More than 300 years ago, courageous Africans escaped from enslavement in British colonies. They fledsouthward on foot to Spanish St. Augustine, crossing swamps and dense tropical forests. Along they way,they sought assistance from Natives, thus creating the first ‘underground railroad’.
Not all survived. Those who reached St. Augustine were granted asylum by the Spanish government. It was a unique offer—freedom, in exchange for conversion to Catholicism and, for men, a term of military service. The first freedom seekers arrived in 1687. This group included eight men, two women and a three-year-old nursing child.
