rodbigelow@netzero.net 
BACK TO BIGELOW HOME PAGE
Children of Thaddeus and Eliza (Baker) Bigelow:
16C41.371 Genevieve, b 1861; res. Albany, NY.
16C41.372 Jeremiah, b 1864.
Sources:
Bigelow Family Genealogy Volume. II page 281;
Howe, Bigelow Family of America;
"The Underground Railroad Conductor"; by Tom Calarco; pg 42;
Chapter Six Legendary Stops in Rensselaer County
Today in Troy, most Underground Railroad landmarks like
the old Liberty Street Church are gone. For some years before its destruction,
it had been a laundromat, but all that remains is a vacant lot at the corner
of a rundown alleyway. Along with it, the residence of freedomseeker William
Henry, where fellow freedomseeker Charles Nolle lived is but an empty plot
of grass; Fayette Shipherd's Free Church and the Bethel Church are gone;
the buildings where Troy stationmaster and black community leader William
Rich had his hairdressing salon and residence have been torn down; and
the location of Abel Brown's home is unknown. Of two houses that remain on
actual locations, both have question marks. The first is the 153 Second Street
house that was home to freedomseeker Lewis Washington—Abel Brown's traveling
and lecturing companion—and afterwards to freedomseeker John H. Hooper,
a laborer and cousin of Harriet Tubman, who lived at the location from 1847-to-1888.
But it has not been determined if the present building dates from that period.
The other building is the site of Trojan Hardware Company at 137 Fourth Street,
where Henry Garnet resided during part of his eight years in Troy.
Troy's textile and shipping industry made it a natural
destination along the Underground Railroad, considering the frequent use
of waterways for the transport of freedomseekers. An important thoroughfare,
which began in Troy and led north to Lake Champlain and steamships
bound for Canada, was the Champlain Canal whose use by freedomseekers
is documented at least as early as 1837 ("Story of a slave ...8), and whose
regular use is revealed in the previously-mentioned 1840 letter of Rev. Fayette
Shipherd.
White abolitionists here also had a close relationship
with the black community. Rev. Nathan Sidney Beman and Customs House official
Thaddeus Bigelow were among the organizers of the Liberty Street Church,
the most important black church in Troy during the antebellum period. Dedicated
in 1834 by New York City Underground Railroad leader Rev. Theodore Wright,
it was used only as a Sunday School until 1840, when Bigelow and blacks
William Rich, and Alexander Thuey were ii:iined trustees ("History of Bethel
. . ."; Wiese Troy's One Hundred . . . I iO). A year later the important
black leader Henry Garnet became its pastor [Several biographies of Garnet
are available, and additional information about him is in The Underground
Railroad in the Adirondack
Region"
rodbigelow@netzero.net