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John Brown's Raid on Harpers Ferry
First Edition©2008 Jonathan Earle
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ISBN:9780312392802
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Despised and admired during his life and after his execution, the abolitionist John Brown polarized the nation and remains one of the most controversial figures in U.S. history. His 1859 raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia, failed to inspire a slave revolt and establish a free Appalachian state but became a crucial turning point in the fight against slavery and a catalyst for the violence that ignited the Civil War. Jonathan Earle’s volume presents Brown as neither villain nor martyr, but rather as a man whose deeply held abolitionist beliefs gradually evolved to a point where he saw violence as inevitable. Earle’s introduction and his collection of documents demonstrate the evolution of Brown’s abolitionist strategies and the symbolism his actions took on in the press, the government, and the wider culture. The featured documents include Brown’s own writings, eyewitness accounts, government reports, and articles from the popular press and from leading intellectuals. Document headnotes, a chronology, questions for consideration, a list of important figures, and a selected bibliography offer additional pedagogical support.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents Foreword
Preface List of Maps and Illustrations
PART ONE. INTRODUCTION: Abolitionist, Warrior, Martyr, Prophet
Brown’s Early Life
John Brown and the Rise of Abolitionism A Radical Abolitionist
Making Kansas Bleed
The Plan
The Raid
The Trial
Reckoning with John Brown The Harpers Ferry Raid: Dramatis Personae
PART TWO. THE DOCUMENTS
1. The Making of a Radical Abolitionist
1. John Brown, Words of Advice to the United States League of Gileadites, January 15, 1851
2. Kansas Territorial Legislature, An Act to Punish Offenses against Slave Property, 1855
3. John Brown, Letter to Wife and Children from Kansas Territory, December 16, 1855
4. Mahala Doyle and Louisa Jane Wilkinson, Accounts of the Pottawatomie Massacre, 1856
5. John Brown, An Idea of Things in Kansas, 1857
6. John Brown, John Brown’s Parallels: Letter to the Editor of the New York Tribune, 1859
2. The Raid and Trial
7. John Brown, Provisional Constitution and Ordinances for the People of the United States, May 8, 1858
8. Osborne Anderson, A Voice from Harpers Ferry, 1861
9. John Brown, Interview with Senator James Mason, Representative Clement Vallandigham and Others, October 18, 1859
10. Excerpts from the Trial of John Brown,1859
Opening Remarks of John Brown to the Virginia Court, October 27, 1859
John Brown’s Response to Claims of His Insanity, October 28, 1859
Last Address of John Brown to the Virginia Court, November 2, 1859
3. The Making of a Martyr
11. John Brown, Selected Prison Letters, October 21–December 2, 1859
4. Responses to John Brown’s Raid
12. Northern and Southern Newspapers React to the Raid and Trial, 1859 New Hampshire Patriot, The Harpers Ferry Affair, October 26, 1859 Petersburg (Virginia) Express, The Harpers Ferry Conspiracy, October 25, 1859 Albany, New York, Evening Journal, From the Philadelphia Press, November 30, 1859 13. Henry David Thoreau, A Plea for Captain John Brown, October 30, 1859
14. Governor Henry Wise, Message to the Virginia Legislature, December 5, 1859
15. U.S. Senate Select Committee on the Harpers Ferry Invasion, The Mason Report, June 15, 1860
16. William W. Patton, John Brown’s Body, 1862
Appendixes
A Chronology of John Brown and Events of the Civil War Era (1800–1865)
Questions for Consideration
Selected Bibliography
Index
Preface List of Maps and Illustrations
PART ONE. INTRODUCTION: Abolitionist, Warrior, Martyr, Prophet
Brown’s Early Life
John Brown and the Rise of Abolitionism A Radical Abolitionist
Making Kansas Bleed
The Plan
The Raid
The Trial
Reckoning with John Brown The Harpers Ferry Raid: Dramatis Personae
PART TWO. THE DOCUMENTS
1. The Making of a Radical Abolitionist
1. John Brown, Words of Advice to the United States League of Gileadites, January 15, 1851
2. Kansas Territorial Legislature, An Act to Punish Offenses against Slave Property, 1855
3. John Brown, Letter to Wife and Children from Kansas Territory, December 16, 1855
4. Mahala Doyle and Louisa Jane Wilkinson, Accounts of the Pottawatomie Massacre, 1856
5. John Brown, An Idea of Things in Kansas, 1857
6. John Brown, John Brown’s Parallels: Letter to the Editor of the New York Tribune, 1859
2. The Raid and Trial
7. John Brown, Provisional Constitution and Ordinances for the People of the United States, May 8, 1858
8. Osborne Anderson, A Voice from Harpers Ferry, 1861
9. John Brown, Interview with Senator James Mason, Representative Clement Vallandigham and Others, October 18, 1859
10. Excerpts from the Trial of John Brown,1859
Opening Remarks of John Brown to the Virginia Court, October 27, 1859
John Brown’s Response to Claims of His Insanity, October 28, 1859
Last Address of John Brown to the Virginia Court, November 2, 1859
3. The Making of a Martyr
11. John Brown, Selected Prison Letters, October 21–December 2, 1859
4. Responses to John Brown’s Raid
12. Northern and Southern Newspapers React to the Raid and Trial, 1859 New Hampshire Patriot, The Harpers Ferry Affair, October 26, 1859 Petersburg (Virginia) Express, The Harpers Ferry Conspiracy, October 25, 1859 Albany, New York, Evening Journal, From the Philadelphia Press, November 30, 1859 13. Henry David Thoreau, A Plea for Captain John Brown, October 30, 1859
14. Governor Henry Wise, Message to the Virginia Legislature, December 5, 1859
15. U.S. Senate Select Committee on the Harpers Ferry Invasion, The Mason Report, June 15, 1860
16. William W. Patton, John Brown’s Body, 1862
Appendixes
A Chronology of John Brown and Events of the Civil War Era (1800–1865)
Questions for Consideration
Selected Bibliography
Index
Jonathan Earle
Jonathan Earle (PhD, Princeton University) is Associate Professor of History at the University of Kansas. In 2005, the History News Network named Earle a Top Young Historian . His book Jacksonian Anti-Slavery and the Politics of Free Soil, 1824–1854 won the James A. Broussard Best First Book Award from the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic. He is currently working on a history of the 1860 Presidential election for Oxford University Press. Earle has also authored many scholarly articles and book chapters on abolitionism, the history of the early republic, and John Brown. He has received fellowships from the NEH and the American Council of Learned Societies.
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