ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 275 resulted in dual legislatures, dual constitutions, dual officers and dual laws—an ideal condition for the strife and bloodshed that attracted the attention of the whole country. The opposition of the Pierce administration to the free state movement, the excesses of the Pro-Slavery party at Leavenworth, the threats of raiders from Missouri and the invasion of a large armed force from that state for the avowed purpose of destroying Lawrence aroused the Free State men to armed resistance and "minute men" were hastily organized and hurried to the defense of that town. Among these was a company known as the "Liberty Guards," commanded by John Brown with the rank of captain, a title that followed him for the remainder of his life. His company belonged to the Fifth Regiment of Kansas Volunteers, under the command of Col. George Smith, in the army of Gen. James H. Lane, "called into the service of the people of Kansas to defend the City of Lawrence * * * from threatened demolition by foreign invaders." This army at once threw up defenses about the threatened town. In this work Captain Brown became conspicuous for his energy and resourcefulness. "His presence," said an eye witness, "lightened up the gloom of the besieged in their darkest hour." In the operations about Lawrence one Free State man, Thomas W. Barber of Ohio, was killed. His body, which was brought to a building occupied by Brown's company, was viewed by the wife and friends of the murdered man. Of this sad affair Brown wrote: "I will only say of this scene that it was heart-rending and calculated to exasperate the men exceedingly ; and one of the sure results of civil war." The pitched battle that seemed imminent did not occur. Governor Wilson Shannon effected a compromise between the contending parties by the terms of which the invaders were to leave Kansas Territory. The Free State men were encouraged to believe that in armed resistance they had an effective defense. Brown wrote hopefully : "Free State men have only hereafter to retain the footing they have gained, and Kansas is free." 20 The defense, which is known as the Wakarusa War," ended with the signing of the terms of compromise, December 8, 1855. The truce, however, was of short duration. John Brown, Jr., who had been active in the preliminary meetings that resulted in the "Topeka movement" to make Kansas a free state, was elected a member of the Legislature. The radical anti-slavery views of the Browns, which had perhaps been intensified by the coming of the father, made them increasingly obnoxious to the Pro-Slavery party. The early part of the winter 1855-1856 passed rather quietly. The Free State men were gathering strength and organizing for the admission of Kansas without slavery. Their convention adopted a constitution and a Free State legislature was chosen. John Brown, Jr., was elected to the latter. 21 On January 24, 1856, President Pierce sent to Congress a message that fanned to flaming heat the resentment of the Free State men. It characterized their acts in attempting to organize the state as revolutionary and likely to lead to "treasonable insurrection." This message was followed by a proclamation placing the United States troops at Fort Riley at the service of Governor Shannon, who was in complete sympathy with the movement to make Kansas a slave state. This proclamation foreshadowed the dissolution of the Free State Topeka legislature by the military forces of the United States. The feelings that this aroused in John Brown are fully revealed in the following  20 - Sanborn, "John Brown," pp. 219-220. 21 - The Free State Legislature was chosen by the free state party. The pro-slavery party did not participate in the election. 276 - HISTORY OF OHIO letter to Joshua R. Giddings, then representing the Western Reserve District of Ohio in Congress : “OSAWATOMIE, KANSAS TERRITORY, 20th Feby, 1856. "HON. JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS, "Washington, D. C. "DEAR SIR, "I write to say that a number of the United States Soldiers are quartered in this vicinity for the ostensible purpose of removing intruders from certain Indian Lands. It is, however, believed that the Administration has no thought of removing the Missourians from the Indian Lands ; but that the real object is to have these men in readiness to act in the enforcement of those Hellish enactments of the (so called) Kansas Legislature ; absolutely abominated by a great majority of the inhabitants of the Territory ; and spurned by them up to this time. I confidently believe that the next movement on the part of the Administration and its Proslavery masters will be to drive the people here, either to submit to those Infernal enactments ; or to assume what will be termed treasonable grounds by shooting down the poor soldiers of the country with whom they have no quarrel whatever. I ask in the name of Almighty God ; I ask in the name of our venerated fore-fathers ; I ask in the name of all that good or true men ever held dear ; will Congress suffer us to be driven to such "dire extremities" ? Will anything be done ? Please send me a few lines at this place. Long acquaintance with your public life, and a slight personal acquaintance incline and embolden me to make this appeal to yourself. "Everything is still on the surface here just now. Circumstances, however, are of a most suspicious character. "Very respectfully yours, "JOHN BROW N." 22 This letter received prompt attention at the hands of the militant congressman who replied in part : "You need have no fear of the troops. The President will never dare employ the troops of the United States to shoot the citizens of Kansas. The death of the first man by the troops will involve every free state in your own fate. It will light up the fires of Civil War throughout the North, and we shall stand or fall with you. Such an act will also bring the President so deep in infamy that the hand of political resurrection will never reach him." 23 On the day that Brown wrote the letter to Joshua R. Giddings, February 20, 1856, The Squatter Sovereign 24 said editorially : In our opinion the only effectual way to correct the evils that now exist is to hang up to the nearest tree the very last traitor who was instrumental in getting up, or participating in, the celebrated Topeka Convention. The Topeka Legislature met March 4, 1856, and was continuously in session until March 15, when it recessed to July 4 of that year. On that national anniversary it was dissolved by military authority of the United States government. John Brown, Jr., was an active and fearless member and was one of the fifteen legislators who signed the memorial to Congress asking for the admission of Kansas as a free state under the Topeka constitution. For his political activity he was afterwards made to suffer an awful penalty. It is impossible, of course, accurately to present the agitated condition of the public mind in the United States at the time of the events here chronicled. It was not confined to "bleeding Kansas." It had extended to every state. Reason seemed to have fled from the forum. 22 - Villard, "John Brown," p. 131. 23 - "Sanborn, "John Brown," p. 224. 24 - Pro-slavery paper, published at Atchison, Kansas. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 277 Faction and sectional bitterness ruled the hour. Legislative halls rang with threats and verbal assaults were followed by deeds of personal violence. In the United States Senate, Charles Sumner was beaten into insensibility by a club cane in the hands of Preston Brooks of South Carolina, because of a speech that Sumner had made in arraignment of slavery and the effort to force it upon Kansas. Pleas for the union had lost their power. The spirit of war—civil war—was in the air through all the land when the first red drops of the approaching storm were falling on the plains of Kansas. In May the Missourians again invaded Kansas. On a mission of vengeance former United States Senator Atchison, at the head of 1,200 men, appeared before Lawrence. The citizens determined to offer no resistance and to put up to the authorities of the United States the responsibility for what might follow. After they had surrendered, Atchison in a fiery speech said among other things "And now we will go with our highly honorable Jones, and test the strength of that damned Free State Hotel. Be brave, be orderly, and if any man or woman stand in your way, blow them to hell with a chunk of cold lead." The Border Ruffians, many of whom were inflamed by drink, sacked the town, destroyed two newspaper offices and threw the types, papers, presses and books into the river. A number of cannon shots were then fired into the Free State Hotel, which was soon on fire and went up in flames. When it lay in ruins the "highly honorable Jones" shouted in glee: "This is the happiest moment of my life. I have done it, by God, I have done it." 25 It has been sometimes claimed that John Brown was in Lawrence at the time its destruction began. This is hardly true, however, as there would have been resolute resistance if he had been there. Some of his friends have claimed that what he saw at Lawrence was his excuse for the act of vengeance on the Pottawatomie, but Villard marshals a lot of evidence to show that John Brown was probably not present and that therefore he could not offer what he saw in excuse for what he later did. It seems very inconsequential whether he was present or not. He certainly heard of what occurred on the 21st of May before the action of his followers on the Pottawatomie on the night of the 24th of that month. And the conclusion cannot be escaped that he and his followers, with this fresh demonstration that the government of the United States would do nothing to preserve life and the semblance of civilization in Kansas, resolved to take the law into their own hands and by a terrible reprisal notify the Border Ruffians that henceforth they would send their hordes into Kansas at their own peril, that their armed assassins coming over the border would, in the language of Corwin, "be welcomed with bloody hands to hospitable graves." Not only had he and his followers heard the details of the sacking and burning of Lawrence, but on their way back they got the news of the brutal attack on Sumner in the United States Senate. On hearing this, one of the party declared afterward that "the men went crazy, crazy. It seemed to be the finishing, decisive touch." 26 The Pottawatomie affair, as Villard states, has caused perhaps more discussion than any other event in the history of Kansas Territory. Upon this the enemies of John Brown invariably dwell at length, while his friends are equally explicit with their apologies and defenses. On the night of May 24, 1856, five Pro-Slavery men, without warning and without opportunity to defend themselves, were taken from their homes and slain. It seems clearly established that they met their fate at the hands of a small band of men led by John Brown. Full particulars of this tragic deed are given by his biographies. John Brown himself 25 - Villard, "John Brown," p. 146. 26 - Villard, p. 154. 