Harriet Tubman (born Araminta Ross. c. 1822 – March 10, 1913) was an American abolitionist, humanitarian, and an armed scout and spy for the United States Army during the American Civil War. Born into slavery, Tubman escaped and subsequently made some thirteen missions to rescue approximately seventy enslaved people, family and friends, using the network of antislavery activists and safe houses known as the Underground Railroad. She later helped abolitionist John Brown recruit men for his raid on Harpers Ferry, and in the post-war era was an active participant in the struggle for women's suffrage.	Born a slave in Dorchester County, Maryland, Tubman was beaten and whipped by her various masters as a child. Early in life, she suffered a traumatic head wound when an irate slave owner threw a heavy metal weight intending to hit another slave and hit her instead. The injury caused dizziness, pain, and spells of hypersomnia, which occurred throughout her life. She was a devout Christian and experienced strange visions and vivid dreams, which she ascribed to premonitions from God.	In 1849, Tubman escaped to Philadelphia, then immediately returned to Maryland to rescue her family. Slowly, one group at a time, she brought relatives with her out of the state, and eventually guided dozens of other slaves to freedom. Traveling by night and in extreme secrecy, Tubman (or "Moses", as she was called) "never lost a passenger". After the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was passed, she helped guide fugitives farther north into British North America, and helped newly freed slaves find work.	When the Civil War began, Tubman worked for the Union Army, first as a cook and nurse, and then as an armed scout and spy. The first woman to lead an armed expedition in the war, she guided the raid at Combahee Ferry, which liberated more than 700 slaves. After the war, she retired to the family home on property she had purchased in 1859 in Auburn, New York, where she cared for her aging parents. She was active in the women's suffrage movement until illness overtook her and she had to be admitted to a home for elderly African Americans that she had helped to establish years earlier. After she died in 1913, she became an icon of American courage and freedom.  © Wikipedia

