Answer:Battling slave catchers and dangerous swamps, they helped establish the first American underground railroad more than a century before the Civil War. Courageous Africans and their Indian allies shuttled runaways southward, rather than to the north, as the later railroad would. In Florida the Spanish freed the fugitives in return for their service to the King and their conversion to the Catholic faith. The Spanish were glad to have skilled laborers, and the freedmen were also welcome additions to St. Augustine’s weak military forces. In 1738 the Spanish governor established the runaways in their own fortified town, Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose, about two miles north of St. Augustine, Florida. Mose (pronounced “Moh- say”) became the first legally sanctioned free black town in the present-day United States, and it is a critically important site for Black American history. Mose provides important evidence that Black American colonial history was much more than slavery and oppression. The men and women of Mose won their liberty through great daring and effort and made important contributions to Florida’s multi-ethic heritage.
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