278 - HISTORY OF OHIO killed no one, it is claimed, but he was present and later assumed full responsibility for what was done. John Brown, Jr., was some distance away and did not learn of the tragedy until some time after it had occurred. Col. Richard J. Hinton in his "John Brown and His Men" fully justifies what was done and terms it the "Pottawatomie executions." Villard strongly condemns the participants in what he terms the "Murder on the Pottawatomie." In an analysis of Brown's motive, however, Villard says : "He killed not to kill, but to free ; not to make wives, widows and children fatherless, but to attack on its own ground the hideous institution of human slavery, against which his whole life was a protest." After all has been said in arraignment, apology and defense, it is probably true that the friends of John Brown regret that this act had to be chronicled and that even his enemies must admit that his provocation was great. The killings on the Pottawatomie startled the inhabitants of Kansas and aroused the Pro-Slavery party to retaliatory activity. Captain Pate, of Missouri, hastened with a company of volunteers on a mission of vengeance. He assisted in the capture of John Brown, Jr., and his brother Jason. Neither of these men had participated in the Pottawatomie affair, but the former was driven chained in front of horsemen over the burning Kansas plains and subjected to such harsh treatment that he became insane. In this condition he was thrown into prison. The homes of the two brothers were burned by the invaders. In the meantime, Captain Pate has turned his attention to John Brown and his party, expecting soon to capture them. Brown heard of this and prepared to meet the Missourians. The two parties met June 2 at Black Jack, where the first pitched battle was fought between Pro-Slavery and Anti-Slavery forces. At its conclusion, Pate and all of his men surrendered unconditionally to John Brown. The Missourians were astounded when they heard that their company which had gone to avenge those who fell on the Pottawatomie had themselves fallen into the hands of Brown, whose name had now become a terror to Pro-Slavery men on the border. The battle of Black Jack was the most complete victory scored by Brown in Kansas, though it is not so famous as his defense of Lawrence and Osawatomie. It remains for some literary genius to describe it as the first battle of the Civil war, for here the North and the South met to settle the issue of slavery in open combat by force of arms. Shortly afterward John Brown gave up his prisoners and captured arms to Col. Edwin V. Sumner, in command of the United States troops in this district and afterwatd a noted Union general in the Civil war. The Topeka Legislature had adjourned to meet July 4, 1856. John Brown and his men were encamped near that city to be at hand if the threatened clash of arms should attend the opening of the session. Seventeen members answered to the roll call. John Brown, Jr., could not be present as he was at that time in prison. Other members were in the city, but before they could assemble Colonel Sumner appeared with Government troops and ordered the Legislature to disperse, declaring : "This is the most disagreeable duty of my whole life." Later Brown and his men left Kansas, but he and his son Frederick soon returned. Free State men from the Northern states began to pour into the territory by way of Nebraska. This immigration was encouraged and financially assisted by various organizations in the East and powerfully stimulated by the eloquence of James H. Lane, whose appeal to Northern audiences turned many liberty loving, adventurous spirits toward the territory that was struggling to become a free state. In the presidential campaign of 1856 the admission of Kansas was made a political issue. The republican party in its first national convention, June 17, 1856, adopted a resolution declaring that "Kansas ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 279 should be immediately admitted as a state with her present free constitution." In the House of Representatives at Washington a bill providing for the admission of Kansas as a free state under the Topeka constitution passed that body by a vote of ninety-nine to ninety-seven on July 3, 1856. The attention of the entire country with increasing interest now turned to Kansas. Disregarding his son's protest that his father should not come to Lawrence for fear of arrest, John Brown accompanied by Lane arrived in that city. The Free State forces now prepared for aggressive war against their foes. As the Border Ruffians pushed the fighting in the earlier struggles of "Bleeding Kansas," their adversaries now rallied to the attack. Their policy, which earlier was purely and at times feebly defensive, had changed and their object now seemed to be to drive the Pro-Slavery element out of the territory. The Southern colonists of Southeastern Kansas trembled with dread at the news of the approach of John Brown. Their startled imagination placed him at the head of every movement of the Free State forces and every rumored raid in the territory. The correspondent of the New York Times referred to him as "the old terrifier" and "the terror of all Missouri." For a time the Free State bands swept southward, driving the Pro-Slavery men before them. Franklin, "Fort" Saunders and "Fort" Titus successively fell into their hands with arms and ammunition. In the attack on "Fort" Titus the Free State men brought into requisition a cannon that they had previously captured and fired into the doomed fort shots moulded from the type of one of their newspaper offices. They gleefully shouted that they were delivering to Colonel Titus "a second edition of the Herald of Freedom." It is doubtful whether John Brown participated in any of these fights, but the vanquished saw his uncanny and ghostly presence in all of them. In the midst of this strife and confusion, after giving up a number of Free State prisoners in exchange for Pro-Slavery men held by Lane and his lieutenants, Governor Shannon resigned his office. President Pierce refused to accept the resignation but peremptorily removed Shannon from office. His administration had been a stormy one and he withdrew with relief to himself and to the evident satisfaction of the contending parties who had filled the record of his brief term of office with turmoil and confusion. The governorship of Ohio has not always been a pleasing job, but Governor Shannon could certainly bear testimony that it is a position under all circumstances much to be preferred to the governorship of the Territory of Kansas in the days of "Jim" Lane, John Brown and "Dave" Atchison. Wilson Shannon, who had previously served as governor of Ohio, spent his last days peacefully as a citizen of Lawrence, Kansas, and reestablished himself in the good will of many who had been his critics and foes. John Brown was not long inactive. He was now prepared to give the Pro-Slavery settlers some of their own medicine. With a company of thirty or forty men, which was soon increased by union with another company, he added to his equipment by contraband seizures until his force was well mounted, well armed and well supplied with food and ammunition. He was getting ready to meet another invasion from Missouri. After capturing a number of prisoners and about 150 cattle, John Brown entered the Town of Osawatomie for the purpose of defending it against the invading army under Atchison. His arrival was now marked by a cloud of dust that enveloped his captured herd and motley 'troopers, giving to the column an imposing and forbidding aspect. The number of his men was comparatively small, not over 100 effectives, and against them was now marching an invading army from Missouri 1,000 strong, under the command of Gen. David R. Atchison, formerly a United States senator from that state. Atchison assemblied his army about forty miles from Osawatomie. 280 - HISTORY OF OHIO He sent forward Gen. John W. Reid with 250 men and a cannon to destroy that town. On his way Reid was joined by other Pro-Slavery men, including Rev. Martin White. As they approached in the dawning twilight, White met Frederick Brown and before the latter could grasp the situation shot him through the heart. He afterward tried to excuse his sanguinary act on the ground that' his home had been attacked. He said : "The same day I shot Fred, I would have shot the last devil of the gang that was in the attack on my house, if I had known them and got a chance." 27 It will thus be seen that in these stirring times even the ministers of the Gospel in Kansas had their blood up to the fighting temperature. John Brown coolly commented on this act as follows : "Old preacher White, I hear, boasts of having killed my son. Of course he is a lion." 28 After the killing of Frederick Brown the forces under General Reid advanced to the attack on Osawatomie. Brown with about forty resolute men prepared to defend the place. One of his followers said to him, "What do you want me to do ?" "Take more care to end life well than to live long," was the grim answer. The Missourians opened fire on the town and Brown's men replied with spirit. When men and horses in the advancing columns were struck with balls from the Sharpe rifles there was confusion in the advancing line. Their leader, however, with drawn sword led them to the charge. The Free State men were gradually driven out of the town but held their position along the stream. From the underbrush and rocks they poured a hot fire into the ranks of the Missourians. Reid brought his cannon into action and Brown's men were finally driven across the Marias des Cygnes, which runs near the town. As soon as the Border Ruffians entered the place they commenced plundering and burning it. General Reid claimed that in this battle about thirty Free State men were killed, including "a son of old Brown and probably Brown himself." In John Brown's report of the battle he says : "The loss of the enemy, as we learned by different statements of our own as well as other people, was some thirty-one or two killed, and from forty to fifty wounded." 29 He speaks of his own loss as two killed in battle ; three missing, probably captured, and two wounded. On their part the Missourians claimed that they had none killed and five wounded. Just what the losses were in the engagement' will perhaps never be known. As John Brown and his son Jason stood on the bank of the stream watching the smoke and flames of burning Osawatomie against the horizon, Brown is reported by his son to have said : "God sees it. I have only a short time to live—only one death to die, and I will die fighting for this cause. There will be no more peace in this land until slavery is done for. I will give them something else to do than to extend slave territory. I will carry the war into Africa." 30 The attitude of the government at Washington while war was in progress between the Pro-Slavery and Free State men of Kansas is significant. United States troops were there ostensibly to keep the peace and maintain the authority of the general government, but for the most part, due to political considerations perhaps, they were inactive. While the Pierce and Buchanan administrations were frankly favorable to the Pro-Slavery party and the agents that they sent were understood to reflect the Washington view, after experience on the soil of Kansas, some of them materially revised their conclusions on the situation and sympathized with the Free State cause. This was notably true of 27 - Villard, "John Brown," p. 242. 28 - Sanborn, "John Brown," p. 320. 29 - Sanborn, "John Brown," p. 319. 30 - Villard, "John Brown," p. 248. