USA > Iowa > Jackson County > Annals of Jackson county, Iowa, Vol 1-6 > Part 53
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64
Mr. Thayer says on same page of Kansas Crusades: "John Brown has now few admirers except the congenial anarchists and nihilists who despise all law and hate all restraints of government." Mr. Lawrence's estimate of Brown above given has been generally sustained. Abraham Lincoln, in his Cooper Institute speech, said with his characteristic "charity for all:" "John Brown's effort was peculiar. It was not a slave Insurrection, it was an attempt by white men to get up a revolt among slaves in which the slaves refused to participate. In fact it was so absurd that the slaves in all their ignorance saw plainly enough it could not succeed. That affair, in its philosophy, corresponds with the many attempts related in history at the assassination of Kings and Emperors. An enthusiast brocds over the op- pression of a people until he farcies himself commissioned by Heaven to liberate them. He ventures the attempt which ends in little else than his own execution. Orsinis' attempt on Louis Napoleon, and John Brown's attempt at Harper's Ferry were in their philosophy the same."
The Chicago convention which nominated Lincoln for the Presidency in 1860, unanimously resolved that Brown was one of the greatest of criminals. Thadeus Stephens said : "Brown ought to be hung for attempting to cap- ture Virginia. U. S. Senator Henry Wilson said, "John Brown is a d-d fool."
Eli Thayer said: "When Brown made h's invasion of and during his trial, conviction and execution, I was a member of Congress and had the means of knowing the opinions of other members. There was not one of that body who considered his punishment unjust. A few, however, were of the opinion that it would have been better to shut him up in a mad house for life. This method would have prevented the grotesque efforts of a few of his sympathizers and supporte:s to parade him before the country as a martyr." Thayer further says : "John Brown arrived in Kansas nearly two years after the conflict there had begun. He was a great injury to the Free State cause, and to the Free State settlers. He said, 'I have not come to make Kansas free, but to get a shot at the South.' He wished to begin a Civil war. He never had any property in Kansas which might be the subject of retaliation and reprisal for his crimes. Skulking about und- er various disguises and pretenses he left the Free State settlers to suffer for his outrages. At length they compelled him to leave the territory. The last installment of Missouri vengeance for his many murders, raids and robberies, and for the subsequent thieving invasions of Lane, fell upon Lawrence in the Quantrell raid and cost her the lives of one hundred and eighty-three of her citizens."
Thayer says: "In Kansas, Brown dragged from their beds at midnight. three men and two boys and hacked them to pieces with two-edged cleavers in such a way that the massacre was reported to be the work of wild In- dians. After this Brown slew an unarmed inoffensive farmer in Missouri. In his murderous raid on Harper's Ferry, the first man he killed was a
Tofit borlogyr t
-95-
negro watchman who was in the discharge of his duty at the railroad sta- tion " To the above should be added the robbing of stores in Kansas. the stealing of horses in the invasion of Missouri, and the stealing of about $4,000 worth of oxen, mules, wagons and harness and such other property as he could find. After Brown's raid in Missouri, although he brought away thousands of dollars worth of property, he appealed to his friends in the East for funds to help to run the negroes through to Canada, and secured vast sums of money for that purpose. Thayer, on page 197 of Kansas Cru- sides, says: "After his midnight murders in Kansas all the people about Ossawatomie assembled to express their indignation and to take measures to bring the fiends to justice. Here on the most friendly terms met the Free State and Slave State settlers. In the overshadowing gloom of such terrible crime, all partisan issues were forgotten. The underlying brother- hood of man asserted itself in unity against an enemy of the human race. But what enemv? John Brown, with characteristic lieing, denied that he was present at the massacre, or that he had anything to do with it. No fact in history is now better established than the fact that he was ather of the crime and leader of the assassins. After the Free State men in Kan- sas repudiated Brown and his practices, he put all of his energies in the work of preparing the nucleus of an army with which he planned for years for the invasion of one of the Slave states. In December, 1857, Brown ac- companied by eight white men and one negro and wit the plunder stolen in Missouri made their way to Cedar county, Iowa, stopping at the village of Springdale, where Brown left them for a period of three months while he was lecturing in the New England states. making frantic appeals to his audiences for funds, as he claimed to provide the necessaries of life for poor destitute Free State settlers in Kansas. At one time claiming that he knew of an attack to be made on a certain sett'ement in Kansas by Missourians and secured $500 in cash. It is needless to say this money was used to pay board for his little army that was being drilled for service at the little Iowa town of Springdale. While on this eastern tour Brown stopped in Collins- ville, Connecticut, for a few days, and while there made the acquaintance of a man by the name of Charles Blair, a blacksmith of Collinsville, with whom he made a contract to make 1 000 pikes, which Brown claimed was to be given the Free State settlers in Kansas to protect their homes with."
