, Joseph and the birth of the Messiah. Stories of shepherds and sheep, kings, angels, and stables. But there is one story that has never been told. One story that has remained hidden in the fabric of time. The story of The Swaddling Clothes.
Mentioned not once, but several times in the Scriptural text, what is the significance of these special cloths? And how did they make their way into a stable in Bethlehem? From the author that brought you the Days of Messiah series comes a whole new adventure critics are calling "intriguing...thought provoking... a fresh twist on an age old story
A great holiday read that will bring the Christmas story to life.

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A Prince Came Calling

by Martha Rogers

All little girls love playing princess, and while watching princess movies with her nieces, Brianna Newcomb dreams of her own Prince Charming sweeping her off her feet. When she meets Damien Penland, sparks ignite and love blooms until she learns he is a real prince from a small country in Europe. When their relationship hits the news and social media, he is ordered home, and Brie expects to never see him again. However, a little bit of scheming by Damien’s American grandmother brings them back together in his homeland. Will their love flare up again and brighten their lives even as the fireworks light up the 

night in a special celebration for his grandmother, the Queen? 

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The Abolitionist's Daughter

by Kathleen L. Maher

The crusading daughter of a Washington politician, Marietta Hamilton comes between twin brothers as the country plunges toward Civil War. Horse traders from Virginia, Ethan Sharpe and his brother Devon would defend their livelihood from her interfering kind. When love ignites, friends become enemies separated over the course of a long and brutal conflict. Can the very influences which carved a chasm unite a torn family against all odds? 

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Cowboy Charm School

By Margaret Brownley

When Texas Ranger Brett Tucker accidentally derails a wedding, he’s determined to bring the estranged couple back together…but he never dreamed he’d start falling for the bride!

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The LAST Doolittle Raid Post!! (PLUS a Giveaway!)

The Dramatic Rescue of Doolittle's Lost Crews

Cindy K. Stewart and I have been tag-teaming to fill you in on the exciting adventures of the Doolittle Raiders. And it’s been my favorite kind of tag team—the kind where she does the bulk of the work! 😊 (You’ll find her final Doolittle Raid post here). But I have a special claim on Planes Six and Sixteen, “Doolittle’s Lost Crews,” as their story inspired my debut novel, The Plum Blooms in Winter. Since my novel will finally be available for pre-order this coming week—YAAY!—Cindy agreed I could have the last word. 😊

If you've been following this blog, by now you have the background. Just six months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, sixteen of the Army's medium-weight B-25 bombers left the deck of the carrier U.S.S. Hornet—a feat never attempted before or since. They deployed their payloads on Tokyo and other key targets on the Japanese main island. 

A B-25 leaves the U.S.S. Hornet's deck

While the mission achieved its military objective, due to a communication breakdown the sortie left seventy-two of the eighty airmen stranded in enemy-occupied China. Eight men—the crew of Plane #16, the Bat Out of Hell, and the three survivors of Plane #6, the Green Hornet—were captured by the Japanese.

Anyone who saw the movie or read the book Unbroken will have a general picture of what these men endured. But where Louis Zamperini was a prisoner for a little more than two years, Doolittle’s “lost crews” remained in Japanese prison camps

… for forty long months, 34 of them in solitary confinement. We were imprisoned and beaten, half-starved, terribly tortured, and denied by solitary confinement even the comfort of association with one another. Three of my buddies were executed by a firing squad about six months after our capture and fourteen months later, another one of them died of slow starvation.… The bitterness of my heart against my captors seemed more than I could bear. 

—Corporal Jacob DeShazer in his tract I Was a Prisoner of Japan

A lurid wartime poster features an image of Doolittle Raider Lieutenant Robert Hite, captive, April, 1942

Sadly, of those eight men, only four came home. I’ve summarized the rest of their story, and how God used that tragedy for His glory, here and here. 

The Empire of Japan Surrenders

On the morning of August 15, 1945, the entire population of Japan… were told that at noon they must stop whatever they were doing and listen to the radio…. What the people of Japan heard that day at noon was not just unexpected, it was unimaginable…. A voice spoke—a voice they’d never heard before…. It spoke an odd form of Japanese, a dialect hundreds of years old that very few could understand clearly. For the first time in the history of the Chrysanthemum Throne, the emperor was speaking directly to his subjects.  

The voice told them: senso owari, the war is over. It said that the emperor was no longer the Son of Heaven, but an ordinary man…. The voice said it was time for the Yamato race to “endure the unendurable, and bear the unbearable.”

—The First Heroes (Craig Nelson, 2002)

In this indirect language, the people of Japan learned of their nation’s surrender. But while jubilation filled the streets of America at the news, it posed a serious question for the more than 80,000 Allied P.O.W.s still in Japanese hands, and for the captured Doolittle Raiders. 

Orders for a Massacre

The Japanese had regularly and publicly announced that, if they lost the war, they would kill every Allied P.O.W. under their control.

