[1] Haviland wrote that Daniel was "a man of ability and influence, of clear perceptions, and strong reasoning powers,"[1] while her mother Sene was "of a gentler turn, ...a quiet spirit, benevolent and kind to all, and much beloved by all who knew her.

[1] Though the Quakers dressed plainly, and strictly forbade dancing, singing, and other pursuits they deemed frivolous, many of their views were progressive by the standards of the day.

In 1815, her family left Canada and returned to the United States, settling in the remote and sparsely populated town of Cambria, in western New York.

[1] Haviland described herself as an inquisitive child, deeply interested in the workings of the world around her, who at a young age began questioning her parents about everything from scripture to Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation.

Once she had mastered spelling, Haviland supplemented her meager education by devouring every book she could borrow from friends, relatives, and neighbors, reading everything from religious material to serious historical studies.

The Havilands spent the first four years of their marriage in Royalton Township, near Lockport, New York, before moving in September 1829, to Raisin, Lenawee County, in the Michigan Territory.

[1] The pictures of these crowded slave-ships, with the cruelties of the slave system after they were brought to our country, often affected me to tears ... My sympathies became too deeply enlisted for the poor negroes who were thus enslaved for time to efface.

Haviland instructed the girls in household chores, while her husband and one of her brothers, Harvey Smith, taught the boys to perform farm work.

[9] In spite of these personal losses, she continued work as an abolitionist; and, in 1851, she helped organize the Refugee Home Society in Windsor, Ontario, Canada, which assisted in settling fugitive slaves.

[1] Suspecting a trap, Haviland went to Tennessee in their place, accompanied by her son Daniel and a student from the Raisin Institute, James Martin, who posed as Willis Hamilton.

His family would continue to haunt her for fifteen years, pursuing her legally in court and privately with slave catchers, while barraging her with derogatory letters.

Thanks be to an all wise and provident God that, my father has more of that sable kind of busy fellows, greasy, slick, and fat; and they are not cheated to death out of their hard earnings by villainous and infernal abolitionists, whose philanthropy is interest, and whose only desire is to swindle the slave-holder out of his own property, and convert its labor to their own infernal aggrandizement ... Who do you think would parley with a thief, a robber of man's just rights, recognized by the glorious Constitution of our Union!

[1]Haviland responded, sarcastically thanking him for naming the child after her family and stating that she hoped "like Moses, may he become instrumental in leading his people away from a worse bondage than that of Egypt.

All throughout the South he circulated "hand-bills" (fliers) describing Mrs. Haviland, detailing her abolitionist work, naming her place of residence and offering $3,000, a considerable sum at the time, to anyone willing to kidnap or murder her on his behalf.

Haviland not only ran the risk of being physically harmed by angry slave-owners, like the Chesters, or their slave-catchers, if found guilty of violating the Fugitive Slave Law she would also be subject to hefty fines and imprisonment.

[9] Still, Haviland was determined to continue with her work, no matter what the personal cost: I would not for my right hand become instrumental in returning one escaped slave to bondage.

[9] In the guise of a white cook, and once even posing as a fair skinned free person of color, she visited plantations and managed to help some slaves escape north.

[9][16] During the Civil War, Laura toured many refugee camps and hospitals, even venturing onto the frontlines, to distribute supplies to displaced citizens, freed slaves, and soldiers.

[9] In an effort to help whites understand what the freedmen had endured under slavery, she toured abandoned plantations and collected chains, irons, restraints, and other implements which had been used on slaves.

[9] She also met personally with President Andrew Johnson to petition for the release of former slaves still being held in Southern prisons for attempting years before to escape slavery.

[9] While working at the Freedmen's Hospital in Washington, D.C., Haviland met and befriended Sojourner Truth, who later recalled an incident that took place one day when they had gone into town to get supplies.

Truth described what happened next as follows: As Mrs. Haviland signaled the car, I stepped to one side as if to continue my walk and when it stopped I ran and jumped aboard.

'[18]After the Civil War, the Freedmen's Aid Commission acquired the former Raisin Institute, renamed it the Haviland Home, and converted it into an orphanage for African-American children.

[9] When the Reconstruction ended in 1877, many African Americans fled the South, where they were subject to attacks by racist individuals and groups such as the Ku Klux Klan.

[9] Determined to help, Haviland set out with her daughter Anna for Washington, D.C., where she testified about the appalling conditions at the camps, before traveling to Kansas with supplies for the refugees.