Robert Hughes, oldest resident of Loyalsock Township, whose home along Freedom Road was a station on the famous Underground Railroad in Civil War times, died at his home on June 10, 1941.

A life-long resident of Lycoming County, Mr. Hughes was born about 1856 in the home where his death occurred. He had never lived in any other house.

He was the last individual in this locality to have personal knowledge of the route over which fugitive slaves were smuggled to Canada while fleeing from their Southern owners before the Civil War.

As a boy he assisted his family in feeding and sheltering slaves who were brought to their out-of-the way home in the hollow north of Williamsport to rest and hide until being moved farther north.

Often, he recalled, it was necessary to conceal the fugitives in the thick underbrush and woods about the cottage house.

The runaways were brought here from Northumberland and after resting in concealment with the Hughes family, would be transferred by night to Elmira, Oswego and Canasteo, N.Y., thence into Canada.

Mr. Hughes was the son of Daniel Hughes, a Mohawk Indian, who came here from Canada, participated in Indian encampments at Muncy, and later purchased the land on which the Hughes homestead is now located. His mother was a Negro, whose uncle was the first settler along Freedom Road.

It was the friendliness of Daniel Hughes and wife that prompted them to open their home to the fugitives. In later years they showed similar sentiments in dedicating one acre of their land for a cemetery for Negroes. In this plot is buried 35 to 40 Negroes of the Civil War.

Mr. Hughes was the last of 16 children.

He had retired about 10 years ago after 40 years with the Vallamont Land Company but until his death insisted on acting as caretaker of the small cemetery beside his house.