—The First Heroes (Craig Nelson, 2002)

The P.O.W.s were well aware of this policy. This so-called “kill-all order” was no joke. It had in fact been enacted on a few occasions when the Japanese surrendered ground: on Wake Island and on Palawan Island in the Philippines. How to ensure the order wasn’t carried out on a massive scale at the Japanese’ final surrender?

This challenge was assumed by the Office of Strategic Services (O.S.S.), the predecessor to the C.I.A. In the months preceding the surrender, the O.S.S. conducted painstaking research into the locations of Japanese prison camps. Immediately after the surrender, bombers began dropping cartons of supplies into the camps.

On August 17, 1945, just two days after the surrender, seven O.S.S. operatives parachuted onto an airfield in Beijing, China. They were surrounded at once by enemy soldiers brandishing rifles, bayonets leveled.

The Americans’ leader, Major Nichols, told the Japanese commander through his interpreter, “The war is over, and we are here to get the prisoners.”

“The war is not over yet,” the Japanese lieutenant responded, and ordered the Americans onto a truck.

Prisoners Released... Except...

The lieutenant’s stance was echoed by his superiors. Two anxious days passed before Major Nichols’ hard-nosed insistence produced the desired result. Hundreds of P.O.W.s were released from their cells and bussed to hotels in Beijing.

However, one set of prisoners were not released along with the rest. The eight captured Doolittle Raiders had been convicted in a kangaroo-court procedure and given special status as “war criminals.” The Japanese had no intention of releasing them.

The Tincup News Service

But praise God, the veil of secrecy behind which the surviving Raiders were held had its chinks. Starting in early 1944, the Raiders were able to exchange messages with a group of U.S. Marines including Commander Scott Cunningham. The messages traveled etched into the bottom of the tin cups that made their rounds through the prison meal service. Upon his release from the prison in Peiping, Commander Cunningham was quick to spread the news that four of Doolittle’s lost crew members were alive and still in prison.

…Cunningham was sure they would never be released… Major Nichols showed Japanese officials the results of his P.O.W. debriefings. He demanded they confess fully to their crimes of torturing, starving, and killing their captives. After confronting them… he demanded that they release the “war criminals” at once. 

—The First Heroes (Craig Nelson, 2002)

Return to Freedom

And so the remaining four Raiders, malnourished to a point of delirium and close to death, found themselves transported to the five-star Peiping Grand Hotel… and back into a life of freedom. George Barr, Jacob DeShazer, Robert Hite and Chase Nielson returned to the U.S. changed men. Here’s how they expressed it in a joint statement:

We were not what you would call religious men before we were captured.... [But in prison] we were given the Bible to read. We found in its ripped and faded pages a source of courage and faith we never realized existed. The verses we memorized as children suddenly came alive and became as vital to us as food.
We put our trust in the God we had not really accepted before and discovered that faith in His Word could carry us through the greatest peril of our lives. 

—Four Came Home (Carroll V. Glines, 1995)

Corporal DeShazer, the former bombardier of the Bat Out of Hell, was transformed by what he read in the Bible. Upon his release, Jake rushed to earn a Bible degree from Seattle Pacific College. In 1948, he returned to Japan with his new bride, Florence, as Free Methodist missionaries.

Corporal Jacob DeShazer upon his release from captivity

Colonel Jacob DeShazer, in a postwar publicity shot

The couple ultimately settled in Nagoya, the very city Jake had bombed during the Doolittle Raid. Their thirty-year ministry in Japan bore fruit in twenty-three church plants and in countless changed hearts.

This time I was not going as a bombardier, but I was going as a missionary. How much better it is to go out to conquer evil with the gospel of peace!

—Jacob DeShazer on his return to Japan

I finally get to give away my own book!! The Plum Blooms in Winter, inspired by a true story from the Doolittle Raid, will be available for pre-order this week. I'll randomly select someone who comments below to receive a complementary copy! The order will be fulfilled on 12/1. Thank you!

I stepped away from a marketing career that spanned continents to write what I love: stories of reckless faith that showcase God's hand in history. I'm so excited to work with the all-star team at Mountain Brook Ink to launch my debut novel, The Plum Blooms in Winter, on December 1! Inspired by a remarkable true story from World War II's pivotal Doolittle Raid, The Plum Blooms in Winter is an American Christian Fiction Writers' Genesis Contest winner. The novel follows a captured American pilot and a bereaved Japanese prostitute who targets him for ritual revenge. Please also feel free to check out my blog, Five Stones and a Sling, which hovers in the region where history meets Bible prophecy meets current events. It's rich ground--we live in a day when prophecies are leaping from the Bible's pages into the headlines!

I live outside Phoenix with my husband, a third-generation airline pilot who doubles as my Chief Military Research Officer. We share our home with two mostly-grown-up kids and a small platoon of housecats. When I'm not writing, you'll find me rollerblading--yes, I know that makes me a throwback 😊--or catching a moonrise, or dreaming of my next trip. Next up: Wales, then Israel.