Slavery's hidden history in the mid-Hudson Valley coming to light

They lived in cellars and likely were locked in at night to prevent their escape.

Some wore steel collars around their neck that identified the family that owned them. That way, if they did escape, their captors would know where to return them. 

They were possessions. They were property. They were slaves. And they were owned not by a family in Virginia or South Carolina, but by the Huguenots, the original European settlers of New Paltz.

Most Americans have a firm grasp of slavery in the south and how its plantations, crops and bondage helped frame a legacy of oppression. The same cannot be said of slavery in the north.