An enslaved man who fled Arkansas in 1841 seeking freedom in Canada, only to be forcibly returned to the U.S., has been honored with a historical marker and a new street sign in the city where he once labored.
The unprecedented 1842 extradition of Nelson Hackett from Canada on a theft charge sparked an uproar in the British colony, which had long been viewed as a safe haven for escaped slaves. Months later, the British government enacted policies that “made similar extraditions extremely difficult,” according to the Nelson Hackett Project, a digital work of public scholarship helmed by the University of Arkansas Humanities Center.
