On the Harpers Ferry Road, Washington County, Maryland, October 16, 1859, 8:30pm.

 The small farm wagon made its way slowly up the narrow dirt lane. The wagon’s driver, known to his neighbors as Isaac Smith, momentarily looked back over his shoulder at the source of the clatter that threatened to alert the residents of a nearby farmhouse. A group of long wooden boxes, marked as farming and mining implements, lay in the wagon, their actual contents of pistols, pikes and other weaponry being the cause of the racket in an otherwise silent night. The driver looked forward again into the foggy darkness, resigned to the fact that nothing could be done about the problem.

 Trailing behind the wagon were twenty-one men, bunched in groups of twos and threes, walking wordlessly through the raw October night. Each man wore a blanket and shawl, which not only provided some degree of comfort, but also served to conceal the rifle, Bowie knife and pair of revolvers each carried. Their shuffling feet added a rhythmic bass note to the high pitched clanking of the wagon, and the men’s minds wandered to thoughts of home, what lay ahead, and their past weeks of preparation in Maryland.

 One of the men, Oliver Brown, thought mainly of his father, John Brown Sr., with whom he had come to Maryland from Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. The elder Brown, being wanted for the murder of five proslavery men in the Kansas Territory, had been using the alias “Isaac Smith” since entering this slave state on July 1^st. Oliver wondered what his father must have been thinking on this night. A night when years of planning were to be, at last, brought to fruition at Harpers Ferry.

 John Brown continued to guide the horse drawn farm wagon at a steady pace, but slow enough not to tire the troops behind him. Brown was a graying, wiry man of nearly sixty years. A full beard now filled out his face, hanging down well beneath his chin, helping the fugitive to hide his identity from those who might otherwise recognize him. The most striking feature about the man was his deep penetrating eyes, the eyes of a true believer. These eyes seemed to compel everyone around him to believe as well.

 It would be two hours before Harpers Ferry was reached, and Brown had time to reflect on what had gone before. He thought of the pain and suffering he had endured, the separations from his family, and of the great responsibility he felt that God had placed on him.

 John Brown drifted back to the tearful goodbye he had bidden his wife and children in North Elba, New York. He began to wonder if it was entirely fair for his wife, Mary, to have to endure such trials on his behalf. She had suffered so much, and despite it all, she never lost the strong face she turned toward him. Brown grieved for her. This was clearly his mission, not hers, and yet she was made to suffer every hardship with him. He suddenly felt very lonely for her and it pained him to think that he might not see her again.

 It had been over three months since John Brown, his sons Oliver and Owen, and Jeremiah Anderson crossed into Maryland from their base in Chambersburg. The four of them had stayed at Sandy Hook until a permanent location in the area could be obtained. This was accomplished within a few days with the renting of a farmhouse, cabin and surrounding land owned by a Kennedy family. Being in a relatively isolated spot within five miles of Harpers Ferry, the location was ideal.

 Shortly after setting up in the Kennedy farmhouse, supplies, military items (marked in boxes as Picks, Shovels and Hardware), money and men began to flow to Brown from points north. Brown’s daughter and daughter-in-law were brought in to run the household and to give the appearance of family. The girls were also charged with the responsibility of getting rid of the nosy ladies from down the road, who nearly drove them insane that summer. They would show up unexpectedly to work the vegetable garden they owned in front of the Kennedy farmhouse, and the ‘soldiers in waiting’ would scramble up to the attic and try not to breathe as the neighbors would press their way in to look around.

 Occasionally, Brown and his sons would ride into town to buy supplies and to ask questions about local farming or mining activities - to give the appropriate impression. John Brown usually did all of the talking on these excursions. To the locals, Isaac Smith and his sons seemed to be little more than quiet, pious farmers, trying to make a new start in Maryland.

