In the March issue of Free Press there will be an article on a newly discovered major American fugitive escape operation never before reported in the press until until now. Like the Underground Railroad, which was not underground or a railroad, neither was the newly discovered route that began around 1700 and still exists today. This rescue operation was trans-Atlantic and involved religious rather than racial persecution. Like the Underground Railroad, this fugitive movement involved safe destinations. Unlike the Underground Railroad, the movement never had a name even though it is still in operation today.
Frantz Michel (1675-1746?) began life was as an adventurous young Swiss nobleman who devoted his life as a bold humanitarian by rescuing thousands of European religious and war refugees, founding six colonies in America to receive them, and persuading the British government to provide their transportation across the Atlantic. In mid-life, Michel became a British citizen, changed his name to Francis Michael, and settled in America.
Francis Michael possessed a grand vision, humanitarian heart, and superior ability to get things done, opened a new continent and joined it to an older one, restored opportunity, religious freedom and peace to those who he resettled, and launched permanent American refugee resettlement that exists today as an official United States program. As the first explorer beyond the Atlantic coast, he also opened the coastal plain and the Appalachians to settlement, then witnessed thousands of refugees he had rescued pour into the lands that he had explored.
The full biography by Free Press publisher Peter Michael has now been published as First Explorer. Until now, this has been one of the most under-told of American heroic stories. To learn more, visit
http://FirstExplorer.us
. To purchase your copy of First Explorer—hardcover, paperback or e-book—visit the book’s Amazon page at https://tinyurl.com/FirstExplorer. I’ll be glad to autograph your copy.
You can leave a review and rating at the book’s Amazon page. If you like the book, I hope you will tell others and consider giving it as a gift, as it isn’t easy promoting a book without a major publisher behind it.
We will see you in March with the next issue of Underground Railroad Free Press and more on the intercontinental fugitive rescue operation that ran in parallel with the Underground Railroad.