In later years, when New England became generally sympathetic, numerous lines of escape traversed that entire section.

Other courses extended northward from the vicinity of Philadelphia, Delaware, and Maryland.

Here, through the center of American Quakerdom, all conditions favored the escape of fugitives, for slavery and freedom were at close quarters.

The activities of the Quakers, who were at first engaged merely in preventing the reenslavement of those who had a legal right to freedom, naturally expanded until aid was given without reservation to any fugitive.

From Philadelphia as a distributing point the route went by way of New York and the Hudson River or up the river valleys of eastern Pennsylvania through western New York.
In addition to the routes to freedom which the seacoast and river valleys afforded, the Appalachian chain of mountains formed an attractive highway of escape from slavery, though these mountain paths lead us to another branch of our subject not immediately connected with the Underground Railroad--the escape from bondage by the initiative of the slaves themselves or by the aid of their own people.