Wickerham Inn: Along the Road to Freedom
The Wickerham Inn, shown here c. 1895, was built in 1800–1801 by Peter Wickerham along Old Zane’s Trace. Operating as a stagecoach stop and tavern, it also served during that same period as an important stop on the Underground Railroad in Adams County, Ohio. Source: Adams County Historical Society.
Built between 1801 and 1805 by Revolutionary War veteran Peter Wickerham (1756-1841), the Wickerham Inn was a stagecoach stop and tavern along Zane’s Trace in Adams County, Ohio. One of the region’s oldest surviving brick structures, the inn became part of a hidden network of abolitionist families who offered shelter, food, and protection to freedom seekers fleeing slavery in Kentucky, Virginia, and beyond. Guided by their antislavery Covenanter (Reformed Presbyterian) faith, the Wickerham family and their allies risked their livelihoods to aid those traveling north through Ohio’s Appalachian foothills.
Routes to Freedom:
The Wickerham Inn’s location made it an ideal refuge at the intersection of two Underground Railroad routes. Zane’s Trace, Ohio’s first major road, carried travelers north from West Union through Locust Grove, passing directly by the inn. Once a frontier highway for settlers and stagecoaches, the road became a discreet pathway for those fleeing slavery.
A second path, known locally as Ripley’s Eastern Route, began in Ripley, Ohio—an abolitionist stronghold where conductors such as John P. Parker and Rev. John Rankin helped freedom seekers cross the Ohio River. From Ripley, travelers moved inland through Red Oak, Decatur, Cherry Fork, Mt. Leigh, and Tranquility before converging near the Wickerham property. From this point, conductors guided them into Highland County and the upland communities around Sinking Spring.
An Interracial Network of Faith and Family
The Wickerham family’s antislavery convictions grew from their Covenanter tradition, a branch of the Reformed Presbyterian Church whose members condemned slavery and disciplined slaveholding within their congregations. John Wickerham, an elder in the church, and his brother Jacob Wickerham—who later settled in nearby Sinking Spring—are documented participants in Underground Railroad activity. Their work was sustained by an extended kinship abolitionist network that connected Adams, Brown, and Highland counties influenced by faith and family. Through their connections to the Platter and McCague families, significant relationships were formed; for instance, Catherine “Kitty” Platter, the niece of Peter Wickerham’s wife, Mary Magdalene Platter Wickerham, wed Thomas McCague. Additionally, Thomas’s younger brother, James McCague, became Jacob Wickerham’s brother-in-law in Sinking Spring. Known affectionately as “Aunt Kitty,” Catherine McCague and her husband were actively involved in the Underground Railroad in Brown County, collaborating closely with African American conductor John P. Parker in Ripley. The McCague family were also linked to the dramatic escape of Eliza Harris, a story later immortalized in Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Both Jacob Wickerham and James McCague continued guiding freedom seekers northward into Highland County, further demonstrating their own religious convictions, and marriage alliances.