 During daylight hours, Brown’s men would stay indoors, assembling the long steel headed pikes that were to be distributed to slaves freed in the upcoming raid. Also, they studied a simplistic military drill book, “The Patriotic Volunteer”, that had been written just for them. Other materials on hand for the invasion were boxes of rifles, revolvers, percussion caps and ammunition for the guns.

 They ventured outside only at night for fresh air, exercise and drilling. This regimen eventually began to make the small army restless and impatient for action. They had spent many weeks inside the stifling hot farmhouse preparing to overthrow slavery, and the longer they were forced to wait, the more anxious they became. Brown was able to keep them under control through the charismatic leadership qualities he possessed. Once, however, only his threat to resign put an end to a particularly heated debate.

 John Brown had been delaying his assault because he wasn’t at all satisfied with the number of men that had answered the call to arms that was being secretly spread amongst abolitionist in the North. He had especially hoped for more support from the free Negroes in the Canadian provinces.

 When he had convened his Constitutional Convention there a year ago, there were hundreds of free blacks in Canada who seemed ready to take decisive action on behalf of their brothers still in bondage. But by October of 1859, only five had come to Maryland to do the work, and this was a disappointment to Brown. In spite of this, however, he was still convinced that the task of holding the mountains of Western Virginia could be accomplished with his force, which would soon enough be complemented by escaping slaves.

 Brown took great encouragement from the example of Nat Turner, who was able to incite a slave rebellion, and then, for a time, hold part of Virginia with only fifty men. John Brown and his followers, believing that a general slave uprising was only a matter of time anyway, had become convinced that once the news spread about the Ferry, the slaves in the vicinity would spring into action and rush to support the insurrection. Then, with an enlarged army of over one thousand rebelling slaves (now armed with pikes and captured arms from the government arsenal at Harpers Ferry), they would take to the mountains, entrench and repel all attempts to remove them. Once having convinced the enemy of the uselessness of attack, a new nation would be born in the mountains. This nation would soon stretch southward into the heart of Dixie, drawing its strength from a constant flow of rising slaves.

 Once the dominoes of slaveholding counties began to fall into the hands of rebelling slaves and Brown’s abolitionist backers began to exert political pressure on Washington, the entire system would necessarily collapse, Brown thought. And then, the victorious heroes of the struggle would reign forever in the mountains and take their place in a righteous society, where the law of God had conquered the law of guilty man.

 Not every abolitionist believed it would be that easy. John Brown had met with Frederick Douglass, an acquaintance of many years, in August at Chambersburg. Douglass doubted Brown’s ability to accomplish his rather lofty objectives. He told him so, saying that Brown was “going into a perfect steel trap, and that once in you will never get out alive”. Douglass argued in favor of an earlier plan, whereby Brown would quietly free small groups of slaves and slowly assemble them in the Alleghenies.

 John Brown’s mind was made up, though, and for his part, he tried to convince Frederick Douglass to accompany him to Harpers Ferry, to help organize the masses of newly freed slaves. Certain that the assault was folly, Douglass refused. Despite this, a free Negro who had traveled to Chambersburg with him, Shields Green, decided to sign on for the expedition, much to Douglass’ surprise. They parted there, and would never see each other again.

 In late September, fearing that his plans were about to be exposed, Brown was ready to act. On the thirtieth, he escorted the ladies to a Chambersburg boarding house, telling them to await instructions there. Returning to the Kennedy farm, he began to make final preparations for the advance on Harpers Ferry.

 On Sunday morning, October 16, John Brown announced to his followers that the time for their blow against slavery had arrived. Presiding over the Morning Prayer service, Brown read aloud his two favorite Biblical passages.

 “From the Book of the Prophet Isaiah,” he began. “ ‘But thus saith the Lord…’ “ His voice was deep and booming now, filling the room with righteous thunder. “ ‘Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered: for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children.

