The Underground Railroad

Chapter 2 Summary

This chapter opens with a runaway enslaved person bulletin by a W.M. Dixon. Dated July 18, 1820, it states that a "negro" girl by the name of Lizzie ran away and may possibly be hiding near the plantation of someone named Mrs. Steel. It offers a $30 reward for Lizzie’s return and threatens the penalty of the law for anyone found to be harboring her.

The chapter begins on Jockey’s birthday, which “only [comes] once or twice a year” (11), and is always on a Sunday, the enslaved people's half day. Birthday feasts are a priority, unless they have obtained a pass to sell wares in town or hired themselves out for day labor: “Impossible was the slave impudent enough to tell a white man he couldn’t work because it was a slave’s birthday” (11).

Cora takes a seat on the hunk of sugar maple in her garden. This is her customary Sunday spot. Cora’s garden tending is not only maintenance, but “also a message that she had not lost her resolve since the day of the hatchet” (12). Cora’s friend Lovey asks her when her birthday would be if she could choose it. Cora proceeds to tell Lovey that she has already told her when she was born.