According to Blair's testimony before the U. S. Senate committee in- vest'gating the invasion of Virginia, Brown showed Blair a large double edged dagger that he claimed to have been taken from Captain Pate in Kansas, and said that a blade like that fastened to a pole about six feet long, would make a good weapon to furnish the settlers to keep in their log cabins to protect themselves and families. Blair agreed to make 1,000 of these weapons with a double-edged blade or spear about 15 inches long riveted to a fork handle about 5 or 6 feet long for $1.00 each or $1,000. Later the order was changed by Brown requesting Blair to fix the heads so they could be screwed on to the handles, in order that they could be packed for shipping better. Brown paid $350 down and an additional $200 in a short time, but did not finish paying for the work until June, 1859. Blair had not heard from Brown for a long time and considered the contract forfeit-
-
-96-
ed, but on the 3rd of June, 1859. Brown turned up in Collinsville and want- ed the pikes finished up immediately. Blair told Brown that he had sup- posed for a long time that the contract was forfeited, that he was different- ly situated than when he entered into the contract, and asked Brown what possible use the pikes could be to him then as the trouble in Kansas was about settled. Brown said that the pikes were no good to anybody as they were, but if finished up that he might be able to get something out of them. He still persisted in the claim that they were just the thing for the poor settlers in Kansas. He finally made arrangements with Blair whereby the pikes were to be completed as soon as possible, and paid the balance of $1,000, the contract price. During the winter of 1857 and 1858, Brown's little army consisted of Realf, Kagi, Cook, Stevens, Tidd, Leeman, Moffatt, Parsons and Owen Brown, also a negro by the name of Richardson. The parties above named were drilled all winter by Stevens. They were support- ed by Brown who boa'ded them with a farmer named Maxom, and it was known by these men that Brown was preparing for an invasion in the mountainous regions of Virginia.
In April, 1858, Brown returned to his little army and while there recruit- ed two new men for his army, George Gill and Stewart Taylor. After spend- ing a few days at Springdale, Brown transferred his army to Canada via Chicago and Detroit, stopping at Chatham, Canada West. From thecce Brown sent out a lot of circular letters to different parties in the States inviting them to attend a quiet convention of the friends of freedom to be held at Chatham on the 10th day of May, 1858. During the stay of Brown and his party in Canada, they boarded with a colored man. On the 8th day of June, a constitutional convention was held, and a constitution promulgated and adopted, and two days later another convention was held at which officers for the provisional government were elected. At the first convention John Brown said that for twenty or thirty years the idea had possessed him like a passion to free the slaves. He believed that a success. ful excursion could be made into some mountanous part of the South, that all of the free negrces of the North would flock to his standard as well as the slaves of the South so soon as freed ; that money could be obtained from rich people in the eastern and northern states to equip the expedition. A
negro doctor in Chatham was very enthusiastic over the prospective invas- ion and assured Brown that every negro in Canada would go with him. The constitutional convention was presided over by a negro preacher and John Kaggi, Brown's son-in-law, acted as secretary. At this constitution- al convention where a constitutional and provisional government was pro- mulgated the convention was composed entirely of Brown, his sous and son- in-law, and the men taken by Brown from Iowa, and a few negroes, very few of whom could write their names. The convention was a secret one, held behind closed and guarded doors, and the evidence of one of the lead- ers was that the white people in and about Chatham knew nothing about the provisional constitutional convention.
