Harriett Tubman is one of the most recognized icons in American history and her legacy has inspired countless people from every race and background. She was a woman of African descent who was born in slavery on a Maryland plantation in 1820. When she was only seven years old, she tried to run away from the plantation, but she was captured and severely beaten for trying to run away. In 1849, she escaped to Pennsylvania. Soon after her escape, she became a conductor on the Underground Railroad, which was not a real railroad. It was an informal network of people in the United States and Canada who believed slavery was wrong. They helped runaway slaves by giving them shelter on their journey out of the South. The members of the Underground Railroad helped hide the runaway or fugitive slaves, and then they "conducted" them to the next safe home or "station." After her escape from Maryland, Harriet Tubman returned to the South nineteen times to help other slaves escape north. Between 1850 and 1860, she helped more than 300 slaves escape to freedom in the North, including her own parents. She conducted many of these slaves along the Underground Railroad all the way to Canada. In 1861, the American Civil War between the North and the South broke out, and Harriet went to help the army of the North, or, as it was also called, the Union Army. She worked as a nurse and helped to take care of thousands of recently freed slaves. Harriet served as a nurse for the North, but she also served as a spy and a commando. In 1863, she and a Union officer led a band of 150 black soldiers on a raid against the army of the South, or, as it was called, the Confederate Army. Harriett and the soldiers destroyed a lot of army supplies and then led nearly 800 slaves out of the area to freedom. With the end of the war, Harriett returned to Auburn, NY and married a Civil War veteran named Nelson Davis. Although her service in the Union Army was much publicized, she had great difficulty in getting a pension from the government, but was eventually awarded a nurse's pension in the 1880s. Harriett also established the Harriet Tubman Home for the Aged on a property adjacent to her own. However, as Harriett aged, the head injuries sustained early in her life became more painful and disruptive. She underwent brain surgery at Boston's Massachusetts General Hospital to alleviate the pains and "buzzing" she experienced regularly. At the age of 93, Harriett died of pneumonia on March 10, 1913, surrounded by friends and family. She was buried with military honors at Fort Hill Cemetery in Auburn. All in all, Harriet Tubman did not have an easy life, but a very remarkable life. She was a small woman in stature, but she was a giant in the story of the fight against slavery in the United States and, indeed, in the world.