I Cant Die But Once

This line comes from Sarah Bradford's Harriet Tubman: The Moses of Her People (1886). Tubman reportedly said it when asked how she dared undertake the dangerous work of guiding people through slave territory. It reflects a fatalistic courage that she described repeatedly: having already resolved that death was preferable to slavery (see her "liberty or death" statement), she had no additional fear to overcome. Bradford documented this attitude as central to Tubman's character throughout their interviews.