 “ ‘And I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh; and they shall be drunken with their own blood, as with sweet wine: and all flesh shall know that I the Lord am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob.’ “

 Brown continued from the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, his tone growing shrill with fury. “ ‘For among my people are found wicked men: they lay wait as he that setteth snares; they set a trap, they catch men…’ “ John Brown’s reading now roared to its conclusion. “ ‘Shall I not visit for these things? Saith the Lord: shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?’ “

 After the prayer meeting had ended, the men packed all of the necessary equipment, and decided what would be left behind for later use. John Brown then gathered his Provisional Government Army around him. Once more Brown reviewed his “Provisional Constitution and Ordinances for the People of the United States”, a document adopted at the convention in Canada the previous year.

 In its reading, the “Provisional Constitution” sounds like a hybrid of the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. The most notable difference is the total abolition of slavery, which was, of course, the centerpiece of Brown’s new government. The leader now had his men swear allegiance to this document, which he had printed in the thousands, ready for distribution to the runaway slaves that would soon be flocking to him.

 Under the “Provisional Constitution”, John Brown served as Commander-In-Chief of the Provisional Government Army, now gathered before him. In this role he now bestowed officer’s commissions, generally to those whom he had led since the Kansas battles, and whom he most trusted. Once this was done, the plan of attack was reviewed, duties detailed, assignments given. The soldiers were instructed to fire only when necessary, so as not to waste ammunition. The group broke up in an air of enthusiastic expectation as dusk fell on the Maryland countryside.

 Just after eight that Sunday night, Brown gave the order to depart. “Men, get on your arms; we will proceed to the Ferry.” There was no moon to brighten the evening and a light drizzle had begun to fall.

 Harpers Ferry is nestled at the feet of Maryland, Loudoun and Bolivar Heights where the Shenandoah meets the Potomac. Because of the mountains looming up around it, the town feels more isolated than it really is. From across the Potomac on Maryland Heights that night, Harpers Ferry appeared to be a disorganized clutter of homes, small shops, hotels and saloons, stretching up the banks of the two rivers and climbing Bolivar Heights to its rear. About half of the 2,500 who lived there at the time were Negroes, almost all of them free. Most of the whites in Harpers Ferry were not local, but in fact were skilled Northern workers who had migrated south to work at the armory or rifle works. Of the residents who were slaveholders, these were nearly all small farmers, their chattel being well kept house servants, not field hands, and mostly women. From the perspective of a potential slave uprising, Harpers Ferry seemed a curious choice of location.

 One of the factors that made the selection of Harpers Ferry more understandable was the presence of a United States Government armory and arsenal, along with Hall’s Rifle Works, a half a mile up the Shenandoah River. Once these were in the possession of Brown and his men, every freed slave would become a soldier in the Provisional Government Army.  

 As the invasion force wound its way down Maryland Heights, the twinkling lights of the peaceful village of Harpers Ferry began to show through the trees. Unconsciously, the pace of the men quickened as they neared the level ground bordering the river and the canal which ran alongside it.

 Once on flat land, John Cook and Charles Tidd broke off from the group, moving to cut the telegraph lines east and west of Harpers Ferry, to silence any alarms that might go out. Now the unit moved on the covered bridge that crossed the Potomac River into town. This bridge served a dual purpose, carrying both train and conventional traffic over the water. Its night watchman was startled by the approach of John Kagi and Aaron Stevens. The two produced revolvers and told the incredulous watchman that he was their prisoner. The man had to be convinced that this was not an attempt at humor. Assured that they were in bitter earnest, the watchman was walked off the bridge at gunpoint, and four of the invaders were left to garrison the structure and extinguish its lights.

 As John Brown and his men moved into Harpers Ferry, the town seemed completely deserted. Quietly they sneaked past the brightly lit Wager House, which served as a combination saloon and railroad station, and the Galt House, another saloon on the banks of the Shenandoah River.

 Charging across Potomac Street and on to the armory yard gate, Brown’s men advanced on a solitary figure there. The armory’s night watchman found himself pinned against the gate by these mysterious assailants. Once the area was secured, his confusion was cleared up by John Brown himself. “I came here from Kansas, and this is a slave state. I want to free all of the Negroes in this state,” he explained. “I have possession now of the United States armory, and if the citizens interfere with me,” he said, concluding, “I must only burn the town and have blood.”

