Health Freedom Walk Route 2006

The Simpsonville Freetown Legacy Trail

The Freedom walk was held on April 22, 2006 starting at the Locust United Methodist Church. On August 10, 1869, a deed was written in which Mr. Jeremiah Wilson, for the sum of twenty-five dollars ($25) was granted on half-acre of land at the present site of this church.

The walk proceeded down Harriet Tubman Lane in Simpsonville, MD. Harriet Tubman High School which opened in 1948 before the Cooksville High School closed. Students were bused from all over Howard County to the only High School available to African Americans.

Then the course passed the Indian Cave across the street from Middle Patuxent Creek. Legend has it that before the Civil War, a group of about nine runaway slaves hid themselves in the cave near Route 32 and Cedar lane. Either intentionally or inadvertently, they avoided destroying a spider web at the mouth of the cave. When bounty hunters rode by, they shouted that the runaways could not be in the cave because the spider web was not disturbed.

The course then wound passed the Simpsonville Mill circa 1850 and passed the Quaker Safe House. The original Quaker Safe House burned down and was replaced circa 1890. Harriett Tubman was known to have stayed at Quaker Safe Houses.

The Course continued along Cedar Lane to Freetown Road. It is reported that in 1845, a slave owner- Nicholas Worthington, upon his death, freed his 17 slaves and gave them 150 acres of land which became known as Freetown.

The Course ends at Locust Cemetery back at the Locust United Methodist Church. Oral history says that Harriett Tubman and fleeing slaves hid and rested at the gravesites.