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 281 Governors Reeder and Geary and even the attitude of Governor Shannon was at times disappointing to the Pro-Slavery party. Although John Brown was defeated at Osawatomie the stand that he made there added immensely to his reputation. Gen. James H. Lane ("Jim Lane," as he was popularly called) and some of his Free State associates were holding a "council of war" in Lawrence on September 7, which was interrupted by loud cheering in the streets. The bent form of old John Brown as he rode into the town with a rifle across his saddle bow aroused wild enthusiasm. The cheering was declared by an eye witness to have been "as great as if the president had come to town, but John Brown seemed not to hear and paid not the slightest attention." He next proceeded to the home of Ottawa Jones, a friendly educated Indian, and found it in ruins. On September 10 he was joined by his son, John Brown, Jr., who had been imprisoned by the territorial agents of the Pierce administration without even the form of an indictment. He was finally released on bail, but was never afterward brought to trial. While in prison he had regained his reason, but he never fully recovered from the effects of the brutal treatment to which he was subjected immediately following his capture. He hurried at once to Lawrence, where an enthusiastic meeting of Free State men was in progress. He brought with him the chains with which he had been bound and which had been worn bright during his long imprisonment. 31 About this time the new territorial governor, John W. Geary, appointed by Buchanan, arrived and made a sincere effort to end the civil war that had been raging in Kansas. He was supposed to have come with Pro-Slavery inclinations, but, like some of his predecessors, he gradually swayed so far in favor of the Free State cause that he found it expedient to resign. Governor Geary began his administration by a vigorous restoration of order in the territory. He played no favorites. While he captured and threw into prison over 100 Free State men, he was equally zealous in his efforts to stop invasions from Missouri. Not long after he assumed the duties of his office another army from that state, more formidable than any previously sent, came to make one more desperate effort to capture Kansas for the slave power. Under the leadership of Reid, Heiskel, Stringfellow and Whitfield, this well organized and equipped force of 2,500 men moved forward with Lawrence, the Free State stronghold, as their objective. Governor Geary ordered Lieut.-Col. Joseph E. Johnson, now a United States army officer but later a famous Confederate general, to defend the town. This pleased the Free State men, as they began to feel that they would be protected in their constitutional rights by the new governor. In the meantime, in the presence once more of imminent danger, the citizens of Lawrence threw up rude works and prepared for a siege. The ruined walls of the old Free State Hotel were used in building breastworks. John Brown was again there, giving directions, moving among the defenders and urging them to resist to the death the advancing host. It was on this occasion that he mounted a dry goods box in the main street of the town and delivered the following characteristic speech: GENTLEMEN-It is said there are twenty-five hundred Missourians down at Franklin, and that they will be here in two hours. You can see for yourselves the smoke they are making by setting fire to the houses in that town. This is probably the last opportunity you will have of seeing a fight, so that you had better do your best. If they should come up and attack us, don't yell and make a great noise, but remain perfectly silent and still. Wait until they get within twenty-five yards of you, get a good object, be sure you see the hind sight of your gun, 31 - These chains are now in the museum of the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society. 282 - HISTORY OF OHIO then fire. A great deal of powder and lead and very precious time is wasted by shooting too high. You had better aim at their legs than at their heads. In either case, be sure of the hind sight of your gun. It is for this reason that I myself have so many times escaped, for, if all the bullets which have ever been aimed at me had hit me I would have been as full of holes as a riddle. 32 The invaders, however, did not attack the town. Governor Geary gave the Missourians to understand that they must quit the territory or face the United States troops. They reluctantly concluded to retire. This ended the invasions by the Border Ruffians. As they withdrew they realized, as the whole country was coming to realize, that the effort to make Kansas a slave state had ended in failure. The tide of immigration was steadily adding strength to the Free State party and its ultimate complete triumph could not long be delayed. With the restoration of peace and the liberation of his son, John Brown decided to leave Kansas. He no longer had any incentive to stay. One of his sons had lost his life. Another had been severely wounded. Another had been driven into temporary insanity and imprisoned. Their homes had been burned. There was little to hold them in Kansas. John Brown, though he kept his own counsel, was thinking of operations in another field—he was planning "to carry the war into Africa." If the freedom of Kansas was assured, as he was still disposed to doubt, that would be very good so far as it went, but he was dreaming of nothing less than liberating the bondmen in all slave states of the Union. He would still keep a very watchful eye on Kansas, and if occasion seemed to demand it, would again appear in the territory where his name was known to every inhabitant and was still an asset to the militant element of the Free State party. On October 10, 1856, he and his four sons had reached Tabor, Iowa, a frontier town settled chiefly by immigrants from Oberlin, Ohio. Here he found the people kindly disposed and sympathetic with his views. The anti-slavery sentiment was strong and they had followed with absorbing interest the news from Kansas. Here Brown and his men rested for a time, but he could not long remain inactive. Later in the month he went to Chicago with his sons, Jason and John. Here he met Horace White, afterward editor of the Chicago Tribune and the New York Evening Post and now assistant secretary of the National Kansas Committee. Brown at the request of friends in the East assisted in forwarding arms to Tabor to be used in Kansas if occasion should require. Two hundred rifles in this shipment afterward went for use to Harper's Ferry. From Chicago Brown proceeded to Ohio. It was probably on the occasion of this visit to the state that his half-sister, Mrs. S. C. Davis of Grafton, Ohio, said to him : "John, isn't dreadful that Fremont should have been defeated and such a man as Buchanan put into office?" "Well, truly," answered Brown, "as I look at it now, I see that it was the right thing. If Fremont had been elected, the people would have settled down and made no further effort. Now they know they must work if they want to save a free state." 33 He proceeded East, meeting Gerrit Smith, Frank B. Sanborn, Dr. Samuel G. Howe, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Theodore Parker, George L. Stearns, Wendell Phillips, Henry D. Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson and other prominent anti-slavery men. These all became his stanch friends and enthusiastic supporters. Among the recommendations that Brown carried with him was one from Governor Salmon P. Chase of Ohio. 34 32 - Redpath, "John Brown," pp. 163-164. 33 - Villard, "John Brown," p. 270 (note). 34 - Governor Chase's recommendation bore date of December 20, 1856. He gave Brown $25 at that time. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 283 On the 18th of February he appeared before the joint committee on federal relations of the Massachusetts legislature and delivered an address recounting his experiences in Kansas. On this occasion he held up before the committee the chains by which his son John had been bound. His stirring appeal brought applause but no financial support. After visiting many persons in the East in an effort to raise money for his anti-slavery warfare, he came to Cleveland May 22, to Akron the day following and spent several days in his old home town of Hudson. On June 24 he attended the semi-centennial of the founding of Talmadge, Ohio. A message was here handed to the chairman of the meeting, stating that John Brown was present and "would like to speak about Kansas." This privilege the chairman refused on the ground that it would be "entirely inconsistent with the occasion." By August 7 he had returned to Tabor, Iowa. In the meantime, Kansas, under the administration of Governor Geary, had been peaceful. His evenhanded justice, however, did not suit President Buchanan or the South. They wished to have more favor shown their friends within the Territory. The governor received so little assistance from Washington that he felt constrained to resign in March. He was succeeded by Robert J. Walker of Mississippi, former United States Senator from that state and Secretary of the Treasury. The South felt that now they had one of their own men in office and could have matters in Kansas administered to their liking. In this they were disappointed. Governor Walker began by promising both parties absolutely fair treatment and a fair election. They accepted this assurance and went to the polls together. The Free State party won a big victory, electing their delegate to Congress by a majority of 4089 and choosing thirty-three members of the Legislature to nineteen for the Pro-Slavery party. The result was anything but pleasing to the Washington administration. As soon as it became apparent that Walker was pursuing a policy similar to that of Geary, he incurred the hostility of the Pro-Slavery party. Buchanan, who had appointed him six months before, accepted his resignation. It is significant that Governors Reeder, Geary and Walker, all democrats and appointed as men of Pro-Slavery views, when on the ground where they could judge the situation from first hand knowledge, so far swayed to the favor of the Free State party that they were given to understand that their resignations would be acceptable. Brown returned to Kansas in 1857 and recruited a few men for the warfare against slavery. On November 17, he started with his men for Tabor and from this village he soon set out for Springdale, Iowa, a Quaker community thoroughly in sympathy with his anti-slavery views, but opposed to warfare and the use of "carnal weapons" to liberate the bondmen. The trip overlands was performed through the storms and drifting snows of winter. The little band included Luke F. Parsons, Richard Raelf, John E. Cook, William H. Leeman, Charles P. Tidd, and John Henri Kagi. To these followers he declared, "God has created me to be the deliverer of slaves as Moses delivered the children of Israel." "They found nothing in this statement," declares Villard, to make them doubt his sanity, or that seemed inherently impossible. A fanatic they recognized him to be ; but fanatics have at all times drawn satellites to them, even when the alliance meant certain death." On the dreary journey they trudged over the snow, from December 4, arriving in Springdale shortly after Christmas. They whiled away the evenings in debating various questions and singing, in which John Brown heartily joined. "The Slave Has Seen the Northern Star" and "From Greenland's Icy Mountains" were among his favorites. Their journey at last ended, they found a very hospitable reception in Springdale. Located here in comparative comfort, they spent the remainder of the long winter very pleasantly. They kept up and con- 284 - HISTORY OF OHIO ducted with decorum their debates. A mock legislature was organized, 35 bills were introduced, discussed and enacted into laws. Cook, Kagi and Raelf were men of much more than ordinary ability and developed into speakers of power and eloquence. At Springdale Brown added two Quaker youths, of Ohio birth, to his company—Edwin and Barclay Coppoc. Leaving his men in Springdale, John Brown proceeded to the East, stopping to visit his son John at Lindenville, Ohio. It was on this trip, at the home of Gerrit Smith in Peterboro, New York, that Brown divulged his remarkable plan for a constitution to govern the territory captured from the slave power. Chimerical as this seemed, his friends in the East, after full explanations from him, approved the general plan. As Brown had by-laws for the government of his men in Kansas, he felt that he must have an ambitious constitution for the larger project that was now absorbing his thought. After visiting Canada he returned to Springdale and with his men went to Chatham, Canada, where a convention of colored freedmen and his followers from Springdale united to form the constitution. The details of the proceedings and the full text of this document are elsewhere available to interested readers. The preamble only is here reproduced : "Whereas, Slavery, throughout its entire existence in the United States is none other than a most barbarous, unprovoked, and unjustifiable War of one portion of its citizens upon another portion ; the only conditions of which are perpetual imprisonment, and hopeless servitude or absolute extermination ; in utter disregard and violation of those eternal and self-evident truths set forth in our Declaration of Independence : "Therefore, we, citizens of the United States, and the oppressed people who by a recent decision of the Supreme Court are declared to have no rights which the white man is bound to respect, together with all other people degraded by the laws thereof, do, for the time being, ordain and establish for ourselves the following Provisional Constitution and Ordinances, the better to protect our persons, property, lives and liberties, and to govern our actions." 