 While stragglers on the street were rounded up and taken to the fire engine house by the gate, Brown brought the wagon into the armory yard.

 John Brown now led a small party up the Shenandoah to Hall’s Rifle Works. While doing so, they added another prisoner to the lot. John Kagi and John Copeland were left to man the rifle works, which was located on a small island in the river. Later, Lewis Leary, a freed slave, would join them there.

 Another squad of men was dispatched into the Virginia countryside to apprehend slave owner Colonel Lewis Washington, who was the great-grandnephew of the first President, and was known to live in the immediate area.

 For a time, silence descended upon the town, as Brown and his men began to relax, satisfied in the work thus far accomplished.

 Shortly after midnight, a four-horse wagon bearing Col. Washington, fellow “slaver” John Allstadt and son, and ten liberated slaves rolled into the armory yard. As these were presented to Brown, a bonus discovery was produced, Col. Washington’s sword, which supposedly had been given to George Washington by Frederick the Great. This prize Brown decided to keep with himself, perhaps as symbolism, perhaps for luck.

 Once in the engine house, Col. Washington demanded to know what was going on. John Brown took great care in explaining what he could to him. When the prisoner inquired about his own status, Brown replied, “I wanted you particularly for the moral effect it would give our cause having one of your name as prisoner.” Washington did not seem flattered. The newly freed slaves were handed pikes and instructed to keep guard over their masters, which they reluctantly did.

 Old Brown was busy admiring Col. Washington’s sword when word arrived that the telegraph wires had been cut. Just as everything seemed to be going perfectly, a shot rang out. The bullet had been directed at the relief watchman for the covered bridge, who apparently had attempted to escape when confronted. Though hit, he was only wounded slightly about the scalp, and he managed to get away. However, the bleeding man knew little, and raced to tell his neighbors of a robbery in progress.

 At just about this time, the express train eastbound from Wheeling came in to Harpers Ferry, and the wounded man flagged the train down. The relief watchman told his story to the conductor, who relayed it to the engineer. Deciding that firsthand information was required, the engineer and another employee began to walk ahead of the train, only to be driven back by shots from the darkness of the bridge. Sensing the dangerous position of the train, the engineer climbed aboard and backed it up until it was out of rifle range. Then he shouted the alarm.

 Curious passengers started to awaken and press their faces to the windows in an effort to see exactly what was amiss.

 Alerted to an unknown threat on the wooden bridge, Hayward Shepherd, the station’s baggage master (and a free black), headed toward the bridge, hoping to speak to its watchman. As he drew near, a voice called out, “Halt!” Not knowing exactly what that meant, but guessing that it was not good, Shepherd reversed his path and started back for the station. Before he got too far, a rifle shot cut him down. The relief watchman carried the dying man back inside, where he spent his final few hours in intense pain.

 The commotion that had disturbed the early morning hours of Monday, October 17 had finally gotten the attention of the townsfolk. They began trickling out of their homes to investigate, and wild rumors started to circulate among them. Fearing that an army of invaders was about to besiege them, many people, white and black, fled to Bolivar Heights behind Harpers Ferry. Someone had the presence of mind to climb the steps to the Lutheran church and ring its bell in alarm. Soon, there were church bells ringing throughout the land, and hastily formed militia companies fell out for duty at the Ferry.

 Back at the express train, John Brown had spoken to the engineer regarding his purposes at Harpers Ferry, and he assured the man safe passage into Maryland. However, not until Brown himself walked the train to the covered bridge would the engines be fired up and the engineer feel safe in moving over the span. Once across, the engineer began to compose a telegraph message in his mind, to be sent from Monocacy Junction regarding the events he had witnessed. The Wheeling Express roared off into the crisp Maryland morning, as fast as steam could carry it.

