Anti-Slavery Influence from Oberlin

Another anti-slavery influence came from areas around Wayne County from towns such as Oberlin. Conveniently located on a direct route to lake Erie, Oberlin was a hotbed of abolitionist sentiments. This small town is most well known for the Wellington-Oberlin Slave rescue of 1858, when a fugitive slave living in Oberlin, John Price, was taken by force by slave hunters to the nearby town of Wellington. There he awaited a train that would transport him back to Kentucky and back to slavery. In response to this, a mob of Oberlin citizens traveled to Wellington and rescued Price by carrying him out of a window in the building where he was being kept. [1]