36 Whatever may be the opinion of this constitution as a whole, it must be admitted that the preamble sets forth pretty clearly Brown's view of slavery and the Dred Scott decision. The former he considered "most barbarous, unprovoked and unjustifiable war." The latter stripped one portion of our population of all rights and reduced them to a condition of "perpetual imprisonment and hopeless servitude." Against both he and his followers took up the gage of battle. John Brown was fast maturing plans for "carrying the war into Africa," for making a descent upon the institution of slavery in Virginia. These plans, however, for a time were frustrated by Hugh Forbes, a soldier of fortune who had served under Garibaldi, the liberator of Italy, and now attached himself to the payroll of Brown and his financial supporters. He at first entered with enthusiasm upon the service, with dreams of becoming the Garibaldi of the colored race in America. When the term of his employment ended and no additional funds for his pay were in sight, he made all sorts of trouble for Brown. Whenever he could get an influential hearing he revealed the arrangements for the intended attack. This caused a temporary abandonment of plans and the return of Brown to Kansas for his spectacular invasion of Missouri. In the latter part of June, 1858, John Brown reentered Kansas. He returned in the disguise of a patriarchal beard, almost white, which he wore for the remainder of his days, and under the assumed name of Shubel Morgan. From Lawrence he proceeded to southeastern Kansas where there had been considerable excitement as the result of the brutal killing of five inoffensive Free State settlers who had been captured by 35 - In the schoolhouse. 36 - Redpath, "John Brown," p. 234. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 285 the Pro-Slavery leader, Charles A. Hamilton, afterward a Confederate colonel, who "had boasted that if Pro-Slavery men could not make headway in the territory, abolitionists should not live there." In the vicinity of Fort Scott, Brown and his men remained for a time and kept in close touch with James Montgomery, a militant Free State leader, who afterward rose to the rank of colonel in the Union army. It was while Brown, or "Shubel Morgan," was here that he wrote to his son John in Ohio of an Anti-Slavery lecture that he gave a Pro-Slavery settler who came to his camp. It was here also that he began a sketch of his life, "as connected with Kansas ; by one who knows." It was never finished. In the latter part of this summer with some of his followers he made a short trip over the line into Missouri, taking with him his surveying instruments to avoid suspicion. When they came within sight of the house of Rev. Martin White, who had killed his son Frederick, he was asked to look through a field glass at a man sitting in a distant yard under a shade tree. "I declare, that is Martin White," said Brown. At the suggestion that they go and talk to the old man he said, "No, no, I can't do that." When others proposed to go, he said, "Go if you wish, but don't you hurt a hair of his head."37 In speaking of White, he is reported to have said to James Hanway : "People mistake my objects. I would not hurt one hair of his head. I would not go an inch to take his life ; I do not harbor the feeling of revenge. I act from principle. My aim and object is to restore human rights. 38 In December occurred his famous "foray" into Missouri. The historian, William E. Connelley, thus summarizes it : "On Sunday, December 19, 1858, a negro man came from Missouri to Brown's camp and begged that his wife and family be resuced from slavery before they were sold to be carried South. The following Monday night Brown, with a number of men from his company, made a foray into Missouri, and secured these slaves, eleven in number, and carried them into Kansas. They were carried to the Pottawatomie and kept in a cabin on the open prairie for more than a month, while every ravine and thicket swarmed with people searching for them. No one thought of their being concealed in the deserted old cabin in plain view of a number of houses, and they escaped without detection." This raid created much commotion in Kansas and Missouri. The governor of the latter offered a reward of $3000 for the capture of Brown, to which President Buchanan added $250. To show his contempt for their efforts, Brown, according to Connelley, "immediately had printed a small handbill in which he publicly proclaimed that he thereby offered a reward for Buchanan, declaring that if any lover of his country would deliver that august personage to him, well tied, at Trading Post, he would willingly pay such patriot the sum of two dollars and fifty cents. It is said that reflection upon the matter afterwards convinced him that this sum was more than the President was actually worth for any purpose." The eleven slaves were now free and temporarily concealed in Kansas, but the enterprise that John Brown had on his hands was about as unpromising and visionary as any that he had ever conceived. These slaves were to be provisioned and conveyed through the dead of winter over one thousand miles to freedom under the British flag. He started with a plodding ox team almost alone, poorly clothed and confronted at every town on the way with premium notices posted for his arrest. Many dangers confronted him and the difficulties to be overcome seemed almost insurmountable ; but the stern old Puritan did not falter. Over frozen roads and through blinding blizzards the wagons moved slowly toward the goal of freedom. 37 - Villard, "John Brown," p. 357. 38 - Ibid, p. 358. 286 - HISTORY OF OHIO Samuel Medary, 39 from Ohio, had been appointed governor of Kansas by President Buchanan and was now striving to arrest Brown as he moved northward with his liberated slaves. The sudden rising of a stream halted Brown and his charges and Medary gleefully notified Buchanan that the capture of Brown was assured. On January 31, 1859, the men sent to make the arrest were suddenly fired upon by Brown and some reinforcements sent to his aid from Topeka. At the first volley the posse sent by Medary were panic stricken and fled in confusion to escape "the old terror," some leaping on behind their mounted comrades and others clinging to the horses' tails in their wild scramble to get away. Brown captured three of the men sent to arrest him, four horses and abandoned arms, while Medary and Buchanan were left empty-handed. Col. Richard J. Hinton facetiously called this final fight of John Brown's on Kansas soil the "Battle of the Spurs," and it has ever since been so known in the history of that Territory. Brown proceeded on his journey by way of Nebraska City, Tabor, Aurora, Des Moines, Grinnell, Iowa City and Springdale to West Liberty, where he boarded a train with his colored cargo for Chicago. Then they proceeded to Detroit and crossed to Windsor, Canada, where the slaves were finally delivered from the land of bondage. They had come in eighty-two days a distance of 1100 miles, 600 of which had been covered in wagons through the rigors of a northwestern midwinter. From Canada Brown went to Cleveland, Ohio, where he sold the horses that he had captured at the "Battle of the Spurs." In offering them for sale he explained that "the title might be a little defective" but that they were "abolition horses." Asked how he knew this, he answered that he was certain of it because he had "converted" them. They brought a good price, however, as there were purchasers in Cleveland who were eager to get Buchanan horses from Kansas that had been "converted" by John Brown. Arrangements had been made in Cleveland for a lecture in Chapin's Hall. This was well advertised in an announcement published in the Cleveland Leader of March 18, 1859. The meeting was to be held on the evening of that day. A violent storm prevented the attendance of many people and the lecture was postponed to March 21. The Leader again published a liberal and attractive notice. The meeting, however, was poorly attended. Representatives from the Leader and the Plain Dealer published rather full accounts of it Artemus Ward reported this meeting for the Plain Dealer. The following characteristic excerpt is quoted from the account of "Ward" who had not at that time achieved great fame as a humorist but who was earning $12 a week as a reporter : He is a medium-sized, compactly-built and wiry man, and as quick as a cat in his movements. His hair is of a salt and pepper hue and as stiff as bristles ; he has a long, waving, milkwhite goatee, which gives him a somewhat patriarchal appearance ; his eyes are gray and sharp. A man of pluck is Brown. You may bet on that. He shows it in his walk, talk, and actions. He must be rising sixty, and yet we believe he could lick a yard full of wild cats before breakfast and without taking off his coat. Turn him into a ring with nine Border Ruffians, four bears, six Injuns and a brace of bull pups, and we opine that "the eagles of victory would perch on his banner." We don't mean by this that he looks like a professional bruiser, who hits from the shoulder, but he looks like a man of iron and one that few men whould like to "sail into." The report of the Leader is devoted about equally to the addresses of Kagi and Brown. It is complimentary, and somewhat extended. The following is a brief excerpt : 39 - "Samuel Medary was born in Pennsylvania, February 25, 1801, and moved to Clermont County, Ohio, in 1825. He served in both branches of the Legislature of Ohio, and by appointment was governor of the Territory of Minnesota and the Territory of Kansas. He was editor of the Ohio Statesman and the Crisis, both published in Columbus. