Major Brown

“ Major Brown's personal appearance was doubtless a sufficient reason for the unwonted stir among the women, especially in the lodges where the younger ones dwelt. He certainly was a handsome man, and, in conscious indifference to its effect, bore himself in a dignified manner among the people. ”

“ That Brown might have become a great general was possible, had his experience been larger; but whatever was his merit as a general, his qualities as a fighter were more remarkable than those of any other general officer in the war. Except immediately [82] after receiving his wound at Lundy’s Lane, when his army was exhausted by four hours of extreme effort, he never seemed satiated with fighting. Among all the American major-generals, he alone made raw troops as steady as grenadiers, and caused militia to storm entrenched lines held by British regulars. ”

“ Both of these major transactions—the placing of the order for the spears, and the employment of Forbes, as stated—are so discreditable to ordinary intelligence, that they impeach Brown's sanity, except upon the sole hypothesis, that these two men had, at that time, so matured their plans for attempting a revolution, through an insurrection of the slaves, that Brown felt justified in placing the order for the spears, and in engaging [Pg 226] the services of a man capable of directing large military operations. ”

“ The blood is running freely from the mouth of Lieut. Jewett; but he does not leave his company. Sergeant-major Trotter is wounded, but still fights. Sergt. Shorter is wounded in the knee, yet will not go to the rear. A shell tears off the foot of Sergeant-major Charles L. Mitchel; and, as he is carried to the rear, he shouts, with uplifted hand, “Cheer up, boys: we’ll never surrender!” But look away in front: there are the colors, and foremost amongst the bearers is Robert M. King, the young, the handsome, and the gentlemanly sergeant, whose youth and bravery attract the attention of all. ”

“ Brown's successful trip across the country, from Kansas to Canada, in the rigor of winter, with these colored fugitives, will always stand to the credit of his courage, his sagacity, and his perseverance. The initial drive from Osawatomie to Major Abbott's place near Lawrence, where they arrived January 24th, had its discomforts. Mr. Villard, quoting from Gill's narrative says: "Through mud, and then over frozen ground, without a dollar in their pockets, their shoes all but falling apart, Gill and Brown, resolutely drove the slow-going ox-team with its [Pg 279] load of women and children. ”

“ Some partisans of John Brown have attempted to prove that he was in command, but the evidence is conclusive that he declined Major Abbott's offer of the command of a company, and then, at his request, went from one of the "forts" to another, encouraging the men, urging them to fire low, and giving them such military information as was his, everywhere, according to Major Abbott, with excellent results. [213]
Of the invaders, Mr. Villard says: [214]
They had with them no less than twenty-seven hundred men, some of them completely uniformed and well equipped. ”

“ After living with Major Freeland five or six months, I ran away, and went into the woods back of the city: and when night came on, I made my way to my master's farm, but was afraid to be seen, knowing that if Mr. Haskell, the overseer, should discover me, I should be again carried back to Major Freeland; so I kept in the woods. One day, while in the woods, I heard the barking and howling of dogs, and in a short time they came so near that I knew them to be the bloodhounds of Major Benjamin O'Fallon. He kept five or six, to hunt runaway slaves with. ”

“ Major Booth, who was killed near the close of the fight, conducted the defence with great coolness, skill, and gallantry. His last signal to the boat was, “We are hard pressed and shall be overpowered.” He refused to surrender, however, and fought to the last. By the uniform and voluntary, testimony of the rebel officers, as well as the survivors of the fight, the negro-artillery regiments fought with the bravery and coolness of veterans, and served the guns with skill and precision. ”

“ The attachment which the colored men form for their officers is very great, often amounting to self-sacrifice. Thus when Major Bogle fell wounded, one of his soldiers sprang forward to rescue him, and bear him to the rear. At that instant a rebel sergeant fired, and wounded the black man in the shoulder. ”

