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John Brown's infamous raid on Harpers Ferry was a turning point on our nation's path to the civil war.It widened the gap between the Northern and Southern States and fueled the radical opinions of both.On October 16, 185, John Brown and 1 of his followers attacked the arsenal at Harpers Ferry with the idea of taking weapons from it and giving the weapons to slaves in the South.They were hoping this would create a slave uprising that would put an end to slavery, similar to a modern day Spartacus.
Even though things did not happen according to Brown's plan, the attack still had a big impact on the country.The raid at Harpers Ferry, heightened tensions between the states; the country was a mixture of union, rebel, and border states.
John Brown had always hated slavery.His parents were abolitionists who worked to end slavery and who also instilled a strong religious faith in him which would serve as his reason and motivation for ending slavery.As a boy, he helped fugitive slaves escape to Canada, and as he grew older, he would become one of the most radical abolitionists of his time.
When Brown was living in Osawatomie, Kansas, in 1855, working to make sure Kansas did not become a slave state, a group of pro-slavery men burned the nearby town of Lawrence.Outraged by this, Brown, and a group of his comrades, went to Pottawatomie Creek and murdered five pro-slavery men.A year later, another group of pro-slavery men arrived and attacked Osawatomie.After defending his town, Brown earned the nickname "Old Osawatomie Brown", and began his bloody path to fame.
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Brown became an outlaw after the incident at Pottawatomie Creek, but this did not stop him from freeing slaves.It seemed to encourage his hate toward slavery.From the events at Pottawatomie Creek up until the raid at Harpers Ferry, not much is known about Brown and his actions.What is known is that Brown had the idea to arm the slaves in the south and create a huge slave uprising.He knew that the slaves out numbered the whites.He also believed that all of the talk of ending of slavery was not accomplishing anything.
Brown received private funding from wealthy benefactors, who were known as the "Secret Six".Not all of the six men thought the raid on Harpers Ferry was a good idea but they still provided money to purchase the 00 rifles, 00 pistols, and 1000 pikes to arm the slaves.The plan was that the slaves would hear about the raid at Harpers Ferry and come to Brown's aid.They would attack the arsenal capturing weapons.They would then use these weapons in a widespread slave revolt.
Brown recruited twenty-one men, which consisted of five black men and sixteen white men.Three of his men were also his sons.In August of 185, Brown met with Frederick Douglass and former slave "Emperor" Shields Green, trying to convince them to join him.Green agreed to it, but Douglass did not.Douglass explained himself by saying "You're walking into a perfect steel-trap and you will never get out of alive."Brown would have liked to have Douglass join him but was not angered by his decision not to.Brown had a group of twenty-one other men who would give their lives to help end slavery.Some of these men were former slaves hoping to rescue their families.
During the night of October 16, 185, Brown began his long awaited raid on Harpers Ferry.The arsenal was guarded by only one watch man, whom Brown and his men quickly overpowered.Brown stopped a train that was heading east, but let it continue to spread news of the raid.After capturing the arsenal, Brown and his men took Hall's Rifle Works, which was a supplier of weapons to the government.They also took 60 wealthy citizens hostage.By morning, the whole town was out trying to put down the raid.Ironically, the first casualty was an innocent bystander, a black baggage master at the railroad station, who was shot by one of Brown's men.The townspeople killed eight of the raiders before Brown, his men who were left, and the hostages, retreated to the engine house.
Colonel Robert E. Lee was ordered to go to Harpers Ferry with a group of marines and put down the raid.Lee was in Arlington at the time, and rushed to Harpers Ferry without even bothering to put on his uniform.He ordered his marines to storm the engine house, but to attack with swords and bayonets so the hostages would not be shot by accident.On the morning of October 18, two more of Brown's men and one marine were killed, and John Brown was wounded and captured.Brown lost ten of his men, including two of his three sons.Seven men were captured and eventually hanged.Five others escaped and fled to the north.The slaves that were supposed to rise up and help John Brown, never came.