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 287 Mr. Brown remarked that he was an outlaw, the governor of Missouri having offered a reward of $3000 for him and the President $250 more for him. He should never submit to an arrest, as he had nothing to gain from submission, but he should settle all questions on the spot if an attempt was made to take him. The liberation of those slaves was meant as a direct blow to slavery and he laid down his platform that he considered it his duty to break the fetters from any slave when he had the opportunity. He was a thoroughgoing abolitionist. He stated many incidents in Kansas affairs and conveyed much information on territorial affairs. Mr. Brown is a man apparently sixty years old, and full of nerve and boldness. His narrative was highly interesting and instructive. While the people of Cleveland did not flock out to hear Brown neither did his most rabid opponents in that city make any effort to have him arrested. He and Kagi here saw posted up in numerous places the offer of the rewards by the governor of Missouri and President Buchanan for the arrest and detention of Brown. The opportunity to earn this reward, however, was not sufficiently tempting to lead any patriot to make the attempt. The fact was well understood that any effort in this direction would arouse the people of Cleveland in the defense of Brown. At West Andover, Ashtabula County, while visiting at the home of his son, Brown received from Joshua R. Giddings, the eminent opponent of the slave power and congressman from the Western Reserve, an invitation to speak in the Congregational Church at Jefferson, the county seat. On Sunday, May 27, Brown was present in answer to this invitation and spoke after the church exercises. After the raid at Harper's Ferry Giddings was accussed of complicity in that affair and much was made of his previous entertainment of Brown at Jefferson. In a speech delivered in Philadelphia October 28, 1859, Giddings stated his own attitude on the question of slavery as follows : While serving in Congress, Mr. Haskell, a slaveholder, inquired of me publicly whether I believed it morally right for slaves to leave their masters. I felt bound to speak frankly. I answered that I not only believed they could do so, but that it was morally wrong and wicked for them to remain in slavery an hour when they had the power to escape, even by slaying those who opposed their freedom ; that were I a slave I would escape, if in my power, though compelled to walk upon the dead bodies of slaveholders from Mississippi to Malden. Proceeding to the charge of association with Brown he said : I am of opinion that he came to Jefferson on Saturday afternoon, and that so far as I am informed, his object was to make arrangements for the lecture. On Sabbath, after the regular services, he spoke in our church. The ministers of the church and of other churches, I think, attended the lecture. Ladies and gentlemen were present. Republicans and democrats all listened to his story with attention. It is impossible for me at this time to give an abstract of the lecture. If anyone desires knowledge on this point, I would refer him to the Hon. Jonathan Warner, a democratic leader of that county. He was present and one or two of his sons, and being very pro-slavery, he would be more likely to recollect particulars than myself. He spoke of the Kansas troubles, of his expedition into Missouri and bringing off some twelve or twenty slaves, and he urged it as a solemn Christian duty to assist slaves to obtain their freedom. He gave us clearly to understand that he held to the doctrines of the Christian religion as they were enunciated by the Savior. I am not aware that he spoke of going into slaves states to aid slaves in escaping from bondage, but I had the impression that he would do so if opportunity should present. I think, however, that I inferred this from the fact that he had done it in Missouri, rather than from what he said. After he closed I addressed a few words to the audience in favor of a contribu- 288 - HISTORY OF OHIO tion, referring to his condition, to the death of his son and the fact that in his situation he had no business which he could follow for his support. I believe that every democrat as well as republican present gave something. After the close of the meeting I cordially invited him to take tea at my home. While there at the fireside, I inquired as to the particulars of his Missouri expedition. Mrs. Giddings also put questions. I fully expressed my own opinions as to the crime of slavery, the right of the slave to his liberty at all times and under all circumstances. Brown was in Kingsville, Ohio, April 7. He left for Peterboro, New York, on the 10th of that month. While he confided his plans only to trusted friends, he was now bending all his energies to preparation for the invasion of Virginia. He was busily engaged raising money and collecting arms and men for that enterprise. On May 7 he was with his ardent young friend, F. B. Sanborn, in historic Concord, Massachusetts, where he spoke in the town hall on the day following. He then went to Boston, where he spent about three weeks visiting friends and supporters in that city. The week ending June 16 he spent with his family in their home at North Elba, New York. This was his last visit. On June 18 he was again with his son John at West Andover, Ohio. This entry in his journal of that date is of interest : Borrowed John's old compass and left my own, together with Gurley's book, with him at West Andover ; also borrowed his small Jacob staff ; also gave him for expenses $15.00. Write him under cover to Horace Lindsley, West Andover. 40 From Akron, June 23, he wrote to his wife and family. This seems to have been the last letter addressed to them from this state. He wrote in part : We start for the Ohio River today. Write me under cover to John at West Andover, for the present. The frost has been far more destructive in Western New York and in Ohio than it was in Essex County. Farmers here are mowing the finest looking wheat I ever saw, for fodder only. Jason has been quite a sufferer. May God abundantly bless and keep you all. The reference in the above, of course, is to the great frost in June of that year which is still recalled by those living at that time. While in Ohio, Brown visited for the last time Hudson, his old home town. On this trip he was also in Cherry Valley, Ohio. On June 23 he went to Pennsylvania, proceeding by easy stages from Pittsburg, by way of Bedford Springs, to Chambersburg. On July 3 he reached Harper's Ferry, the end of his restless wanderings, the goal of all his striving. Returning to Chambersburg, he spent some time with Frederick Douglas, the colored orator, who opposed the plan as soon as he learned that it contemplated an attack on the United States arsenal at the Ferry. He felt that the anti-slavery cause would be injured by the contemplated attack on the federal government. Arms and men were gradually assembled at the Kennedy farm not far from Harper's Ferry for the proposed attack. The purpose of the movement was carefully concealed and the people of Harper's Ferry and the adjacent country were led to believe that these strangers were making a geological inspection of the surrounding mountains in search of mineral wealth. Brown himself, however, stated in conversation with farmers in this region that he was looking for a home to which he might move his family. He spoke of the destructive frost of that summer and said that he believed he would be better satisfied with a farm in Virginia. It is remarkable that his secret should have been kept so well by the assembling company for more than three months. In that time John Brown and his men became thoroughly acquainted with the gov- 40 - This compass is now in the museum f the Ohio State Archaeological, and Historical Society. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 289 ernment works at Harper's Ferry and the lay of the country surrounding the town. The government at Washington knew nothing of the threatened raid, and yet there was in the office of the secretary of war a letter bearing date of August 20, 1859, and warning the government of the contemplated attack. It gave in considerable detail Brown's plan, but was unsigned. The secretary of war paid little attention to it and the warning was unheeded. After the raid Richard Raelf and Charles W. Moffet, two of John Brown's men who failed to come to Harper's Ferry, were suspected of having written this letter. Redpath in his "Life of John Brown" violently assails Raelf for this betrayal of the cause. In this conclusion he was wholly mistaken as he afterward acknowledged. It was not until long years afterward that David J. Gue, of Iowa, became publicly known as the real author. He with other Quaker friends resorted to this means to prevent the clash of arms at Harper's Ferry—to save John Brown and his men from the fate that would certainly overtake them. The anonymous letter was sent to the postmaster at Cincinnati to be remailed there. From that city it went to the secretary of war. The men of John Brown's company gradually assembled at the famous Kennedy house about six miles from Harper's Ferry. In order to avoid suspicion and make life here more homelike, Anne, the daughter of John Brown, and Martha, the wife of Oliver, came from North Elba to administer household affairs at the farm. John E. Cook had preceded the others to Harper's Ferry and for some time had been living with his young wife in that town. Following is the list of men who were finally marshalled and armed for the capture of the Ferry : John Brown, Watson Brown, Oliver Brown, Owen Brown, William Thompson, Dauphin Thompson, John Henri Kagi, Aaron Dwight Stevens, John E. Cook, Charles Plummer Tidd, William H. Leeman, Edwin Coppoc, Barclay Coppoc, Albert Hazlett, Jeremiah G. Anderson, Francis Jackson Merriam, Steward Taylor, Shields Green, Dangerfield Newby, John A. Copeland, Jr., Lewis Sherrard Leary and Osborn P. Anderson. Kagi, the Coppoc brothers and John Brown's three sons, Watson, Oliver and Owen, were all born in Ohio. Leary and Copeland enlisted from Oberlin, Ohio, and John Brown himself had grown up to manhood in this state. Green, Newby, Copeland, Leary and Osborn P. Anderson were colored. Thomas Jefferson, in his "Notes on the State of Virginia," written in 1787, has described, as viewed from Jefferson Rock, the natural scenery of the country where the Shenandoah and the Potomac meet off the peninsula on which Harper's Ferry stands : You stand on a very high point of land ; on your right comes up the Shenandoah, having ranged along the root of the mountain a hundred miles to find a vent ; on your left approaches the Potomac, in quest of a passage also. In the moment of their junction they rush together against the mountain, rend it asunder, and pass off to the sea. The scene is worth a voyage across the Atlantic ; * * * these monuments of a war between' rivers and mountains which must have shaken the earth itself to its centre. It is a coincidence that at this spot should fall the bolt that shook a nation. Sunday evening, October 16, 1859, was cloudy, damp and dark. In spite of the threatening weather, the attendance in the churches of the village was large. There had been a religious revival in this mountain region and the people came in crowds to hear the message of peace. The services over, they started for their homes. On their way some of them were made prisoners and securely held in the enclosure at the old engine house, through the remainder of that gloomy and mysterious 290 - HISTORY OF OHIO night. The dawning of the next day found Harper's Ferry, the armory, the arsenal and the rifle works in the hands of an unknown foe. The story of this historic raid that startled the nation and terrified Virginia has been told in varied detail often and well. A part only of the interesting features are sketched here. Soon after the town and the government works were in the hands of Brown and his party, prominent citizens, most of them slaveholders, were brought from the surrounding country and placed under guard. Among these prisoners was Col. Lewis Washington, great-grandnephew of George Washington. With him were brought some of his prized personal possessions, including two interesting historic relics—a pistol presented to President Washington by Lafayette and a sword said to have been given him by Frederick the Great. This sword John Brown carried until the end of the raid. He had sent for these, in order that he might .inaugurate his war against slavery with weapons that were once the precious possession of the chieftain who led another revolution to a triumphant conclusion. After the capture of the arsenal and other government buildings, the eastbound train on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad arrived in the early morning of October 17, between the hours of 1 and 2 o'clock. It was halted before it crossed the bridge, but at dawn of day was permitted to move onward, scattering the news as it proceeded to Washington. A citizen rode to Charlestown, eight miles distant, and spread the alarm. Many persons believed that this was the first act in a general servile insurrection—the secret dread of the slave states—with all the horrors of the uprising of the blacks in San Domingo. Soon the militia of Virginia was assembling to move on Harper's Ferry and later in the day United States troops, under command of Lieut.