 Harpers Ferry was quiet now as the insurrectionists settled in. They could only imagine what must be going on in slave quarters all around them, as news of the attack on slavery spread, and Negroes began to take heart and rise up to free themselves. Some of the men strained to hear the sounds of rebellion in the distance, but could only hear the gurgling splashes of the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers. Still, the thought of it seemed wonderful and exciting, and they believed that they would see and hear its effects soon enough.

 As a warming sun rose over the mountains, an uneasy calm lay over the town. For much of that Monday morning, there was little to betray that an armed attack was in progress, except an eerie quiet that ruled the empty streets.

 By about eleven that morning, the first groups of farmers and militiamen were arriving. Once organized, they split off to commence pouring fire on the rifle works and the armory where John Brown and his Provisional Government Army held its hostages.

 Brown seemed stunned by the suddenness and ferocity of the assault against him. Certainly he was not expecting to end up trapped inside an armory yard, and now, caught off guard, he did not know how to respond. John Kagi, part of the group at Hall’s Rifle Works, sent a number of messages to the Commander-in-Chief that the time had come to withdraw. Still, Brown did nothing. He did, however, think to order breakfast for his prisoners from the Wager House.    

 A Maryland schoolhouse close to Harpers Ferry had been secured for the purpose of storing ammunition. Brown now sent the four-horse wagon back to the Kennedy farmhouse to move the ordnance to its new facility. With the wagon, he sent John Cook, Charles Tidd, William Leeman and a few of Col. Washington’s slaves. Not long after leaving, Leeman returned with a Maryland slave owner, who had been snared along the way.

 As afternoon moved through Harpers Ferry, the skies darkened. John Brown, confused by the developments of the morning, appeared incapable of decisive leadership. As a result, his small band of liberators sat and nervously waited as the jaws of the vise closed around them.

 Arriving on the scene now were the Jefferson Guards, from nearby Charlestown. The militia company formed on the Maryland side of the covered bridge and attacked, quickly driving Oliver Brown and the others down into Harpers Ferry. Dangerfield Newby, a freed slave who had just recently joined Brown, was hit as he tried to get back into town. Newby, described as “quiet, sensible and very unobtrusive”, had dreamed of freeing his wife and seven children from a Virginia plantation. When he fell, he was carrying a letter from his wife in his pocket. Part of it read: “Oh dear Dangerfield, com this fall without fail monny or no monney I want to see you so much that it is the one bright hope I have before me.” Shot through the throat, he dropped to the ground, gagging and choking on his own blood, and soon died.

 As the forty eight year old husband and father lay dead at the foot of the covered bridge, someone grabbed the body and pulled it to the gutter, where Newby’s ears were sliced off, presumably as souvenirs. After this, drunken and angry locals beat the body with sticks. Later in the day, a pack of hogs would find Dangerfield Newby’s corpse and root on it.

 Emboldened by the sudden turn of events, the people of Harpers Ferry started to come down from Bolivar Heights en masse, to find guns and to get in on the action.

 Sensing the desperate nature of his position, John Brown sent Will Thompson with one of the captives, under a flag of truce, to try and negotiate a cease-fire. It didn’t work. Thompson was immediately hauled into the Galt House at gunpoint.

 Leaving Jeremiah Anderson and Albert Hazlett to hold the arsenal, Brown gathered everyone else, including his eleven most important prisoners, inside the small (and more easily defended) fire engine house.

 The engine house itself was made completely of brick, with heavy oaken doors in the front and arched windows above them.

 The remaining hostages were herded into the engine house watch room, and left there unguarded. Not knowing the nature of their situation, and hearing the sounds of battle around them, they made no attempt to flee.

