This is an early 19th-century horse-powered ferry boat, the kind used by James Ford. |
James Ford also had an association with illegal slaver trader and kidnapper of free blacks, John Hart Crenshaw, and may have taken part in the Illinois version of the Reverse Underground Railroad. At one point, they used the Cave-in-Rock as their headquarters, on the Illinois side of the lower Ohio River, which is approximately 85 miles below Evansville, Indiana.
The Ford and Potts era at Cave-in-Rock ended with the murder of Ford in 1833 by another gang member.
Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.