-Col. Robert E. Lee, were on their way to suppress the insurrection. The first person killed on Monday morning was a negro named Hayward, who had refused to halt at the command of a raider. Throughout the day the fight was kept up between the raiders, the militia and the citizens of the town. The result of the first day's fighting had reduced Brown's effective followers to four men—Dauphin Thompson, Jeremiah G. Anderson, Edwin Coppoc and Shields Green. John Henri Kagi, William H. Leeman, Stewart Taylor, William Thompson, Lewis S. Leary, Danger-field Newby and Oliver Brown had been killed. Watson Brown was mortally and Aaron Stevens severely wounded. The others of Brown's party were prisoners or had escaped. The following Virginians had been killed : Shephard Hayward (colored), Fontaine Beckham, mayor of Harper's Ferry, Thomas Boerly, and Capt. George W. Turner. The surviving raiders who remained on the scene of action had retreated to the engine house. Flushed with success, "the militia reformed and started to assault the engine house. They never reached it. When they were within sixty yards of it, the besieged opened with a destructive volley of bullets. Two of the attacking party fell dead and a half dozen were wounded. The column wavered, reeled and then fled up the armory yard." This was the status of affairs at the close of Monday, October 17. That night Lieut.-Col. Robert E. Lee and Lieut. J. E. B. Stewart arrived from Washington with a company of marines. John Brown, with four effective men, a dead son, a son dying and eight prisoners as hostages, grimly held the engine house and refused to surrender unconditionally. It became apparent to Lee that he and the remnant of his band must be taken by force. He first offered to the militia the honor of storming the engine house, but this was declined. The marines were then commanded to undertake it. Twenty-five picked men stood ready for the assault. One of the number, armed with a sledge, attempted to batter down the door, but failed. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 291 Maj. W. W. Russell then asked the marines to lay aside their arms and "pointed to a flagstaff against which rested a forty-foot ladder." The marines ranged themselves on both sides of this and, using it as a battering ram, assaulted the ponderous door. At the second stroke the door partially gave way ; two shots rang out from the engine house and two of the marines fell, one of them mortally wounded. A third stroke of the ladder broke an opening through the door. Major Russell entered and demanded a surrender. The raiders complied and dropped their guns. Lieutenant Green struck Brown on the head with his sword. 41 A second blow felled him to the floor. A marine following Green bayoneted the prostrate and unconscious leader with a thrust through the shoulder and another near the kidneys that pinned him to the floor. In the meantime Dauphin Thompson and Jeremiah G. Anderson were killed. Brown was apparently dead and the fight was ended. 42 The details of the losing act of the raid are variously related by writers and witnesses who were present. It is stated that Green's sword was a light, dress affair, not intended for mortal execution, but no one has claimed that the bayonet thrust through the body was a toy weapon. The prisoners held as hostages by Brown were liberated from their nerve racking position and welcomed by the crowd with great acclaim ; the dead and wounded raiders were brought out and laid on the grass amid the howls of the enraged Virginians. Brown gradually revived and was taken to the paymaster's office. A newspaper correspondent, who was an eye witness, thus described what followed : "Major Russell ordered the wounded man to be carried into the rear room of the paymaster's office, to protect him from the infuriated mob. He was laid on the floor with a carriage cushion under his head. When he regained consciousness he recognized Major Russell, who was standing at his side, and said : " 'Young man, as you entered the engine house I had you covered with my rifle and could have killed you, but your frank face and your true courage caused me to pause, and I spared your life.' The major threw his hand to his cap as he replied : " 'I am deeply thankful to you for it.' "The raider then said : " Tor what I have done I am willing to answer before any proper tribunal, but I do not want to be torn to pieces by a mob.' " 'Neither shall you be, so long as I have a soldier to defend you,' replied Major Russell. 41 - Lieutenant Israel Green was born in Vermont. He entered the United States Army as lieutenant of marines in 1847 and served as such until the beginning of the Civil war. Though born in a New England state, his sympathies were with the South. He resigned his position in the army and entered the service of the Confederacy as major of marines in March, 1861, a position which he held till the close of the war. In the December, 1885, number of the North American Review was published a description of his capture of John Brown. In this it seems to be his purpose to defend himself and his men against a charge of unsoldierly conduct on that occasion. He declares that Brown and his men continued the fight after he and his marines entered, the engine room; that then were fired the shots that killed one marine and wounded the other. This statement is highly improbable. Not only is it at variance with the testimony of other eye witnesses, but it does not accord with the sketches drawn by artists on the ground. The pictures invariably show the two marines falling before any soldier or officer entered the engine house. There seems little doubt that John Brown was bayoneted and two of his men were slain after they had surrendered. The action of the marines was perhaps unsoldierly but it was perfectly natural. One of their number had lust been slain and they were wrought to a high pitch of fury. Earlier in the fight citizens and the militia had vented their wrath by riddling with bullets the dead bodies of Brown's men who had fallen. Green died in South Dakota, May 26, 1909, in the eighty-fourth year of his age.—Villard. 42 -S. K. Donovan, "John Brown at Harper's Ferry and Charlestown," in Ohio Archaeological and Historical Publications, Vol. XXX, pp. 319-321. 292 - HISTORY OF OHIO "At this point I stooped down at his side and said, 'Who are you, and what are you doing here ?' " 'I am John Brown ; better known to the public as 'Old Brown of Kansas'—Osawatomie Brown. I came here to free slaves and for no other purpose.' " 43 Among eminent men who came to see John Brown as he lay on the floor of the paymaster's office, were Henry A. Wise, governor of Virginia; J. M. Mason, United States Senator from that state, and author of the Fugitive Slave Law, and Clement L. Vallandigham, congressman from Ohio. At the time of the John Brown raid there were two representatives in Congress from Ohio of diametrically opposite views on political issues and the burning question of the hour. The attitude of Joshua R. Giddings on the slavery question has already been briefly set forth. The representative from the Dayton district, Clement L. Vallandigham, by ancestry and training was a strict constructionist and in political sympathy with the South. Like Giddings he was a man of high moral and religious character, but, unlike Giddings, in the heated political controversies of the times he made no appeals to the "law higher than the constitution." Vallandigham appeared early on the scene at Harper's Ferry after the capture of John Brown and his surviving men in the engine house. In company with Senator Mason he asked the old man while he lay bleeding on the floor a number of questions. The correspondent of the New York Herald made a record of these questions and answers. This record has been preserved in Redpath's "Life of Captain John Brown" and a number of other biographies that have since been published. A few of these questions and answers are here reproduced : Mr. Vallandigham—"Have you ever been in Portage County?" Brown—"I was there in June last." Mr. V.—"When in Cleveland, did you attend the Fugitive Slave Law Convention ?" Brown—"No ; I was there about the time of the sitting of the court to try the Oberlin rescuers. I spoke there publicly on that subject ; I spoke on the Fugitive Slave Law, and my own rescue, of course. So far as I had any reference at all, I was disposed to justify the Oberlin people for rescuing a slave, because I have myself forcibly taken slaves from bondage. I was concerned in taking eleven slaves from Missouri to Canada last winter. I think I spoke in Cleveland before the convention; do not know that I had any conversation with any of the Oberlin rescuers. Was sick part of the time I was in Ohio ; had the ague. Was part of the time in Ashtabula County." Mr. V.—"Did you see anything of Joshua R. Giddings there?" Brown—"I did meet him." Mr. V.—"Did you consult with him?" Brown—"If I did I would not tell you, of course, anything that would implicate Mr. Giddings, but I certainly saw him and had a conversation with him." Mr. V.—"I don't mean about this affair of yours, I mean about that rescue case." Brown—"Oh, yes, I did hear him express his opinion on it very freely and frankly." Mr. V.—"Justifying it ?" Brown—"Yes, Sir ; I do not compromise him by saying that." Vallandigham was severely criticised in a number of papers of the North for asking these and other questions of Brown in his wounded condition. The impression at the time was that he had gone to Harper's Ferry with the express purpose of questioning Brown and leading him 42 - Donovan, "John Brown," in Ohio Archaeological and Historical Society Publications, Vol. XXX, pp. 320-321. