For Ellen and William Craft, two people escaping their enslaver in 1848, all was going according to plan. That is, until they reached Baltimore. At the ticket counter of the B&O Railroad’s historic Mount Clare Station, William was told he’d need the bond of a White man deemed respectable enough to certify his voyage. But the couple was well-prepared. Ellen, a Black woman with a light complexion, had chopped her hair and donned a fashionable suit.