After the adjournment of the convention Brown and the white men who had accompanied him to Canada, went to Cleveland, Ohio, and with
-- 97-
the exception of Brown found employment in the country near Cleveland as Brown's funds were very low, Brown himself going East to raise more money. He kept in touch with the men by correspondence and they were notified when to assemble to meet him on his return. His success was not very great. He came back with only about $300 which he divided among the men who were with two or three exceptions allowed to go back to their homes and hold themselves ready for action when called upon. Realf was sent East on the trail of a man whom Brown had once employed and trust- ed and whom he had learned was going to betray his plans to the govern- ment. John E. Cook was sent to Harper's Ferry, Virginia, there to re- main as agent of John Brown and to carry out such orders as he might from time to time receive. Some time in July, John Brown himself went to Harper's Ferry under the assumed name of Isaac Smith and was accom- panied by two of his sons-in-law, claimed to be a farmer from New York, and rented a small farm on the Maryland side of the river, and to this place he called his men to him. He kept a few men at Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, to receive the aims that he had ordered shipped to that point. These arms consisted of 200 Sharps carbins, which had been pur- chased in 1856 by the Massachusetts State Kansas committee for the use of the Free State settlers in Kansas, were shipped to Chicago and later to Tabor, Iowa, and had never got to their destination, but were placed und- er the control of the National Kansas committee, which was composed of one member from each of the slave-holding states. At a meeting of this committee in January, 1857, Brown appeared and made application for these arms, claiming he wanted to use them in Kansas-wanted to distri- bute them among the Free State settlers for their protection in case of an invasion from the Slave states. The committee was suspicious of him, however, and voted the arms back to the Massachusetts Kansas committee from whom Brown succeeded in getting control of the arms. There was also 200 revolvers which a man by the name of Stearns, who appeared to be a great admirer of Brown, had paid for and put in Brown's possession. The above with the 1 000 pikes made in Connecticut for the use of the ne- groes, provided arms for an army of fourteen hundred men. In addition to the 200 revolvers furnished John Brown by Stearns, he was authorized to draw on Stearns for $7,000.
By the middle of October, 1859, Brown's plans had sufficiently matured to begin action. The arms shipped from Massachusetts to Chambersburg, Pa., had been delivered. His little army was assembled and on the night of the 16th about midnight he crossed the bridge from the Marsland side with 18 of his men and immediately took possession of the buildings com- posing the United States Arsenal. The inhabitants of the village were asleep. There was not an armed soldier there for the protection of all the government stores at this important arsenal. Brown found the gate lead- ing to the works locked, and the watchman on duty refused to open it, but it was quickly forced open and the watchman made prisoner. Brown's bag- gage train consisted of a one-horse wagon which carried their extra arms. Brown took possession of a strong brick building used for an engine room. and stationed armed guards at the street corners and cver the Arsenal
.
-- 98-
buildings where the arms were stored. After getting full possession of the Arsenal and village without an alarm, an armed party was sent out into the country to bring in as hostages some of the most prominent men, and to gather up all the slaves they could find. Cook, who had been in the lo- cality for a year and knew the country well, led this party to the residence of Colonel Washington with whom he had become somewhat acquainted, roused the Colonel out of bed, after breaking open the door, made a prison- er of him, and took such arms as could be found, including a sword which had been a present from Frederick the Great to General Washington, and which was appropriated and worn by Brown while in command of Harper's Ferry. Washington and several other men were brought to Harper's Ferry and confined in a strong room, while their slaves were armed with the pikes before mentioned and made to do guard duty and assist wherever desired. The first alarm given of the invasion by an armed foe was on the arrival of a mail train on the B. & O. Road from Wheeling to Baltimore. Brown had stationed two armed guards on the bridge with orders to allow no one to pass. On the arrival of the train it was promptly stopped by the guards. Soon after the arrival of the train a free negro who was employed by the railroad company came out on the bridge, was ordered to halt, but turned back towards the office and was shot in the back and killed by the guard.
