In the late 1850s the telegraph was brand new. News and events of the day could now be transcribed in a central location and then shared throughout the newspaper world. John Brown knew that and with every killing, ambush or battle his exploits were known by supporters and enemies.
The South considered Brown an enormous threat. Since Nat Turner’s Virginia slave rebellion in 1831 where 50-plus individuals from white slave holding families were slain, a slave rebellion was the single worst thought a southerner could have.
Britain had outlawed slavery in their vast colonial holdings in 1833. Why, I ask, was it taking the United States so long to purge itself of this inhuman practice, the answer: cotton and money. When the Civil War first broke out, why did New York City want to remain neutral: cotton and money.
Europe was addicted to the South’s cotton. The commodity made up over half the dollar value traded from the United States in the first half of the 19th century.
Cotton was dependent on slavery and in an odd twist, slavery was dependent on cotton. The commodity was very labor intensive from planting to harvest.
John Brown was the most famous individual pre-Civil War era in the United States. His fame came from the reporting of his beliefs and violent acts. The more he was on the attack the more media coverage he got. Perhaps he had been the first to really manipulate the now instant media in his favor, but I’m not sure he realized how good he was at it.
His next plan was to produce an opportunity for slaves to rebel, arm them and create open warfare against the institution. Harpers Ferry, Virginia, had an arms manufacturing facility and armory founded by George Washington with only a few soldiers guarding. It was perfect for an attack. The town was on rail at the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers, in the heart of slave holding country.
For several years Brown and Frederick Douglass had been friends. Douglass, the respected ex-slave orator, who at the time was promoting a nonviolent end to slavery. Brown approached him about joining the effort, but he rejected the involvement out of hand. After the entire episode Douglass would go on to write, “whether it was my discretion or cowardness, I declined to join in the attack.”
On a cool evening on October 16,1858, Brown made his move—he and 17 other whites, five freed slaves and one runaway found only one night watchman on guard. They took his keys. It was that easy, but now what? Spreading the word of the attack to slaves was a significant problem. But the overall plan was flawed at the conception; was it truly to raise a revolt and spread the abolitionist doctrine or flood the media with publicity about John Brown? His ego and conviction both never wavered.
In the “facts are stranger than fiction” file, the response of the U.S. Army to Brown’s occupation was ironic. Two days after the initial raid, Union Colonel Robert E. Lee, that's right, Union Colonel, before he declared he could not fight against his home State of Virginia in the Civil War, led a regiment of soldiers along with fellow future Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart to arrest John Brown and his band.
Brown had not received the support from whites or blacks as he had hoped and was cornered in the fire engine house later to be named John Brown’s Fort by those U.S. forces. Stuart made a futile negotiation attempt giving Brown a chance to surrender before his troops charged, but he was rebuffed.
Stuart’s assault was over in three minutes.
One of my favorite movies of all time is the 1940 classic, “Santa Fe Trail.” Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland and Ronald Reagan depict the era and happenings in and around Harpers Ferry in a wild west style adventure. Raymond Massey gives a performance of John Brown that is brilliant and haunting.
Brown was wounded in the taking of the firehouse but able to stand trial for treason. All eyes and newspapers were focused on Harpers Ferry and the aftermath.
Brown had made several famous acquaintances while leading his crusade: Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Henry David Thoreau, William Garrison and William Seward, but no one came to his aid.
While America watched, John Brown and several others were found guilty of treason against the Commonwealth of Virginia and sentenced to hang.
As I said, charges were brought against Brown by Virginia, not the United States. This widened the gap further between southern states and the Federal Government. Brown’s crusade against slavery and the national divide over the institution left no doubt the nation was on the brink. His last words before he was hanged was telling, “I, John Brown am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away, but with blood.”
On December 2, 1859, Brown was led from his jail cell to a wagon that would usher him to the gallows. He sat on a long box in the back of the wagon — his coffin. Not much of a crowd witnessed the hanging; there was concern about protests but the small group that did gather was noteworthy. Thomas Jackson an instructor at VMI, later to become a famed Confederate General and several students were present along with John Wilkes Booth an acclaimed actor who would of course play his best known role in real life, as the assassin of President Abraham Lincoln.
By all accounts John Brown met his death as the man he was. He would have no minister or preacher attend to him because in Virginia, no doubt, they would be a supporter of slavery.
The South, of course, was pleased John Brown was gone, but on his day of death in many cities of the north, church bells rang.
The divide between North and South had deepened by the biased newspaper accounts about the John Brown affair…from both sides.
I have been to Harpers Ferry three times, frequented Brown’s Osawatomie, Kansas cabin, crossed Pottawatomie Creek and walked the Black Jack battlefield. John Brown wasn’t mad, he was a man of incredible conviction against the inhuman institution of slavery—never compromising or surrendering.
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You can find more of Bob’s work including his Bob Ford’s History, Mystery and Lore podcast on his website bobfordshistory.com and his YouTube videos under Bob Ford’s History. He can be reached at robertmford@aol.com