In 1845, after several years as an abolitionist, and in order to dispel doubts that a man so knowledgeable and eloquent could have been a slave, Douglass wrote a narrative of his life. In that narrative, for reasons he thought obvious while slavery still existed, he withheld precise details of his escape. Now, in 1881, he has published those details for the first time.

On September 3, 1838, dressed as a sailor—a fairly common occupation for free Blacks in the early 19th century—and armed with an official “sailor’s protection” document borrowed from a friend, Frederick boards a train from Baltimore to Philadelphia. Had the conductor carefully reviewed the document, he would have seen that Frederick did not fit the protected sailor’s description. The document is official, however—it even sports an American eagle insignia—and that apparently is enough to convince the conductor to move on to the next passenger.

Several anxiety-inducing obstacles remain. The passage across the Delaware River from Wilmington to Philadelphia occurs by steamship, and the border between slaveholding Delaware and free Pennsylvania is infested with slave-catchers. Likewise, on more than one occasion Frederick dodges glances from passengers whom he thinks he recognizes and, in at least once instance, who almost certainly recognize him.