Harriet Tubman was an American abolitionist and humanitarian who led the Underground Railroad, which helped more than three thousand slaves to freedom in the mid-19th century.
She was a conductor on the Underground Railroad for about 25 years, freeing over 70 slaves. She worked with John Brown and Frederick Douglass to help fugitive slaves escape to freedom.
In 1857, she successfully led a group of people during the successful “Moses” rebellion. In 1864 she was appointed as a Union spy and sent to South Carolina by General Benjamin Butler to incite slave rebellion along with her sisters Anna Murray and Olivia Crayton-Wright, who were also spies. She was also one of several black women who served as nurses during the Civil War.
Tubman has been described as “the most remarkable woman in American History.”
These are her most inspiring quotes that are still relevant today and encourage you to find the leader within you.
29 Harriet Tubman Quotes To Become Your Own Leader
“Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.”
“Never wound a snake; kill it.”
“I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person.”
“Don’t ever stop. Keep going. If you want a taste of freedom, keep going.”
“Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.”
“Stop searching for happiness in the same place you lost it. Change is not dismantling the old, it’s building the new.”
“If you hear the dogs, keep going. If you see the torches in the woods, keep going. If there’s shouting after you, keep going. Don’t ever stop. Keep going. If you want a taste of freedom, keep going.”
“I grew up like a neglected weed – ignorant of liberty, having no experience of it.”
“I started with this idea in my head, “There’s two things I’ve got a right to, death or liberty.”
“I was the conductor of the Underground Railroad for eight years, and I can say what most conductors can’t say; I never ran my train off the track and I never lost a passenger.”
“I had reasoned this out in my mind, there was one of two things I had a right to, liberty or death; if I could not have one, I would have the other.”
“I never had anything good, no sweet, no sugar; and that sugar, right by me, did look so nice, and my mistress’s back was turned to me while she was fighting with her husband, so I just put my fingers in the sugar bowl to take one lump, and maybe she heard me, for she turned and saw me. The next minute, she had the rawhide down.”
“In my dreams and visions, I seemed to see a line, and on the other side of that line were green fields, and lovely flowers, and beautiful white ladies, who stretched out their arms to me over the line, but I couldn’t reach them no-how. I always fell before I got to the line.”
“I never ran my train off the track, and I never lost a passenger.”
“I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person. There was such a glory over everything. The sun came up like gold through the trees, and I felt like I was in heaven.”
“And I prayed to God to make me strong and able to fight, and that’s what I’ve always prayed for ever since.”
“We saw the lightning and that was the guns and then we heard the thunder and that was the big guns; and then we heard the rain falling and that was the blood falling; and when we came to get in the crops, it was dead men that we reaped.”
“There are two things I’ve got a right to, and these are, Death or Liberty – one or the other I mean to have. No one will take me back alive; I shall fight for my liberty, and when the time has come for me to go, the Lord will let them, kill me.”
“I freed a thousand slaves I could have freed a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves.”
“I had reasoned this out in my mind; there was on of two things I had a right to, liberty or death; if I could not have one, I would have the other; for no man should take me alive.”
“Slavery is the next thing to hell.”
“I said to the Lord, I’m going to hold steady on to you, and I know you will see me through.”
“I would fight for my liberty so long as my strength lasted, and if the time came for me to go, the Lord would let them take me.”
“You’ll be free or die!“
“I had crossed the line. I was free; but there was no one to welcome me to the land of freedom. I was a stranger in a strange land.”
“I was the conductor of the Underground Railroad for eight years, and I can say what most conductors can’t say; I never ran my train off the track and I never lost a passenger.”
“I can’t die but once.”
“It wasn’t me, it was the Lord! I always told Him, ‘I trust to you. I don’t know where to go or what to do, but I expect You to lead me,’ and He always did.”
