1854 – Fugitive Slave Anthony Burns is Returned to Slavery

On June 3, 1854, Anthony Burns, a formerly enslaved man who escaped to Boston, was ordered returned to slavery under the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. His courtroom trial drew massive public attention and protests. Federal troops were used to escort Burns back to a ship bound for Virginia, a display that cost the government over $40,000—an enormous sum at the time. The injustice of the event fueled abolitionist sentiments across the North, leading many moderates to embrace anti-slavery activism. Boston\’s Black community and white allies continued efforts to free him, and within a year, his freedom was purchased. Burns later became a minister and a symbol of the injustice of slavery. His case exposed the brutality of the Fugitive Slave Law and became a flashpoint in the growing national debate that would lead to the Civil War.