Although that effort failed, they were freed from slavery by funds raised by the Congregational Plymouth Church in Brooklyn, New York, whose pastor was Henry Ward Beecher, a prominent abolitionist.

From about the ages of 13 or 14, they were "hired out" to work in elite private homes in nearby Washington, D.C., under a type of lease arrangement, where their wages went to the slaveholder.

[4] This practice of "hiring out" grew from the shift away from the formerly labor-intensive tobacco plantation system, leaving planters in this part of the United States with surplus enslaved people.

By 1848 four of the older Edmonson sisters had bought their freedom (with the help of husbands and family), but the master had decided against allowing any more of the siblings to do so.

The Edmonson sisters and four of their brothers joined a large group of enslaved people (a total of 77) in an attempt to escape on the Pearl to freedom in New Jersey.

The escape had been planned by two white abolitionists, William L. Chaplin and Gerrit Smith, and two free black men in Washington, including Paul Jennings.

The steamboat caught up with the Pearl at Point Lookout, Maryland, and the posse seized it, towing the ship and its valuable human cargo back to Washington, DC.

Daniel Drayton and Edward Sayres, the two white captains, had to be taken into safety as pro-slavery people attacked them for threatening their control of property.

[11] Three days of riots and disturbances followed, as pro-slavery agitators attacked anti-slavery offices and presses in the city in an attempt to suppress the abolitionist movement.

Most of the masters of the fugitive enslaved people decided to sell them quickly to slave traders, rather than provide another chance to escape.

When the merchant died in 1853, Samuel moved with that family and its other slaves to what is now the 1850 House in the Pontalba Buildings on Jackson Square.

Accompanied by William L. Chaplin, a white abolitionist who had helped pay for the Pearl for the escape attempt, Beecher went to Washington to arrange the transaction.

"[2][4] At the rallies, the Edmonson sisters participated in mock slave auctions designed by Beecher to attract publicity to the abolitionist cause.

In describing the role that women such as the Edmonson sisters played in such well-publicized political theater, a scholar at the University of Maryland asserted in 2002: Beecher staged his most successful auctions using attractive mulatto women or female children (such as the Edmonson sisters, or the beautiful little girl, Pinky, who, according to Beecher, "No one would know from a white child"), making a material choice in "casting" his political protest that was calculated to arouse the audience's interest.

[4][16][17] While there were many slaves "whom it was impossible to tell from a white", the Edmonson sisters' mixed-race appearance may have well suited their role as two of the "public faces" of American slavery.

[4] That same year, Stowe included part of the Edmonson sisters' history with other factual accounts of slavery experiences in A Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin.

[4] Eighteen-year-old Emily returned to Washington with her father, where she enrolled in the Normal School for Colored Girls (now known as University of the District of Columbia).

They returned to the Sandy Spring, Maryland, area and lived there for twelve years before moving to Anacostia in Washington, DC.

[4] Edmonson maintained her relationship with fellow Anacostia resident Frederick Douglass, and both continued working in the abolitionist movement.