A Story of Escape and Courage
An 1894 letter written by Peter N. Wickerham preserves a vivid account of an Underground Railroad escape that unfolded at Sinking Spring in 1844 and directly involved the Wickerham family. Written decades later, Wickerham recalled how an African American conductor named Jason arrived at his family’s home with a freedom seeker whose pursuers were close behind. As he explained, “Jason brought to my father’s house at Sinking Spring a fleeing slave whose pursuers were hot upon his tracks.” The man was quickly hidden in a neighbor’s barn, “hastily secreted in a haymow,” just as his owner and a posse from West Union, “with William Lee as leader,” arrived to search the Village. Wickerham remembered that the slave hunters believed the fugitive was being protected by local abolitionists and regarded his father as “a leader” among them. According to his account, the Kentuckian leading the search “bribed Indian Tom and others of the baser sort to act as pickets and to assist in the search.” Some members of the party trampled the hay and probed it with pitchforks, narrowly missing the hidden man. After the searchers withdrew, Wickerham wrote that the conductors quickly moved him from the haymow and concealed him beneath the flooring of another neighbor’s barn. For three days and nights, the village—home to about 150 residents—was “picketed and patrolled by the slave hunting gang.” On the fourth night, members of the local network devised a deliberate diversion. Wickerham recalled that “two horsemen with a lead horse between them rode in front of Dubar’s house on the main street,” at which point “a colored person emerged and mounting the spare horse, went galloping northward.” The diversion drew the attention of the pickets, whose gunfire Wickerham remembered hearing as they rushed back for orders. At the same moment, he wrote, “the real fugitive … dressed in my mother’s gown and bonnet was taken out of town by a back street.” The decoy rider—identified by Wickerham as John Weyer in disguise—later met the freedom seeker at an agreed upon location, and together they “proceeded in safety until he reached the settlement of Friends where the slave catchers deemed it useless to follow.” Wickerham’s account offers a rare firsthand description of the intricate planning, secrecy, and interracial collaboration that characterized the Underground Railroad in Appalachian Ohio. It emphasizes the significant contributions of African American conductors, women in abolitionist households, and extended family networks in their efforts to thwart slave catchers and assist freedom seekers on their journey to safety. Additionally, the Wickerhams maintained strong connections with the Ammen family from Sinking Spring and Ripley, which further integrated the Ohio riverfront Underground Railroad operators with the inland communities along Zane’s Trace. The marriage of Eve Ammen, daughter of conductor Daniel Ammen, into the Wickerham family solidified the bonds between Ripley’s abolitionist community and the inland conductors operating within this vital corridor. In Ripley, Daniel Ammen took on the role of publisher for Rev. John Rankin’s influential Letters on Slavery, a significant series of writings in which Rankin advocated for the immediate abolition of slavery during a period when many reformers favored colonization or gradual emancipation. In 1900, Adams County historian Nelson Wiley Evans described the Underground Railroad network in this area as “almost a family affair,” noting the strong connections among the conductors along the route.
Family Ties and Shared Faith
The Wickerhams also maintained close ties with the Ammen family of Sinking Spring and Ripley, part of a broader Presbyterian abolitionist network that linked Ohio riverfront Underground Railroad operators with inland communities along Zane’s Trace. Eve Ammen, daughter of Underground Railroad conductor Daniel Ammen, married into the Wickerham family, reinforcing ties between Ripley’s abolitionist circle and inland conductors along this corridor. In Ripley, Daniel Ammen served as publisher of Rev. John Rankin’s influential Letters on Slavery, a nationally significant series of writings in which Rankin argued for the immediate abolition of slavery at a time when many reformers still promoted colonization or gradual emancipation. Writing in 1900, Adams County historian Nelson W. Evans described the Underground Railroad line through this region as “almost a family affair,” noting how closely connected conductors were along the route.
Erected 1977 by Adams County Historical Society and the Ohio Historical Society in 1977, this historical marker notes that “Runaway slaves were hidden here when the “Underground Railroad” was in operation.” Source: Mark Hilton, September 9, 2017, Th Historical Marker Database.
Legacy and Recognition
Like many Underground Railroad sites, the Wickerham Inn operated in plain sight. Taverns and stagecoach stops along Zane’s Trace provided natural cover for travelers whose presence might otherwise arouse suspicion. Oliver Treber, whose family also kept an inn along Zanes Trace, later recalled that “two miles south of Locust Grove, the Wickerhams were active.” Treber’s father, himself a staunch antislavery man, rebuked proslavery guests, declaring that they “had no more right to own those men than he had to own the southern men themselves.” After the inn ceased operating around 1850, it remained in the Wickerham family for generations. During the Civil War, the Wickerham Inn was briefly occupied by Confederate soldiers led by Brigadier General John Hunt Morgan, creating a stark contrast to its previous function as a sanctuary for those seeking freedom. Today, the Wickerham Inn stands as a testament to the courage of Appalachian faith communities who turned Zane’s Trace into a pathway for liberation. Recognized by the National Park Service’s Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, the Wickerham Inn preserves the legacy of freedom seekers and the families who risked everything to support them.
This site is part of the Appalachian Freedom Heritage Tour, funded by an ARC POWER Grant and developed by the Lawrence Economic Development Corp.
