JOHN BROWN’S MEN

I have written almost entirely of John Brown, and because of necessities of space I have given little attention to the brave youths who fought under him at Harper’s Ferry. Yet here I must stop and with only the facts, paint some portrait of the men who followed John Brown. It will be seen that they were no ordinary ruffians, no bandits, adventurers or madmen, as the South called them at the time. They were young crusaders, thoughtful, sensitive and brave. They had a philosophy of life; and they were filled with passion for social justice. One may disagree with such men, but one must not fail to respect them.

There were twenty-one men with John Brown at Harper’s Ferry, sixteen of whom were white and five colored. Only one was of foreign birth; nearly all were of old American pioneer stock.

John Henry Kagi was the best educated of the raiders, largely self-taught, a fine debater and speaker, and an able correspondent for the New York Tribune and the New York Evening Post. He had been a school-teacher in Virginia, and had come to know and hate slavery there, protesting so vigorously that he was finally run out of the State. He practised law in Nebraska, but left this to join John Brown in the Kansas fighting. He was killed at Harper’s Ferry.

Aaron Dwight Stevens was in many ways the most attractive and interesting of the personalities about John Brown. He ran away from his home in Massachusetts at the age of sixteen, and joined the United States army, serving in Mexico during the Mexican War. Later he was sentenced to death for leading a soldiers’ mutiny against an offensive pro-slavery Major at Taos, New Mexico. President Pierce commuted the sentence to three years at hard labor in Fort Leavenworth. Stevens escaped from this prison, and joined the Free State forces in Kansas, for he had always been a firm abolitionist. Stevens came of old Puritan stock, his great-grandfather having been a captain in the Revolutionary War. He was a man of superb bravery and of wonderful physique; well over six feet, handsome, with black penetrating eyes and a fine brow. He had a charming sense of humor, and a beautiful baritone voice, with which he sang in camp and in prison. He was hung soon after John Brown for the Harper’s Ferry raid.

John E. Cook was a young law student of Brooklyn, New York, a reckless, impulsive and rather indiscreet youth, to whom much was forgiven because of his genial smile and generous nature.

Charles Plummer Tidd escaped after the raid, and died a First Sergeant in one of the battles of the Civil War. He had not much education, but good common sense, and was always reading and studying in an attempt to repair his lack of training. Quick-tempered, but kindhearted, a fine singer and with strong family affections.

Jeremiah Goldsmith Anderson, killed at Harper’s Ferry in his 27th year, was also of Revolutionary American stock. A sworn abolitionist, he wrote in a letter three months before his death: “Millions of fellow-beings require it of us; their cries for help go out to the universe daily and hourly. Whose duty is it to help them? Is it yours? Is it mine? It is every man’s, but how few there are to help. But there are a few to answer this call, and dare to answer it in a manner that shall make this land of liberty and equality shake to the center.”

Albert Hazlett, executed after Brown, was a Pennsylvania farm worker, “a good-sized, fine-looking fellow, overflowing with good nature and social feelings.”

Edwin Coppoc, also one of those captured and hung, was well-liked even by the Southerners who saw him in jail, and some of them hoped to get him pardoned. He came of Quaker farmer stock.

Barclay Coppoc, his brother, was not yet twenty-one when he fought at the Arsenal. He escaped after the raid, but was killed in the Civil War. After the raid he had returned to Kansas, and had nearly lost his life in an attempt to free some slaves in Missouri.

William Thompson, a neighbor of the Browns at North Elba, in New York, was killed at Harper’s Ferry, in his 26th year. He was full of fun and good nature, and bore himself unflinchingly when face to face with death.

Dauphin Osgood Thompson, his brother, was only twenty years old, when he met the same fate for the cause of freedom. Dauphin was a handsome, inexperienced country boy, “more like a shy young girl than a warrior, quiet and good,” said one of the Brown women later.

Oliver Brown, John Brown’s youngest son, was also twenty years old when he died at Harper’s Ferry. His girl-wife and her baby died early the next year. “Oliver developed rather slowly,” says Miss Sarah Brown. “In his earlier teens he was always pre-occupied, absent-minded—always reading, and then it was impossible to catch his attention. But in his last few years he came out very fast. His awkwardness left him. He read every solid book that he could find, and was especially fond of Theodore Parker’s writings, as was his father. Had Oliver lived, and not killed himself with over-study, he would have made his mark. By his exertions the sale of liquor was stopped at North Elba.”

John Anthony Copeland, a free colored man, 25 years old, was educated at Oberlin College. He was dignified and manly, and in jail there were prominent Southerners who were forced to admit his fine qualities. He was hung for the raid.

Stewart Taylor, the only one of the raiders not of American birth, was a young Canadian wagon-maker, 23 years old. He was fond of history and debating, and heart and soul in the abolition cause. Killed in the Arsenal.

William H. Leeman, the youngest of the raiders, killed in his 19th year. He had gone to work in a shoe factory at Haverhill, Mass., when only 14 years old, and though with little education, “had a good intellect and great ingenuity.” He was the “wildest” of Brown’s men, for he smoked and drank occasionally, but the Old Puritan captain liked him, nevertheless, for he was boyish, handsome, and brave.

Osborn Perry Anderson was also a Negro. He escaped after the raid, and fought through the Civil War.

Francis Jackson Meriam, was a wealthy, young abolitionist who put all his fortune into the cause, and came from New England to join John Brown in the raid. He escaped also, and died in 1865, after having been the captain of a Negro company in the Civil War.

Lewis Sheridan Leary, colored, left a wife and a six-months-old baby at Oberlin, Ohio, to go to Harper’s Ferry. He was a harness maker by trade, and descended on one side from an Irishman, Jeremiah O’Leary, who fought in the Revolution. Leary was 25 years old when he died of his terrible wounds in the Arsenal fighting.

Owen Brown, another of John Brown’s sons, was stalwart and reliable, and is reported original in expression and thought, like all the Browns. He is also said to have been quite humorous. He survived the raid, and died in Pasadena, Calif., in 1891.

Watson Brown, another son, 24 years old when killed at the Ferry, was tall and rather fair, very strong, and a man of marked ability and sterling character.

Dangerfield Newby was born a slave in Virginia, but his father, a Scotchman, freed him with other mulatto children. Newby had a wife and seven children still in slavery, and he was trying to raise money to buy them, for they were to be sold further south. He failed at this; and joined John Brown in desperation. He was killed at the Ferry, and so failed to free his poor family, as he had dreamed.

Shields Green, colored, was also born a slave, but escaped, leaving a little son in slavery. He met Brown through Frederick Douglass, the great Negro orator, and joined in the raid, though many warned him it would mean his death. He was uneducated, but deeply emotional, and deeply attached to the “ole man,” as he called John Brown. He was hung after the raid; his age 23.

They were all young men; the average age of the band was 25 years and five months. They were all strong, intelligent, in love with life and eager for the future; but they chose to attempt this mad, dangerous deed rather than consent any longer to the lie and to the power of black slavery.

John Brown they followed and loved as one would a strong and kindly father. There was always something patriarchal about John Brown and his soldiers, many observers said. It made his deed seem like some story out of the Bible, the swift and terrible Justice of the Lord of Hosts.