[1] On August 21, 1842, an escaped slave known only as Charley, owned by Chauncey Durkee of Monticello, Missouri came to the house seeking help and transport.
Charley was returned to Durkee who requested that Eells be charged with “harboring and secreting a fugitive slave”, a crime in the Illinois Criminal Code of the time.
Despite the heavy weight of this defense team, the Supreme Court was unwilling to challenge the national status quo then sympathetic to slave owners.
[3] In 2015, Quincy Mayor Chuck Shultz sought a posthumous pardon for Dr. Eells and it was finally granted by Governor Pat Quinn.
Dr. Eells house in the South Side German Historic District of Quincy has been restored and is open to the public.