When daylight came the villagers who had slept peacefully through the momentous night, and the male portion of whom were principally employed on the government works, came forth to resume their duties, they were promptly seized by Brown's men and hurried to the engine room as prison- ers, and in a short time Brown had twice as many prisoners as soldiers. It was well into the day before the alarm spread, but when once given it spread rapidly, and as it became known that an armed party had seized the Arsenal and had parties of armed men out freeing the slaves and taking them away, the people hurriedly armed and enrolled themselves in bands and prepared to attack the invaders. The villagers themselves, before out- side help had arrived, attacked and killed, or captured a detachment of Brown's men who were guarding Hall's Rifle Works, which was somewhat detached from the main Arsenal buildings. Armed bands of citizens arriv- ed at the Ferry and laid siege to Brown's position and during the day all of Brown's men who were not with him in the engine house were killed or captured, except a small squad on the Maryland side of the river who made their escape. Two citizens of Virginia had been killed during the day by Brown's men. The party immediately under Brown remained barricaded in the engine house all day Monday. They had with them as prisoners, ten very prominent men whom Brown held as hostages, and on whom he de- pended to be able to make terms with the authorities if his move was un- successful.
During the day firing was kept up by besiegers and besieged. Two of Brown's men had been killed in the building, and a citizen had been killed without. The train that had been held for several hours by Brown's men. when allowed to proceed, rapidly spread the news of the raid, and on the report reaching Wash ngton, Colonel Robert E Lee was ordered to take a
0069 -2270
-99-
company of Marines and proceed to the scene of strife. His second in com- mand was J. E. B. Stuart, famous afterward as a Confederate Cavalry lead- er, and killed in battle Lee arrived in the night too late to get a complete knowledge of the situation, but made arrangements to attack at daylight. But Lee said the safety of the ten gentlemen whom Brown held as hostages was of painful consideration.
Lee, in his report, further says: "As soon after daylight as arrange- ments could be made, Lieutenant J. E. B. Stuart, who had accompanied me from Washington as a staff officer, was dispatched with a flag of truce with a written summons to the leader of the insurgents to surrender." But he says: "Knowing the character of the leader I did not expect it would be acc pted. I had therefore directed that the Volunteer troops under their commanders should be paraded on the lines assigned them outside the Armory, and prepared a storming party of twelve Marines under Lieuten- ant Green, and had placed them near to the engine house and secure from its fire. Three Marines were furnished sledge hammers to break in the doors, and the men were instructed how to distinguish our citizens from the insurgents. Also to attack with the bayonet and not injure the blacks unless they resisted. Lieutenant Stuart was also instructed not to receive any counter propositions from the insurgents. If they accepted our terms they must immediately give up their arms and release the prisoners, if they did not he must immediately on leaving give me a signal. My object in or- der to save our citizens was to have as short a lapse of time as possible be- tween the parley and attack. The summons was, as I anticipated, reject- ed. At the concerted signal the storming party moved quickly to the door and commenced the attack. The tire engines in the house had been placed close to the doors, the doors were fastened by ropes which prevented them being broken by blows from the hammers. The men were, therefore, o: der- ed to drop the hammers and use as a battering ram, a heavy ladder with which they dashed in a part of the door and gave admission to the storming party. The fire up to this time had been harmless. At the threshold one marine fell mortally wounded. The rest, led by Lieutenant Green and Maj- or Russell, quickly ended the contest. The insurgents that resisted were biyonetted. Their leader, John Brown, was cut down by the sword of Lieutenant Green, and our citizens were protected by both officers and men. Thus ended most disastrously the plans entertained by Brown for more than twenty years. He jeopardized and sacrificed his own life as well as the lives of his sons and sons-in-law, to free and set at liberty men who did not care to be free, and who hastened back to their masters as soon as re- leased."
Lee sent Stuart out to bring in the pikes, guns and pistols stored in a schoolhouse near the Ferry, and made a list of same with list of names and casualties in the short but sanguinary struggle. Those pikes, but very few of which were ever put into the hands of slaves as designed by Brown, have a sequel to their h'story. It will be remembered that Stonewall Jackson captured and burned Harpers' Ferry in 1861, and the building in which the pikes had been stored was burned with contents. Some time after the Civ-
0
-100-
il war was over, the pikes with vast quantities of other obsolete govern- ment stores was condemned and sent to Rock island Arsenal to be sold. Some man, I have been told the same who made the pikes for Brown, bought up the heads, which was all remaining of the pikes, at a very small cost, and sold them for relics for about four times what they originally cost Brown. The Ellis collection of Maquoketa has two of these pikes whose history is well authenticated.
