John Hart Crenshaw (November 19, 1797 – December 4, 1871) was an American landowner, salt maker, kidnapper and slave trader, based out of Gallatin County, Illinois.

Although Illinois was a free state, Crenshaw leased the salt works in nearby Equality, Illinois from the government, which permitted the use of slaves for the arduous labor of hauling and boiling brackish water to produce salt.

In 1828, Crenshaw took Frank Granger and 15 others downriver to Tipton County, Tennessee, and sold them as slaves.

In 2004, the National Park Service named the Crenshaw Mansion, referred to as "The Old Slave House", as part of the Underground Railroad Network to Freedom program to acknowledge its importance in the "reverse underground railroad" and the role John Crenshaw played in condemning free blacks to slavery for profit.

[4][1] This article includes public domain text from the National Park Service website