Quilt Codes

      The African Americans found other resourceful ways to convey codes to other slaves and runaways as well. This was done through what is called a "quilt code". A "quilt code" is various geometric patterns commonly found in American patchwork quilts. These were used to convey messages in connection with the Underground Railroad.
     But even among Code proponents, the patterns’ meanings, how the quilts were used, and who used them is a matter of debate: as of mid-2005 at least 15 contradictory versions of the Code were circulating. Some proponents claim the Code as part of their family oral history, but none can point to an ancestor who used it to escape to the North or even participated in the Underground Railroad.

The link below is to a website that explains what each block on the quilt meant.

http://home2.fvcc.edu/~cgreig/final/blocks.html

-Emily