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 293 to implicate some of his northern friends, especially Joshua R. Giddings. It appears, however, that Vallandigham had started from Washington to his home in Ohio before he heard of the raid. The first news of it he got when he reached Baltimore. He was delayed there for some time and arrived in Harper's Ferry on the morning of the 19th of October. Here he met Senator Mason of Virginia, the author of the Fugitive Slave Law, who had been called to the Ferry by the insurrection. In company with Mason and a few others Vallandigham was permitted to see the prisoners. John Brown and Stevens were severely wounded and covered with blood. Brown, however, did not object to talking with newspaper correspondents and answered very freely most of the questions that were asked by Vallandigham and Mason. In answer to criticisms through the press Vallandigham, on October 22, 1859, addressed a letter to the Cincinnati Enquirer explaining his presence at Harper's Ferry and stating the purpose of his questions. Incidentally he gave his opinion of John Brown and the insurrection he had planned. His letter in part reads as follows : No "interview" was asked for by me or any one else of John Brown, and none granted, whether "voluntarily and out of pure good-will," or otherwise. Brown had no voice in the matter, the room being open equally to all who were permitted to enter the Armory enclosure. All went and came alike without consulting Brown, nor did he know either myself or the other gentlemen with whom he conversed. Entering the room, I found Senator Mason, of Virginia, there casually, together with eight or ten others, and Brown conversing freely with all who chose to address him. Indeed he seemed eager to talk to every one ; and new visitors were coming and going every moment. There was no arrangement to have any reporter ; nor did I observe for some minutes after I entered that any were present. Some one from New York was taking sketches of Brown and Stevens during the conversation, and the reporter of the Herald made himself known to me a short time afterward ; but I saw nothing of the Gazette reporter till several hours later, and then at the hotel in the village. Finding Brown anxious to talk and ready to answer any one who chose to ask a question, and having heard that the insurrection had been planned at the Ohio State Fair held at Zanesville in September, I very naturally made the inquiry of him, among other things, as to the truth of the statement. Learning from his answers that he had lived in Ohio for fifty years, and had visited the state in May or June last, I prosecuted my inquiries to ascertain what connection his conspiracy might have had with the "Oberlin Rescue" trials then pending, and the insurrectionary movement at that time made in the Western Reserve to organize forcible resistance to the Fugitive Slave Law ; and I have only to regret that I did not pursue the matter further; asking more questions and making them more specific. It is possible that some others who are so tenderly sensitive in regard to what was developed might have been equally implicated. Indeed, it is incredible that a mere casual conversation, such as the one held by me with John Brown, should excite such paroxysms of rage and call forth so much vulgar but impotent vituperation, unless there be much more yet undisclosed. Certain it is that three of the negroes, and they from Oberlin, and at least six of the white men, nine in all out of the nineteen, including John Brown, the leader of the insurrection, were, or had been, from Ohio, where they had received sympathy and counsel, if not material aid in their conspiracy. But the visit and interrogation were both casual, and did not continue over twenty minutes at the longest. Brown, so far from being exhausted, volunteered several speeches to the reporter, and more than once insisted that the conversations did not disturb or annoy him in the least. The report in the New York Herald, of October 21st, is generally very accurate, though several of the questions attributed to me, and particularly the first four, ought to have been put in the mouth of "By- 294 - HISTORY OF OHIO stander," who, by the way, represents at least half a score of different persons. As to the charge preferred of "breach of good taste and propriety," and all that, I propose to judge of it for myself, having been present on the occasion. There was neither "interview," "catechising," "inquisition," "pumping," nor any effort of the kind, but a short and casual conversation with the leader of a bold and murderous insurrection, a man of singular intelligence, in full possession of all his faculties, and anxious to explain his plans and motives so far as possible without implicating his confederates otherwise than by declining to answer. The developments are important : let the galled jades wince. And now allow me to add that it is vain to underrate either the man or his conspiracy. Capt. John Brown is as brave and resolute a man as ever headed an insurrection, and, in a good cause, and with a sufficient force, would have been a consummate partisan commander. He has coolness, daring, persistency, the stoic faith and patience, and a firmness of will and purpose unconquerable. He is tall, wiry, muscular, but with little flesh—with a cold gray eye, gray hair, beard and mustache, compressed lips and sharp aquiline nose, of cast-iron face and frame, and with powers of endurance equal to anything needed to be done or suffered in any cause. Though engaged in a wicked, mad and fanatical enterprise, he is the farthest possible remove from the ordinary ruffian, fanatic or madman ; but his powers are rather executory than inventive, and he never had the depth or breadth of mind to originate and contrive himself the plan of insurrection which he undertook to carry out. The conspiracy was, unquestionably, far more extended than yet appears, numbering among the conspirators many more than the handful of followers who assailed Harper's Ferry, and having in the North and West, if not also the South, as its counsellors and abettors, men of intelligence, position and wealth. Certainly it was one among the best-planned and executed conspiracies that ever failed. Governor Henry A. Wise represented the almost unanimous sentiment of the slaveholding aristocracy of the South, but he exemplified also something of the chivalry for which that section is famous. His treatment of the prisoners at Charlestown was greatly to his credit and the same may be said of the local officials, Sheriff Campbell and the jailer, Captain Avis. Shortly after the capture of Brown the governor was reported to have said to him, "Mr. Brown, the silver of your hair is reddened by the blood of crime and you should eschew these hard words and think of eternity." To this Brown 'replied : Governor, I have from all appearances not more than fifteen or twenty years the start of you in the journey to that eternity of which you kindly warn me ; and whether my time here shall be fifteen months, or fifteen days, or fifteen hours, I am. equally prepared to go. There is an eternity behind and an eternity before ; and this little speck in the center, however long, is but comparatively a minute. The difference between your tenure and mine is trifling, and I therefore tell you to be prepared. I am prepared. You all have a heavy responsibility, and it behooves you to prepare more than it does me. In a public speech shortly after the raid Governor Wise gave the following estimate of Brown : They are mistaken who take Brown to be a madman. He is a bundle of the best nerves I ever saw ; cut and thrust and bleeding, and in bonds. He is a man of clear head, of courage, fortitude, and simple ingenuousness. He is cool, collected, and indomitable, and it is but just to him to say that he was humane to his prisoners, as attested to me by Colonel Washington and Mr. Mills, and he inspired me with great trust in his integrity as a man of truth. He is a fanatic, vain and garrulous, but firm, truthful and intelligent. 44 44 - Redpath, "John Brown," p. 273. ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 295 In the same speech the governor described the capture of Col. Lewis Washington and quoted that distinguished Virginian as to Brown's bearing during the storming of the engine house : When Colonel Washington was taken, his watch and plate and jewels and money were demanded, to create what they call a "safety fund," to compensate the liberators for the trouble and expense of taking away his slaves. This, by a law, was to be done with all slaveholders. Washington, of course, refused to deliver up anything ; and it is remarkable that the only thing of material value which they took, besides his slaves, was the sword of Frederick the Great, which was sent to General Washington. This was taken by Stevens to Brown, and the latter commanded his men with that sword in this fight against the peace and safety of Washington's native state. He promised Colonel Washington to return it to him when he was done with it. And Colonel Washington says that he, Brown, was the coolest and firmest man he ever saw in defying danger and death. With one son dead by his side, and another shot through, he felt the pulse of his dying son with one hand and held his rifle with the other, and commanded his men with the utmost composure, encouraging them to be firm and to sell their lives as dearly as they could. 45 On Wednesday, October 19, John Brown, Stevens, Green and Edwin Coppoc were taken to Charlestown and lodged in jail. Six days later John Brown was put on trial in Charlestown, Virginia (now West Virginia). He was still suffering from his wounds, and during his trial lay most of the time on a cot. The trial ended on November 2, and John Brown was asked whether he had anything to say why sentence should not be pronounced upon him. Although he had not expected to be sentenced so soon, he rose from his cot and in a firm, clear voice, delivered the following remarkable address : I have, may it please the court, a few words to say. In the first place, I deny everything but what I have all along admitted : of a design on my part to free slaves. I intended certainly to have made a clean thing of that matter, as I did last winter, when I went into Missouri and there took slaves without the snapping of a gun on either side, moving them through the country, and finally leaving them in Canada. I designed to have done the same thing again on a larger scale. That was all I intended. I never did intend murder, or treason, or the destruction of property, or to excite or incite slaves to rebellion, or to make insurrection. I have another objection, and that is that it is unjust that I should suffer such a penalty. Had I interfered in the manner which I admit, and which I admit has been fairly proved—for I admire the truthfulness and candor of the greater portion of the witnesses who have testified in this case—had I so interfered in behalf of the rich, the powerful, the intelligent, the so-called great, or in behalf of any of their friends, either father, mother, brother, sister, wife or children, or any of that class, and suffered and sacrificed what I have in this interference, it would have been all right. Every man in this court would have deemed it an act worthy of reward rather than punishment. This court acknowledges, too, as I suppose, the validity of the law of God. I see a book kissed, which I suppose to be the Bible, or at least the New Testament, which teaches me that all things whatsoever I would that men should do to me, I should do even so to them. It teaches me, further, to remember them that are in bonds as bound with them. I endeavored to act up to that instruction. I say I am yet too young to understand that God is any respecter of persons. I believe that to have interfered as I have done, as I have always freely admitted I have done, in behalf of His despised poor, I did not wrong, but right. Now, if it is deemed necessary that I should forfeit my life for the furtherance of 45 - Ibid. 296 - HISTORY OF OHIO the ends of justice, and mingle my blood further with the blood of my children and with the blood of millions in this slave country whose rights are disregarded by wicked, cruel, and unjust enactments, I say, let it be done. Let me say one word further. I feel entirely satisfied with the treatment I have received on my trial. Considering all the circumstances, it has been more generous than I expected. But I feel no consciousness of guilt. I have stated from the first what was my intention, and what was not. I never had any design against the liberty of any person, nor any disposition to commit treason or incite slaves to rebel or make