John Brown was taken to Charlestown jail the following day, and his trial began on October 5.John Brown had to lie on a cot in court because he was severely wounded.Brown's lawyer wanted him to plead insanity, but Brown refused.When asked if Brown had anything to say in his defense, Brown rose to his feet despite his injuries and addressed the court with the following words
I deny everything but...a design on my part to free slaves...Had I interfered in the manner which I admit...in behalf of the rich, the powerful, the intelligent, the so-called great...every man in this court would have deemed it an act worthy of reward rather than punishment. (Hakim, Pg 57)
Despite Brown's stirring speech, he was sentenced to death on November
185, with his execution to be carried out on the nd of December.While in jail he wrote to his wife "I have been whipped as the saying is, but I am sure I can recover all the lost capital occasioned by that disaster; by only hanging a few moments by the neck; and I feel quite determined to make the utmost possible out of a defeat." (McPherson, Pg 0)
Before his execution, Brown wrote a note to his jailer that said, "I John Brown am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood.I had as I now vainly think flattered myself that without very much bloodshed, it might be done" (Hakim, Pg 58).
One of the men captured with Brown was John Anthony Copeland Jr., a freed black man.He wrote the following letter to his parents as he awaited execution
Dear Parents, - my fate as far as man can seal it is sealed but let this not occasion you any misery for remember the cause in which I was engaged, remember that it was a "Holy Cause", one in which men who in every point of view better than I am have suffered and died, remember that if I must die I die in trying to liberate a few of my poor and oppressed people from my condition of servitude which God in his Holy Writ had hurled most bitter denunciations against and in which men who were by the color of their faces re-moved from the direct injurious affect, have already lost their lives and still more remain to meet the same fate which had been by man decided that I must meet.(jefferson.village.virginia.edu)
Four of the five men who escaped from Harpers Ferry joined the Union Army in the civil war.The man who did not join the army was John Brown's own son, Owen Brown.It was because of his quick thinking and good judgments that the small group of surviving raiders from Harpers Ferry escaped and reached a safe place.
It is wondered if John Brown could ever have imagined what effect his raid on Harpers Ferry had on everyone in the country.It terrified the Harpers Ferry residents.They could not believe that something like that could happen to their small town.George and Mary Mauzy, who were living in Harpers Ferry at the time, wrote several letters to their children who were living in England, recounting the events to them
Last night a band of ruffians took possession of the town, took the keys to the armory and made captive a great many of our citizens...Our men chased them in the river just below here and I saw them shot down like dogs.I saw one poor wretch rise above the water and someone strike him with a club.He sank again and in a moment they dragged him out a corpse.
This had a big effect on the North and the South.The north hailed John Brown a hero.On December , 185, the day of his execution, church bells tolled in the north, and many silent vigils were held in his name.John Brown soon became a martyr to the north and to the abolitionists.While Ralph Waldo Emerson said of John Brown, "That new saint will make the gallows glorious, like the cross" (Hakim 57), Nathaniel Hawthorne showed his different opinion by saying, "No man was ever more justly hanged" (Hakim 57).
People had different views about the raid on Harpers Ferry.Some believed that Brown was truly on a mission from God and he did a noble thing.For the most part, the southerners were outraged by it.Also, they could not comprehend how the Northerners could think of John Brown as a martyr, when it was obvious to them he was a murderer.The last thing that the Southerners wanted was a slave revolt, and the thought that John Brown could have succeeded with his plan to start a revolt terrified them.
Many states had not decided whether to secede from the Union or not.John Brown's raid at Harpers Ferry helped some of them decide.Southerners wondered how the Northerners could approve of such a man, and his attack on their safety.Many chose to abandon the country they felt they could no longer trust.
The raid on October 16, 185, at Harpers Ferry, had affected those involved in the raid and those living in Harpers Ferry.But more than that, it affected the country as a whole, and added fuel to a smoldering fire.It hastened the coming of the Civil War, which touched every family, and shaped the United States into what it is today.The Civil War proved that Americans were willing to fight for what they believed in, even if it meant shooting one's own countrymen.Had John Brown's path in life differed and the raid at Harpers Ferry not have occurred, the Civil War would have still have been fought.But some people wonder if it would have been fought with such vengeance, bitterness, and bloodshed.John Brown took the answer to that question to his grave.
Bibliography
McPherson, James M. Battle Cry of Freedom, New York Ballantine Books, 188
Hakim, Joy. War, Terrible War, New York Oxford University Press, 14
Bibliography
McPherson, James M. Battle Cry of Freedom, New York Ballantine Books, 188
Hakim, Joy. War, Terrible War, New York Oxford University Press, 14
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