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The Last Days of John Brown

John_brown_interior_engine_house

 

The Last Days of John Brown is a multi-part series about the October 16, 1859 anti-slavery raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia that helped spark the Civil War.

The Last Days of John Brown: Martyr, Revolutionary or Terrorist?

November 29, 2021 by John Warren 2 Comments

John_Brown_hangingThis week marks the anniversary of John Brown’s execution. Had Brown escaped from Harpers Ferry rather than been captured he might well today be just a footnote, one of the tens of thousands that struggled to undermine the institution of slavery in America before the Civil War.

It’s often said that just one thing secured Brown’s place in the hearts of millions of Americans that came after him – his execution and martyrdom. There is another equally important reason Americans will celebrate the life of John Brown this week however – he was right that slavery would end at a heavy price. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: Martyr, Revolutionary or Terrorist?

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Abolition, Civil War, John Brown, Military History, Slavery, The Last Days of John Brown

The Last Days of John Brown: A Speedy Trial

November 25, 2021 by John Warren Leave a Comment

carrying john brown to prison from courtFollowing the capture of John Brown and his associates at Harpers Ferry they were first held in the armory’s guardhouse.

The next day, October 19th, 1859, they were taken to the County Jail in Charles Town, about eight miles away. On October 25th (after being questioned by Virginia Governor Henry A. Wise, Virginia Senator James M. Mason, and Representative Clement Vallandigham of Ohio) John Brown was led into court for arraignment. He was manacled to Edwin Coppoc and escorted by some 80 militiamen with bayonets fixed. Brown was still suffering from his wounds and needed to be supported at the bench. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: A Speedy Trial

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Abolition, Black History, Civil War, Crime and Justice, John Brown, Slavery, The Last Days of John Brown

The Last Days of John Brown: Brown’s Fellow Prisoners

November 20, 2021 by John Warren Leave a Comment

PrisonersWhile John Brown waited to hang for leading the raid to free people enslaved near Harpers Ferry, Virginia, his compatriots were led to the Charles Town court and tried before Judge Andrew Parker. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: Brown’s Fellow Prisoners

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Crime and Justice, John Brown, The Last Days of John Brown

The Last Days of John Brown: The Famous Beard

November 3, 2021 by John Warren Leave a Comment

Ole Peter Hansen Balling 1873 portrait of John Brown National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian InstitutionFor reasons of political expediency, Republicans in the North initially distanced themselves from John Brown and his raid to free people enslaved around Harper’s Ferry.

Many joined the chorus of (often pro-slavery) voices proclaiming Brown insane, no doubt in part to protect their own political party, for as John Brown’s biographer David S. Reynolds put it, “the implication was that Republicans, and by extension many Northerners, were lawbreakers who threatened national peace.”

The truth of course, was that Brown had probably already planned a raid into Virginia to free slaves there before the Republican Party was founded in 1854. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: The Famous Beard

Filed Under: History Tagged With: Abolition, John Brown, Political History, The Last Days of John Brown

The Last Days of John Brown: Prisoners And Fugitives

October 23, 2021 by John Warren Leave a Comment

llustration from Harpers Weekly Nov 12 1859Ten men were killed during John Brown’s anti-slavery raid in Virginia in October 1859. All but two were buried in a common grave on the Shenandoah River, Harpers Ferry.

The body of Jeremiah Anderson, who was bayoneted in the final storming of the engine house, was handed over to a local medical school – his last resting place remains unknown. Watson Brown’s body was given over to Winchester Medical College where it remained until Union troops recovered it during the Civil War and burned the school in reprisal. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: Prisoners And Fugitives

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Abolition, Black History, Civil War, John Brown, Slavery, The Last Days of John Brown

John Brown’s Defeat And Capture (The Last Days of John Brown Series)

October 16, 2021 by John Warren Leave a Comment

John_brown_interior_engine_houseAs the first full day of John Brown’s raid dawned almost no one in the village of Harpers Ferry knew what was happening. Charles White for instance, a Presbyterian minister who had spent the evening the raid began on an island between the rifle works, and the armory and arsenal reported that he “knew nothing until daylight when the gentleman with whom we were staying came into our room and notified us.” [Read more…] about John Brown’s Defeat And Capture (The Last Days of John Brown Series)

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Abolition, Civil War, James Buchanan, John Brown, Political History, Slavery, The Last Days of John Brown

John Brown at Harpers Ferry, Day One (The Last Days of John Brown Series)

October 16, 2021 by John Warren Leave a Comment

Harpers Ferry 1859October 16th is the anniversary of the anti-slavery raid on Harpers Ferry that ended in the trial and execution of John Brown of North Elba. You can read the entire “Last Days of John Brown” series here.

In 1859, John Brown and the men he led from atop a wagon loaded with supplies went undiscovered on their march from the Kennedy Farm to Harpers Ferry. John Cook and Charles Tidd went forward to cut the telegraphs wires into the village from the east and west.

As Brown reached the Ferry Bridge, he sent his most experienced men, Aaron Stevens and John Kagi, to the front of the small column and onto the bridge. There they encountered William Williams and held him.

[Read more…] about John Brown at Harpers Ferry, Day One (The Last Days of John Brown Series)

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Abolition, Civil War, John Brown, Military History, Political History, Slavery, The Last Days of John Brown

The Last Days of John Brown: Final Harpers Ferry Preparations

October 9, 2021 by John Warren Leave a Comment

Kennedy Farm Photo By Tim RowlandIn early October, 1859 John Brown and his small militia were making their final preparations for a raid on the slaveholders of Virginia.

The time and place for a raid seem right even now. It was the harvest season in the south and the fields would be filled with disgruntled and overworked slaves bringing in the crops, a perfect opportunity to turn them to revolt.

Harpers Ferry was lightly guarded and the arsenal there contained about 100,000 muskets and rifles – enough to carry on a lengthy guerrilla war against southern slaveholders. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: Final Harpers Ferry Preparations

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Abolition, Civil War, John Brown, The Last Days of John Brown

The Last Days of John Brown: North Elba

September 18, 2021 by John Warren Leave a Comment

One of the familiar attacks on John Brown (and by extension his anti-slavery legacy) involves his failed business ventures and accusations that he was a swindler and a drifter, roaming from place to place – only briefly and uneventfully staying in North Elba, Essex County, NY.

“Over the years before his Kansas escapade Brown had been a drifter, horse thief and swindler,” Columbia University historian John Garraty once wrote. Garraty served as the president of the Society of American Historians and was co-author of the high school history textbook The American Nation (he died in 2007).

A closer look at Brown and the his family, however, reveals an experience typical of many Americans, then and today, and the importance of North Elba in Brown’s plans for a raid into Virginia. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: North Elba

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Abolition, Adirondacks, Black History, Civil War, Economic History, Essex County, Gerrit Smith Estate, John Brown, North Elba, Panic of 1837, The Last Days of John Brown

The Last Days of John Brown: Pikes, Rifles, and Revolvers

September 13, 2021 by John Warren 4 Comments

John Brown PikeJohn Brown’s raid on the slaveholders of Virginia is often considered a hopeless fool’s errand, but it was far from it. Brown’s plan was simple enough: capture weapons and ammunition form the Harpers Ferry federal Armory, retire to the countryside and conduct nighttime border raids to free Southern slaves.

The principal goal of the actual raid was to free slaves, not attack and hold a Southern state. Brown, well-armed and experienced in the type of raid he was planning, was fairly confident in its success. [Read more…] about The Last Days of John Brown: Pikes, Rifles, and Revolvers

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Abolition, Civil War, Connecticut, John Brown, Military History, Political History, The Last Days of John Brown

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