Circa 1820 – Harriet Ross Tubman, born Araminta “Minty” Ross, was born a slave in the plantation of Edward Brodess in Dorchester County, Maryland. Her mother was Harriet “Rit” Green owned by Mary Pattison Brodess; and her father was Ben Ross owned by Anthony Thomson.
1825 – Young Araminta was hired out to other households. Her first outside job was as a nursemaid where she was violently and frequently beaten when she let the baby cry. She was then hired to set muskrat traps. Because of the nature of the job she fell ill and was sent back to Brodess.
1833 – Araminta was severely injured in the head with a heavy metal weight aimed at a runaway slave.  After the injury she started having seizures which affected her for the rest of her life. She started having premonitions and vivid dreams, she said that God communicated with her.
1840 – Her father, Ben Ross, was manumitted when he turned 45 years old. She found out that her mother’s owner’s will stipulated that she and her children be manumitted when she reached 45 years old. Brodess refused to honor the will, leaving Araminta a slave.
1844 – Around 1844, she married a free black man named John Tubman. Tubman changed her name from Araminta to Harriet soon after her marriage (the exact timing is unclear) as a possible homage to a relative. Although little is known about John or their time together, the union was complicated because of Harriet’s slave status. Since the mother's status dictated that of children, any children born to Harriet and John would be enslaved. Such blended marriages – free people of color marrying enslaved people – were not uncommon on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, where by this time, half the black population was free. Most African-American families had both free and enslaved members.
1849 – Harriet fell ill. Her owner, Brodess, died leaving the plantation in a dire financial situation. Three of her sisters, Linah, Soph and Mariah Ritty, were sold.
September 17 – Harriet and her brothers, Ben and Henry, escaped from the Poplar Neck Plantation. Ben and Henry had second thoughts and returned to the plantation. The newspaper The Cambridge Democrat published a $300 reward for the return of Harriet and her two brothers. Harriet travelled 90 miles to Pennsylvania, a free state, using the Underground Railroad.
She changed her name to Harriet in honor of her mother and took her husband’s last name, Tubman.
1850 – Passage of the Fugitive Slave Law as part of the Compromise of 1850. Started working with Quaker abolitionist Thomas Garrett and Frederick Douglass
December 1850 – Using her connections in the Underground Railroad, Harriet took her first trip to guide a family in their journey to freedom. Her niece, Kessiah, her husband, John Bowley, and their two children were freed from the bondage of slavery.
1851 – Returned for her husband but he refused to leave. He stayed in Dorchester County with his new wife Caroline.
The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 made Tubman re-route the Underground Railroad to Canada. For the next six years her base of operation was in North Street, St. Catherines, Ontario.
1858 – Tubman met John Brown. She helped recruit supporters for the Harper’s Ferry attack. Brown called her “General Tubman”.
1859 – Harper’s Ferry Raid. John Brown was executed in December.
Abolitionist and US Senator, William H Seward, sold Tubman a piece of land on the outskirts of Auburn, New York for $1,200. It became her home for the rest of her life.
1860 – She took her last mission to rescue her sister. When she arrived she found out that she had died. Instead she took the Ennals family.
Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the United States.
1861 – Beginning of the American Civil War. Tubman worked as a cook and nurse in South Carolina and Florida.
Tubman helped General David Hunter recruit former slaves for a regiment of African American soldiers. She served as a spy and scout under the command of Col. James Montgomery.
1863 – Tubman became the first woman to lead an assault during the Civil War in the Combahee River Raid where 700 slaves where set free.
President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation setting slaves in the Confederacy free.
1865 – End of the Civil War. Tubman returned home to Auburn, New York.
1869 – Harriet Tubman married Nelson Davis, 22 years younger than she is. 
Sarah Hopkins Bradford published a biography of Tubman, Scenes in the Life of Harriet Tubman. She got $1,200 from its publication.
1873 – Tubman borrowed money from a friend to buy gold. Before the exchange Tubman was attacked and her money stolen. (It was a swindle operation and the perpetrators were never caught.)  She was seriously injured but recovered.
1874 – The couple adopted a baby girl named Gertie.
1880 – Tubman’s house in Auburn was destroyed by fire. No one was hurt. Nelson Davis, Tubman’s second husband, was a brick maker and helped rebuild her house. He replaced the original wood structure with brick, making it stronger and longer lasting.
1886 – Bradford published a second biography, Harriet, the Moses of her People. 
October 18, 1888 – Husband Nelson Davis died.
1890’s –  After years of haggling, Tubman finally started to receive a pension from the government.  In 1890, two years after the death of her second husband, a law was passed under which Tubman was eligible to receive a war veteran widow’s pension of $8 a month.
    On January 19, 1899 bill HR4982 proposed an increase of her current pension to $25 a month for her services as a nurse in the U.S. Army.
     On February 7, 1899 the Senate objected to the increase. While acknowledging her service and dedication to the country as a nurse, it argued that the number of nurses on the pension roll at a rate higher than $12 a month was very few and that there were no valid reasons why Tubman should receive a pension of $25 a month which would open pension increases for others. The Committee of Pensions instead decided that her widow pension would be increased to $20 a month in consideration of her personal services to the country.
    The Act was approved by Congress on February 28, 1899 and Tubman received $20 a month until her death.
1898 – Tubman became involved in women’s suffrage giving speeches in Boston, New York and Washington.
1898 -- Unable to sleep, Tubman underwent brain surgery at Boston’s Massachusetts General Hospital. She refused anesthesia and instead chewed on a bullet just like she had seen soldiers do when they had a leg amputated.
1903 – Tubman donated her property to the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church in Auburn to be converted into a home for the “aged and indigent colored people.”
1908 – Harriet Tubman Home for the aged celebrated its opening.
1913 – Harriet Tubman died of pneumonia, she was 93. She was buried with military honors at Fort Hill Cemetery in Auburn, New York.

And Still We Rise (part One): Harriet Tubman

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