 Once they were safe inside the engine house, Brown made a second attempt at a cease-fire. Sending his son Watson, Aaron Stevens and the acting superintendent of the armory under another white flag, they walked out into the street. A few feet from the engine house door, bullets dropped both Watson Brown and Aaron Stevens. Watson, shot in the abdomen, managed to crawl back to the engine house, where he lay doubled over in agony. Stevens was dragged back to the safety of the railroad station by Joseph Brua, a prisoner, who then returned to his place in the engine house.

  Confused and flustered by the barbarity of the crowd, John Brown and his men could do nothing but listen to the chants of “Kill them! Kill them!” spilling out from the Galt House.

 Young William Leeman, gripped by terror and desperation inside the engine house, could wait for Brown no longer. Sprinting across the armory yard, he startled everyone around him, who now watched his mad dash with intense interest. Leeman scrambled over the armory gate and stumbled down the rocky slope toward the Potomac. Not far behind were some of the good people of Harpers Ferry, chasing after him and occasionally stopping to shoot at this twenty-year-old revolutionary.

 Two men finally grabbed him at the river’s edge, where they spun him around. Huffing and wheezing from the run, he made no further attempt to escape. This did not satisfy his captors, who proceeded to shoot him dead. His body was left on the rocky shallows of the river, to become a target for bored marksmen. Eventually, his carcass slid into the water and drifted downstream toward the covered bridge.

 At about two that afternoon, one of the raiders actually managed to shoot someone, a slave owner named George Turner. An already bloodthirsty mob now turned manic.

 A group of them stormed Hall’s Rifle Works in the Shenandoah, and Kagi, Copeland, and Leary set off to swim for the other side. Not one made it. Kagi ended up perforated with bullet holes, Leary was mortally wounded and Copeland, a black man born free in North Carolina, was captured. Dragging him toward the nearest tree, the assembly prepared to hang Copeland on the spot. Cries of “Lynch him!” and “Lynch the nigger!” rang out. In the midst of this, a local physician galloped up and kept the executioners away with his horse until militia could escort Copeland to safety.

 The mayor of Harpers Ferry, a popular man named Fontaine Beckham, had let his curiosity get the better of him. As he peered between some freight cars to get a better look at the engine house, Edwin Coppoc, inside the makeshift fortress, saw him. Assuming that Beckham was trying to line up a clear shot, Coppoc decided to fire first. He missed. When Coppoc reloaded, Fontaine Beckham was still there, trying to inch up as close as he thought it prudent to do. This time Coppoc steadied himself and waited. When the mayor leaned forward, Coppoc killed him. Ironically, Beckham’s will provided for the freeing of a slave named Isaac Gilbert, his wife and three children.

 Not long after Beckham’s death, the rain, which had been threatening all day, materialized, and the throng scurried for cover. News of the mayor’s death spread quickly, and the atmosphere soon became frenzied. In the Galt House, men banged on the bar and screamed in a sort of blind blood lust.

 By the time the rain had stopped, the saloonkeeper and Harry Hunter, a Charlestown militiaman, had settled on a course of action. They led a group of avengers to the Wager House, where William Thompson was being held.

 Seeing their intent, a young girl pleaded with them to leave him to the law, but to no avail. Thompson was grabbed by the throat and pushed outside, where he said, “You may take my life, but eighty thousand will rise up to avenge me, and carry out my purpose of giving liberty to the slaves.” This speech only further convinced the men that they were entirely justified.

 They proceeded to carry him, kicking and screaming, to the Potomac, where he was shot in the head with pistols. Now another body lay in the shallow water of the river. It was said that he “could be seen for a day or two after, lying at the bottom of the river, with his ghastly face still exhibiting his fearful death agony.”

 The Harpers Ferry incident was the news of the day in Maryland. In Baltimore, five companies of militia left Camden Station on a special train headed west, to the cheers of thousands. People were gathering all along the B & O Railroad line, waiting excitedly for the latest word on the insurrection.

 From Frederick, Maryland and Martinsburg, Virginia militia units were on the march for the Ferry.

 In Washington, the mayor feared a general slave rebellion and ordered the entire city police force on duty, also being sure to have all routes to the city manned.