The following is a list of the insurgents captured or killed by Col. Lee, as reported by him :
John Brown of New York, badly wounded ; a prisoner ; was Commander- in-Chief.
Aaron C. Stevens, Connecticut ; Captain ; badly wounded ; prisoner.
Edwin Copic, lowa, Lieutenant; unhurt ; prisoner.
Oliver Brown, New York, Captain ; killed.
Watson Brown, New York, Captain; killed.
Albert Hazlett, Pennsylvania, Lieutenant; killed.
William Leeman, Maine, Lieutenant; killed.
Stuart Taylor, Canada, private; killed.
Charles P. Tidd, Maine, private; killed.
William Thompson, New York, private; killed.
Adolph Thompson, New York, private; killed.
John Kaggi, Ohio, private; killed.
Jeremiah Anderson, Indiana, private; killed
John E. Cook, Connecticut, Captain ; killed.
Negroes-Dangerfield, Newly, Ohio, killed; Louis Leary, Oberlin. Oh'o, killed; Green Shields ( Alianas Emperor), New York, unhurt, priscner; O. P. Anderson, Pennsylvania, escaped.
List of killed and wounded by the insurgents: F. Beckham, railroad agent and mayor of Harper's Ferry, killed ; G. W. Turner, Virginia, killed ; Thomas Boerly, Harper's Ferry, killed; Haywood Shepherd, negro railroad porter, killed; Private Quinn, Marine Corps, killed ; Mr. Murphy, wounded.
The following persons, first name not given, were wounded: Young, Richardson, Hammond, McCabe, Dorsey, Hooper, Woolet and Private Ru- pert of Marine Corps.
The Harper's Ferry episode excited and alarmed the people of the South more than anything had ever done. They were stunned by the fact that an armed body of men had entered their borders, captured a United States Ar- senal with large quantities of stores, had boldly went forth arresting the most prominent citizens of the country and confining them as prisoners of war, and carrying off not alone the slaves, but horses, mules, wagons and any other property they thought might be useful to them, and after the in- surrection had been put down, and it was found that the insurgents had bought arms sufficient to equip an army, and the papers found on the bodies of the killed or captured, proved that there was a conspiracy far more reach- ing than ever dreamed of by the people of the South. It was shown that men of wealth in several different States were willing to contribute most liberally of their means to hel slaves to escape from their masters, and were willing to furnish any sum of money required to arm and equip an
- -101-
army to invade the South and forcibly take the slaves from their owners. The Southerners were convinced that their institutions could never be safe again with such an adverse feeling in the North The State governments of the North was almost equally alarmed with the South, for they saw clearly the danger of a divided Union, and were willing to make conces- sions. But the feeling in the South had reached such a state that' com- promise was impossible. The South began at once to take steps to prevent and make impossible another invasion of their territory and an attack on their institutions or property, and it is safe to say that from the date of Brown's attack on Harper's Ferry, the preparations of the South for a struggle with the North, which they clearly foresaw, commenced and never stopped until the surrender of Lee at Appomatox.
The career of John Brown for the last five years of his life is of pecul- iar interest to Iowans for the reason that all of his movements radiated from lowa. During his days of warfare in Kansas, Tabor, Iowa, was his base of operations. When he made a raid into Missouri he brought his plunder to Iowa, and it was at Springdale in Cedar county that he placed his little army. His underground railway, as it was called, was through Iowa. West Branch, Iowa, was also headquarters for Brown, and an old hotel which stood there as late, I think, as 1900, was pointed out to visit- ors as one of the stations where John Brown kept runaway negros. A dozen years ago the old house still stood near Springdale where Brown's little army was quartered, and a friend who visited the historic spot said the ground still showed like an outline map, where Brown's army maneuvered and practiced military tactics half a century ago. The old residents in and about Springdale are full of reminiscences of John Brown and his men, and take a great deal of pleasure in pointing out the places of interest as con- nected with the famous old Abolitionist.
by the Jack
Erected in Mi. Hope
Pt. 6
OLD SETTLERS M
Large Altendant. ny Tim
The
1
1
Erected in Mt. Hope Cemetery, Maquoketa, lowa, July 4, 1905, by the Jackson County Historical Society.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.