The following article was found in the TIMES

The following article was found in the TIMES-NEWS on November 27, 1977, p. 1 Section C:

This Octagon house on Liberty St. in Conneaut once served as a station along the underground railroad and is mentioned in the book "Underground to Freedom:" recently written by Ashtabula Attorney Robert Fuller. The stations served as hiding places for fugitive slaves as they made their way to freedom prior to the Civil War.

ASTABULA - Robert H. Fuller, an Ashtabula attorney, has authored a book accounting the anti-slavery activities that took place in Ashtabula County prior to the Civil War.
     The book is entitled "Underground Railroad" that existed in the County. The railroad aided fleeing slaves as they made their way to Canada and elsewhere.
     The book was printed by the Gazette Printing Co. of Jefferson.
     Fuller traces the anti-slavery movement in Ashtabula County was so militant in the years just before the war that residents defied Federal authorities who came into the area to arrest fugitives from Harpers Ferry.
    "The operation of the Underground Railroad was very efficient in Ashtabula County," Fuller writes. "It was the boast that no slave had ever been recaptured there. The slave catchers were warned that "they might as well attempt to get a saint out of heaven as a slave out of Austinburg.

     The attorney's 32 page narrative was taken largely from compilations of writings of the late E. C. Lampson, editor of The Jefferson Gazette from his booklet, John Brown in Ashtabula County, and from two other Lampson writings.
     Fuller was born in Connecticut and moved to Ashtabula as a teenager. After being graduated from Harbor High School he attended Allegheny College and then received his law degree from Cornell. A member of the County Historical Society, he has been a practicing attorney since 1929.
     "Ashtabula County played a large role in precipitating the Civil War." Fuller says. "My book may perhaps help lead to the construction of a shrine to those people who operated the underground railroad and helped to obtain freedom for the blacks.

This Web Page has been created to promote the City of Conneaut, Ohio by Sharon Wick 2002