“ Andrew of Massachusetts, of Sergt. Stephen A. Swailes, of Company F, Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Regiment, as second lieutenant.
M. R. Delany, M.D., was soon after appointed a major of negro volunteers, and assigned to duty at Charleston, S.C. W. P. Powell, jun., received an appointment as surgeon, about the same time.
The steamer “Planter,” since being brought out of Charleston by Robert Small, was under the command of a Yankee, who, being ordered to do service where the vessel would be liable to come under the fire of rebel guns, refused to obey: whereupon Lieut.-Col. ”

“ We all went up to the schoolhouse and got ourselves ready to fight.
"The crowd came and hung around the schoolhouse a few days, but they didn't try to capture us. The governor of Kansas, he telegraphed to the United States marshal at Springdale: 'Capture John Brown, dead or alive.' The marshal he answered: 'If I try to capture John Brown it'll be dead, and I'll be the one that'll be dead.' Finally those Kansas people went home, and then that same marshal put us in a car and sent us to Chicago. It took us over three months to get to Canada. . . . What kind of a man was Captain Brown? ”

“ John Brown had a motive for disbanding the Liberty Guards. What was it? He had a motive for quitting the Free-State army secretly. Why secretly? He had "no desire all things considered, that the slave-power should cease from its acts of aggression." Why should he not desire peace? He had a purpose in view when he organized the Pottawatomie Rifles under the command of his son, and a motive for organizing five of his sons into a separate company: "a little company by ourselves." ”

“ January 7th, armed with his congratulatory letter from Governor Robinson, he called upon Mr. Amos A. Lawrence, who wrote of him, admiringly, as follows:
Captain Brown, the old partisan hero of Kansas warfare, came to see me. I had a long talk with him. He is a calm, temperate, and pious man, but when roused he is a dreadful foe. He appears about sixty years old. His severe simplicity of habits, his determined energy, his heroic courage in time of trial, all based on a deep religious faith, make him a true representative of the Puritanic warrior. ”

“ There were many other men in the United States bent on destroying slavery, but few so impulsive as John Brown. His plan was rash in the extreme, and even its success would have profited only a few slaves. But Brown was a born crusader. The men who followed him were all impulsive, and many of them were already trained in the rude ways of frontier life. They knew what he had done in Kansas, and were ready to fight on his side anywhere else. They had a real reverence for John Brown. The tall man with the long, almost white hair, keen eyes, and flowing beard was no ordinary leader. ”

“ The spectacle which met Brown's gaze as he stepped upon the porch from the door of the jail on his way to the scaffold, could not otherwise than recall to his mind the dreams of conquest and of military glory which he had cherished. Three thousand men—infantry, cavalry, and artillery—were under arms. In admiration of the display—for the "street was full of marching men," he said: "I had no idea that Governor Wise considered my execution so important," [494] and for that reason, Mr. Villard says, "no little slave-child was held up for the benison of his lips, for none but soldiery was near." ”

“ In projecting his campaign, Brown was a law unto himself, untrammelled by the accepted usages of war. The excess of his ardor and enthusiasm led him to believe that he could corrupt the rank and file of the army. In his philosophy, the daring, dangerous, adventurous men who largely composed the enlisted men of the army at that time, having no hope of promotion in the service, would become eager listeners to his proposal. ”

“ We who know the story of the Civil War and the abolition of slavery think of John Brown as a hero. We forget the outlaw and remember the martyr. If he was setting the laws of men at defiance he was also following the law that he felt was given him by God. His faith and his simplicity have made him a great figure in history. A man who met him riding across the plains of Kansas in the days of the border warfare drew a vivid picture of him. He said that a tall man on horseback stopped and asked him a question. ”

“ JOHN BROWN: A PARADOX.
COMPASSIONATE eyes had our brave John Brown,
And a craggy stern forehead, a militant frown;
He, the storm-bow of peace. Give him volley on volley,
The fool who redeemed us once of our folly,
And the smiter that healed us, our right John Brown!
Too vehement, verily, was John Brown!
For waiting is statesmanlike; his the renown
Of the holy rash arm, the equipper and starter
Of freedmen; aye, call him fanatic and martyr:
He can carry both halos, our plain John Brown.
A scandalous stumbling-block was John Brown,
And a jeer; but ah! ”

