Margaret "Mag" Palm

Margaret Palm (née Devid) was born in Pennsylvania or Maryland, sometime in the year 1829. She grew up in the Adams County Almshouse; the Almshouse opened in 1819 on 91 acres of farmland with the purpose of providing housing to the poor, sick, and mentally ill. Eventually, she would move to George Toot’s farm; it is possible that she was adopted or fostered by Toot and worked on the farm. 

Margaret married Alfred Palm, but when they wed is unknown. They had three children – Joseph, Sarah, and Alfred. It is thought that Joseph died during childhood. Palm made her living as a washerwoman and domestic servant, while her husband worked as a laborer. Palm also functioned as a conductor on the Underground Railroad, leading runaway enslaved people through Gettysburg to the North. 

It is possible that Palm’s activities with the Underground Railroad led to her attempted kidnapping in 1858 in a bid to stop her. One day in February, as the newspaper account goes, Palm was doing the washing at a client’s, Joseph Tuckey, home. Upon leaving in the evening, she was seized by three men who tied her hands and tried to put her in a horse-drawn carriage and presumably take her South. Being a strong muscular woman, she fought them and scared them off with her cries. There were even rumors that during the struggle she bit off one of her snatcher’s thumbs. Palm made a statement to a lawyer naming Ferdinand Buckingham, Philip Snyder, and Tuckey as her abductors and brought them to court. She won her case. 

At the time of the Battle of Gettysburg, Palm and Alfred were renting a house from Abraham Brian, a fellow African American townsperson. Being all too familiar with the perils of being abducted into slavery, Palm and her family fled town ahead of the Confederate Army’s arrival. 

The Palms returned to Gettysburg and remained there for the rest of their lives. In 1879, Palm suffered bad health and reportedly attempted suicide. Palm died on October 25, 1896, at the age of about 67 of heart issues. She is buried in Lincoln Cemetery in Gettysburg. Her husband, Alfried, died some years later in 1903.