 At the Executive Mansion, President Buchanan, hearing that “seven hundred whites and Negroes” were assailing Harpers Ferry, sent three artillery companies complemented by ninety marines from the Washington barracks to quell the disorder. The marines were under the command of Lieutenant Israel Green, but Buchanan also sent Brevet Colonel Robert E. Lee of the 2^nd U.S. Cavalry and Lieutenant J.E.B. Stuart of the 1^st U.S. Cavalry. Once there, Lee was to take overall command.

 Back at the revolution, Osborn Anderson and Albert Hazlett had had enough. Left alone to hold the armory and arsenal, they realized that they might extend their lives considerably by taking independent action. Seeing a small boat nearby at the riverbank, they slipped away unnoticed, crossed the Potomac, and escaped into Maryland.

 Arriving late in the afternoon was the militia company from Martinsburg. Racing through the armory yard behind the engine house, they smashed out the windows of the watch room, releasing the prisoners therein. Brown’s army succeeded in pushing them back, wounding eight militiamen. But Brown’s last open escape route had now been closed.

 From a tree in the mountains on the Maryland side of the Potomac, John Cook was watching events unfold in Harpers Ferry. Hoping to ease the pressure on Brown, he began sniping at a knot of men on High Street. Alerted to this new target, they directed a hail of lead at Cook, missing him, but cutting out the limb he was perched upon. Fifteen feet later, a bruised and bleeding John Cook scampered down toward the canal, and the road which led back to the commandeered schoolhouse. At this temporary arsenal waited Owen Brown, Barclay Coppoc (Edwin’s brother), Francis Meriam and Charles Tidd, anxious for news from the front.

 As more excited militia companies poured into the town, John Brown made a desperate attempt at negotiation. He sent a note out, saying that he would release all prisoners, if only he and his men were allowed to get across the Potomac in safety. These terms were of no interest, however, to the folks encircling Brown now, where an almost carnival atmosphere prevailed. Many a militia company had come a long way to put down a rebellion, and most were just arriving. Besides, with Brown and his troops firmly in their grip, the people of Harpers Ferry saw no need to be charitable.

 As the sun set behind Bolivar Heights, the evening grew dark and drizzly. Inside the engine house, it was cold, musty and pitch black. A palpable sense of doom permeated the room. As John Brown paced nervously, he could barely keep from tripping over his men, some of who were dead or dying. By the heavy oak doors lay Stewart Taylor’s corpse. Brothers Watson and Oliver Brown were sprawled side by side, choking and crying in their agony. Unharmed with their leader were Edwin Coppoc, Jeremiah Anderson, Dauphin Thompson and Shields Green. Brown, still wearing the cherished Washington sword, would mumble to himself and occasionally shout, “Men are you awake?”

 As the night wore on, Oliver begged his father to end his misery. John Brown snapped back, “If you must die, die like a man!”

 Turning to his prisoners, he spoke gently in the dark. “Gentlemen, if you knew of my past history you would not blame me for being here. I went to Kansas a peaceable man, and the proslavery people hunted me down like a wolf.” He paused for a moment. “I lost one of my sons there…” Trembling, he suddenly called out to Oliver. There was no response. “I guess he is dead”, his father concluded.

 Morning’s first light revealed a terrible new sight for what remained of the Provisional Government Army. The ninety U.S. Marines now faced the engine house, with bayonets fixed and sledgehammers at the ready. Gathered behind them was an audience of two thousand, shivering and chattering in the damp morning air.

 Brown knelt down and felt the pulse of Watson Brown. His other hand held tight around his rifle. Brown ordered the doors to be barricaded. Knowing that the end was near, he told his followers to make their lives as valuable as they could.