“ With less than fifty picked men he rashly seized on Harper’s Ferry, held it for some days, and threw old Virginia into fits. He was seized and hung; and many good men approved the hanging; but in little more than a year afterwards, John Brown’s soul was “marching on” in the song of the Northern soldiery going South to battle against rebellion, until the very Charlestown where his gallows was set up was made to ring with the terrible refrain in his honor, the echoes of which are now audible in every State, from Maine to Louisiana. ”

“ I have discovered the existence of a secret association, having for its object the liberation of the slaves at the South, by a general insurrection. The leader of the movement is old John Brown, late of Kansas. He has been in Canada during the winter, drilling the negroes there, and they are only waiting for his word to start for the South to assist the slaves. They have one of their leading men (a white man) in an armory in Maryland—where it is situated, I have not been able to learn. ”

“ In the interview which he gave out after his [Pg 157] capture at Harper's Ferry, in answer to the question: "Did you know Sherrod in Kansas? I understand you killed him?" Brown replied: "I killed no man except in fair fight. I fought at Black Jack, and at Osawatomie, and if I killed anybody it was at one of these places." [184] Brown, therefore, was not present at any of these battles. He was at Lawrence, however, on August 17th, after the fighting was over. ”

“ In honor, as "Captain of the Liberty Guards in the Fifth Regiment Kansas Volunteers," John Brown first received the historic title of "Captain," and in dishonor he abandoned his commission three months later.
Back of every human action there is that which incites the action, that which determines the choice or moves the will. [Pg 121] There was that back of the actions of John Brown, and of his sons and confederates, that moved them to do what they did on the night of the 24th of May, 1856; this inciting force was motive. ”

“ There never was more need for a good life of any man than there was for one of John Brown.... Those who thought best of him, and those who thought the worst, were alike desirous to know more of him than the newspapers had furnished, and to become acquainted with the course of his life, and the training which had prepared him for Kansas and brought him to Harper's Ferry. ”

“ Men like Henry Ward Beecher, Ralph Waldo Emerson, George B. Cheever, William Lloyd Garrison, Wendell Phillips and Theodore Parker, delivered eulogies on Brown after he had been hung. They most eloquently denounced slavery from pulpits and platforms; but they lived in the limelight of oratorical popularity and flourished amidst luxurious ease. To Brown's immortal credit be it said that he gave domestic security, his humble fortune, his perillous work, the lives of his cherished sons and his own blood and life for the anti-slavery opinions that were anchored in his soul. ”

“ Young John Brown's first broad contact with life and affairs came with the War of 1812, during which Hull's disastrous campaign brought the scene of fighting near his western home. His father, a simple wandering old soul, thrifty without foresight, became a beef contractor, and the boy drove his herds of cattle and hung about the camp. He met men of position, was praised for his prowess and let listen to talk that seemed far beyond his years. ”

“ I’ve read his life, and have it now in my trunk in Charleston; sent to New York by the steward of ‘The James Adger,’ and got it. I’ve read it to heaps of the colored folks. Lord, they think John Brown was almost a god. Just say you was a friend of his, and any slave will almost kiss your feet, if you let him. They sav, if he was only alive now, he would be king. How it did frighten the white folks when he raised the insurrection! It was Sunday when we heard of it. They wouldn’t let a negro go into the streets. I was waiter at the Mills House in Charleston. ”

“ An important incident at Black Jack was the failure of the deputy United States marshal, Wm. J. Preston, to arrest the Browns. He had warrants for their arrest for the murders on the Pottawatomie, and came with Sumner to accomplish it. The Colonel notified Brown that they would be served in his presence, but when ordered by Sumner to proceed, the marshal said: "I do not recognize any one for whom I have warrants," to which the Colonel replied: "Then what are you here for?" [164] A man of Brown's years and experience and courage is a dangerous animal when thus situated. ”