any general insurrection. I never encouraged any man to do so, but always discouraged any idea of that kind. Let me say, also, in regard to the statements made by some of those who were connected with me, I hear it has been stated by some of them that I have induced them to join me. But the contrary is true. I do not say this to injure them, but as regretting their weakness. Not one but joined me of his own accord, and the greater part at their own expense. A number of them I never saw, and never had a word of conversation with, till the day they came to me, and that was for the purpose I have stated. Now, I have done. John Brown was sentenced to be hanged December 2, 1859. The interim of one month afforded the opportunity that he so effectively improved to advance the cause for which he forfeited his life in this last desperate enterprise. Someone has said that if John Brown had been killed at the engine house in Harper's Ferry his epitaph would have been a score of lines in the newspapers to be forgotten in as many days, like the record of a desperado who dies by the law against which he raises a violent hand. He lived six weeks and by his bearing, his conversation and his letters won his great battle and the meed of martyrdom. In those forty-five days this son of Connecticut, this tanner, shepherd and farmer of Ohio, showed how he could fearlessly live for a principle and triumphantly die for it. That principle itself was soon to triumph in the Republic and give John Brown a permanent place in history. John Brown had reason to express satisfaction with the treatment accorded him on his trial. Under the circumstances it was doubtless more generous than he had expected. Not only on his trial, but during the fighting at Harper's Ferry there were among those who captured him and the remnant of his band generous and soldierly foes. Lieut.Col. Robert E. Lee and Maj. W. W. Russell exhibited the gallantry that we like to associate with the profession of arms. A meed of praise must also be accorded to Governor Henry A. Wise for the chivalrous spirit that he manifested on a number of occasions. The excesses of the frenzied crowd were unfortunate and deplorable, but they were such as might have occurred under similar circumstances in places north of Mason and Dixon's line. The kind and humane consideration of Sheriff Campbell and Jailer Capt. John Avis won unstinted praise from the prisoners and their friends. While in prison he was given free access to the outside world through correspondence, interviews with newspaper reporters and occasional visits with relatives and friends. While he gratefully acknowledged communications from those interested in his spiritual welfare, he refused the ministrations of the apologists for slavery. The following incident, fully authenticated, illustrates his uncompromising attitude: Brown was visited yesterday by Rev. James H. March, of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The reverend gentleman having advanced an argument in favor of the institution of slavery as it now exists, Brown replied to him, saying, "My dear sir, you know nothing about Christianity ; you will have to learn the A B C's in the lesson of Christianity, as I find you entirely ignorant of the meaning of the word. I, of course, ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 297 respect you as a gentleman ; but it is a heathen gentleman." The reverend gentleman here thought it best to draw such a discussion to a close, and therefore withdrew. 46 Brief extracts are given illustrative of sentiments expressed by Brown while he was in prison awaiting execution. On November 28, 1859, in a letter to Atty. D. R. Tilden of Cleveland, Ohio, he said : "I have enjoyed remarkable cheerfulness and composure of mind ever since my confinement ; and it is a comfort to feel assured that I am permitted to die for a cause—not merely to pay the debt of nature as all must."47 In answer to a letter from T. B. Musgrave he made the following statement in a letter dated November 17: "Tell your father that I am quite cheerful; that I do not feel myself in the least degraded by my imprisonment, my chains, or the mere prospect of the gallows. Men can not imprison or chain or hang the soul. I go joyfully in behalf of millions that 'have no rights' that this great and glorious, this Christian Republic is bound to respect."48 In the course of a long letter to his wife and children November 8, he said: "I can trust God with both the time and the manner of my death, believing, as I now do, that for me at this time to seal my testimony for God and humanity with my blood will do vastly more toward advancing the cause I have earnestly endeavored to promote than all I have done in my life before."49 In an interview with Col. S. K. Donovan shortly before his execution he was asked what he thought would be the final effect of his acts at the Ferry and the atonement which he was to make for them. He said in reply that he did not possess the gift of prophesy, but added : "I and my fellow captives must die, but mark my prediction : our deaths will be the end of slavery." 50 There are, of course, numerous accounts of the execution of John Brown. The one presented here is from a lecture by S. K. Donovan, a Pennsylvanian by birth and an Ohioan by adoption, who, as representative of the Baltimore Daily Exchange, was the first reporter to arrive in Harper's Ferry after the raid began. He remained in Charlestown while Brown and his men were imprisoned there. Some years after the death of Donovan, which occurred in 1902, a manuscript copy of his lecture was found in the possession of his sister and published for the first time in 1921. Following is his description of the final scene in the life of John Brown : The air on the second day of December was crisp and sharp, such as we have in this latitude in early December, when the weather is fine. Early in the morning there were fleecy clouds shrouding the sun, but by ten o'clock these had dissipated and the sun shone brightly. John Brown dressed for execution when he rose from bed. About nine o'clock, bedizened with laces and cords and spangles, General Taliaferro, commandant of the 3,000 Virginia uniformed militia, called at John Brown's cell. The old hero was engaged in writing. As he looked up and recognized the General, he said : "What is the hour of execution ?" "Eleven o'clock," replied the General. "I will have finished my correspondence before that hour," he replied as he resumed his pen. Taliaferro stood for a moment and then turned on his heels and left 46 - Redpath, "John Brown," p 383. 47 - Sanborn, p. 609. 48 - Ibid, p. 593. 49 - Ibid, p. 586. 50 - Donovan, "John Brown," in Ohio Archeological and Historical Society Publications, Vol. XXX, p. 328. 298 - HISTORY OF OHIO the jail. He did not awe the old raider by his imposing presence and attitude. At eleven 11 o'clock a furniture wagon, with two horses attached, was drawn up in front of the jail. John Brown with Sheriff Campbell on one side and Jailer Avis on the other stepped from the jail. Unaided I see him as he places his foot on the first step. No bravado, but a calm mien and exquisite poise, step after step he takes, as though he were JOHN BROWN'S LAST LETTER So far as known, this is the last of Brown's letters, though others may have been written on the morning of his execution. This and the prophetic statement on the preceding page are his only writings that have been published, bearing the date of December 2, 1859. Lora Case, of Hudson, Ohio, was a devoted friend of John Brown. ascending the stairs in a gentleman friend's home to a chamber in which he was to rest. Reaching the top, he steps forward on the trap, glances at the thousands of soldiers by whom he is surrounded and turns to Jailer Avis "Where are your citizens ?" "Citizens are not allowed to be present," the jailer replies. "That is a great mistake—a grave mistake. Your citizens should have witnessed this scene." He throws back his head and looks at the rope which dangles above him. Then his eyes catch the Blue Ridge and he turns almost around ANTI-SLAVERY AND OTHER MOVEMENTS - 299 grasping its beautiful sweep up the valley. A touch on his shoulder calls his attention, and, as he faces, the sheriff whispers to him. The old man reaches up and removes his old black felt hat, laying it at his feet ; then runs his fingers through his hair, and then his arms are pinioned, his limbs are bound, the rope is adjusted and the white cap is drawn over his face. Then an order is given to the military and it commences to maneuver. Charging and retreating, flying off at the flank and falling back on the center ; ten minutes are occupied in this barbarian behavior, and all the while the old man stands on the death trap without a tremour. Jailer Avis becomes impatient and says to Captain Brown : "Aren't you getting tired, Captain ?" "No, but I do not see the necessity for keeping me waiting so long." The military settle. The sheriff approaches the old man and touches his hand with a handkerchief with the remark : "Drop this when you are ready." "Oh, no ! I do not need that. I am always ready." In a few seconds the trap is sprung, and in fifteen minutes John Brown's soul is with his God. 51 The press generally, including all the leading republican papers, condemned the attack on Harper's Ferry, though many of them coupled with their condemnation denunciation of slavery that had maddened men to undertake this rash enterprise. The New York Tribune, perhaps the most prominent of these, regarded Brown as "a madman." The Independent, a radical anti-slavery paper, on the 20th of October, 1859, described Brown as "a lawless brigand." In the days intervening between the attack on Harper's Ferry and the execution of those who participated in it, however, a great change was noticeable in the comment of these papers. The Independent on November 24 editorially stated : "The people's verdict has already stamped John Brown as a brave and honest man. * * * What is it that will be hanged on the gallows before the eyes of all men ? Not John Brown, but slavery. * * * John Brown swinging on the gallows will ring the knell of slavery." The issue of this paper for December 8 contains the following on the influence of Brown : "No man has ever made such a profound impression on this nation through his moral heroism. * * * Each of his actions, every word he spoke up to the time of his execution has only strengthened and increased the power of his example. He grew constantly greater up to the end. He was greatest at the last, when most men would have been weakest." It was perfectly natural for the leaders of both political parties to conclude that any suspicion of sympathy with the work of John Brown would seriously detract from the support of the party manifesting such sympathy. Politicians of that day were similar to those of our own time, who probably under like circumstances would act much the same. Their judgment, however, as to the influence of the Harper's Ferry raid upon the destiny of parties was fundamentally wrong. The executions at Charlestown reached profounder depths than the appeals of campaign orators. They solidified the South in defense of slavery. They aroused the North and set the bells to tolling from Maine to Kansas. Abraham Lincoln and William H. Seward might condemn and deplore Harper's Ferry, but it was perhaps making more votes than any other one influence for their party and rapidly preparing the way for the elevation of one of them to the presidency of the United States. The raid at Harper's Ferry and the executions at Charlestown were prophetic of the cataclysm to follow. While eminent statesmen did not 51 - Donovan, "John Brown," in Ohio Archeological and Historical Society Publications, Vol. XXX, pp. 320-323.