 Robert E. Lee had decided to give John Brown one opportunity to surrender unconditionally. He sent a note to that effect under a flag of truce, carried by Lt. J.E.B. Stuart. Stuart passed the offer to the old man, who quickly scanned it, all the while keeping his weapon leveled at Stuart’s head. Jeb’s face lit up with recognition. “Aren’t you old Osawatomie Brown, who had given us so much trouble in Kansas?” Brown’s reply was to repeat his own terms for surrender. From the darkness behind, hostages begged Stuart to bring Lee to speak with Brown in person. Stuart refused, noting that the terms were directly from Lee himself, who observed from a hill just forty feet away. Once more, John Brown dismissed Lee’s terms and began to discuss his own.

 Without warning, Stuart leapt away from the door, and waved his hat wildly around his head. At this prearranged signal, Lt. Israel Green led the storming party in a rush for the engine house, and the marines began to slam into the heavy oak doors with their sledgehammers, much to the delight of the crowd. The defenders inside the engine house fired at the straining doors, hitting nothing but wood and brick. At this point, the marines found a ladder to employ as a battering ram. Simultaneously, a prisoner inside loosened the door restraints, and when the soldiers struck, the door gave way.

 All was noise and confusion. Bullets flew and two marines fell wounded. Jeremiah Anderson was run through with a bayonet, which lodged in the wall behind him, leaving him pinned by the blade. Dauphin Thompson tried to hide under a fire engine, but was similarly impaled as he crawled on the floor. Both would rapidly expire. Seeing the uselessness of resistance, Edwin Coppoc threw down his gun and surrendered.

 The rescued Col. Washington pointed at John Brown and screamed, “This is Osawatomie!” Brown, kneeling with his weapon cocked, did not fire. Lt. Green struck him with his dress sword, and then tried to run it through Brown. The lightweight blade caught Brown on the belt, lifted him off the ground, and then bent back in the middle. John Brown fell to the ground. Losing control of himself, Green beat the old man with the hilt of his sword until John Brown lay unconscious at his feet.

 The raiders were dragged outside, where Col. Lee looked Brown over, and then summoned a doctor to care for him.

 Word now reached Lee of insurrectionists on the Maryland side of the mountains, and he dispatched a company of Baltimore militia to check it out. They found no revolutionaries, but at the schoolhouse, they did discover the cache of arms left behind by Brown’s army. A detachment under Stuart was led to the Kennedy farmhouse, which was found stockpiled with evidence incriminating Brown and implicating a great many prominent abolitionists in the North. When this information hit the national press, many of Brown’s staunchest supporters went into hiding, some not reappearing until after start of the Civil War, a year and a half later.

   All of those who were captured in the raid were later hanged, as were two, John Cook and Albert Hazlett, who were picked up in the days following the event. Hazlett went to the gallows still trying to persuade Virginia authorities that he was someone else, but they remained unmoved. Osborn Anderson, Barclay Coppoc, Francis Meriam and Charles Tidd survived to fight again for the freedom of slaves in the Union Army. Meriam became the captain of a black infantry company. Owen Brown escaped, and being the only surviving Brown from the assault, became something of a folk hero in the North. Killed with John Kagi in the Shenandoah was Lewis Leary, whose widow would be the grandmother of poet Langston Hughes.

 John Brown’s bold attempt to destroy slavery with twenty-one men may at first be dismissed as a colossal failure. However, the ramifications of his attack on Harpers Ferry would, within a brief period of time, help to bring about his end goal. An already suspicious South would see Brown as proof of Northern complicity in slave rebellion, and respond with a mobilization of its militia system, laying the groundwork for the Confederate Army. The radicals in the North would hail Brown as a martyr, further alienating the slave states, and setting the stage for a showdown in the election of 1860.

 Almost one year to the day before South Carolina passed its ordinance of secession, John Brown rode to the gallows sitting in the back of a wagon, atop his coffin.

 His prophetic final statement, written down and handed to a guard that day, spoke volumes. “I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood. I had, as I now think, vainly flattered myself that without very much bloodshed it might be done.” There would be four years of bloodletting before the “purging” would be finished.