By John Lindstrom
Publisher
Posted: January 2, 2014 2:26 PM

Among the most repulsive laws ever enacted by the United States government, if not the most repulsive, was the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which gave runaway slaves no protection, even if they were in free states, and gave their bounty hunters extraordinary powers to capture them and return them, and which imposed severe punishment on persons helping escaped slaves. The law was one major step on the path to the Civil War, which erupted 11 years later. And an action that took place on January 2, 1847, in Marshall helped spur that law.

Marshall is more than the Calhoun County seat, home to famous Victorian and Georgian houses, and center of an iconic restaurant and its cheese spread; it is where on that day 167 years ago many members of the town stood against slave hunters, at their own legal peril.

Four years earlier, Adam Crosswhite had led his family to escape from a Kentucky plantation after he had learned his children were to be sold, and settled in Michigan, in Marshall.

On January 2, 1847, several slave catchers and a deputy sheriff arrived in Marshall looking for the Crosswhites. Word quickly spread in town the slave catchers were there. Mr. Crosswhite’s neighbors had already surrounded the house in his and his family’s defense, and they were joined by scores more.

Eventually more than 100 Marshall residents surrounded the house, keeping the slave catchers and the deputy at bay. Tensions rose as the slave catchers and the residents exchanged threats.

Finally, the slave catchers – technically within their rights to seize the Crosswhites – demanded the names of the crowd members. And the crowd members were not cowed. In fact, they gave them their names rather than give up the Crosswhites.

The deputy was both so astonished, and moved, he arrested the slave catchers, which ended the immediate crisis. While the slave catchers were able to post bail, the Marshall residents were able to help the Crosswhites flee into Canada.

That did not end the legal issue. Many of the residents who had defended the Crosswhites were fined for their actions, fines which they paid.

Their willingness to endure that helped lead Congress and then President Millard Fillmore (who was personally opposed to slavery but felt it had constitutional rights to exist) to pass the Fugitive Slave Act, which allowed for any person who sheltered a runaway slave to be jailed for six months and fined $1,000 (close to $30,000 today).

So, when next enjoying a famous cheese spread born in Marshall, remember a moment when so many were willing to risk so much for one family.