The Evansville daily journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ia. [i.e. Ind.]) 1848-1862, 1859-10-29

man: -1=-------=
alt is vain to underrate either the man
or his conspiracy. Capt. John Brown is as
brave and resolute man as ever headed an
insurrection, and, in a good cause, and with
a sufficient force would have been a con-
summate partisan commander He has
GOODNESS, daring, persistence, the stole faith
and patience, and q firmness of viii and
purpose unconquerable. = He is tall, wiry,
muscular, but with little fesh-with cold,
gray eye, gray hair, beard and mustache,
compressed lips and sharp, acquiline nose, Of
cast iron face and frame, and with powers
of endurance equal to anything needed to
be done or suffered in any cause. Though
engaged in wicked, mad and fanatical en-
terprise he is the farthest possible remove
from the ordinary rufian, fanatic or mad
man; but his powers are rather executory
than inventive, and he never had the depth
or breadth of mind to originate and contrive
himself the plan Of 'insurrection which he
undertook to carry out.
The conspiracy was, unquestionably, far
more extended than yet appears, numbering
among the conspirators many more than the
handful of followers who assailed Harper's
Ferry, and having in the North and West,
if not also ut the South, as its councillors
and abettors, men of intelligence, position,
and wealth. Certainly it was one among
the best planned and executed conspirscies
that ever failed.
For .wo years he had(been plotting and
preparing it. with aiders and comforters a
thousand miles apart, in the slave States
and the free; for six months he lived with
out so much as a suspicion in slave State,
and near the scene of the instruction, win
ming eveA the esteem and coniideuce of his
neighhors, yet collecting day by day large
quantities of arms, and making ready for
the outbreak. lie had rs co'n2'ete an equip
ment, even to intrenching t'-'' as any COM
mander in regult c5Inn7 I'D intend.
ed, like Napoleon, ~ 80 pport war
He had Shapes rifles an -aaynards re.
volvers for marksmen, and plies for TIC
slaves.
In the dead hour of the night, crossing
the Potomac, he seized the Armory with
many thousand stand OF arms end other
munitions of war; and making prisoners o
more than thirty Of the workmen, officer.
and citizens, overawed the town of Harper.
Ferry with its thousands inhabitants. Will
less than half score of men surviving, h,
held the Armory for many hours, refusing
though cut off from all succor, and sur
rounded upon all sides, to surrender, anc
wa. taken with sword in hand, overpowereC
by superior numbers, yet fighting to the
last. During this short instruction eigh
teen men were killed, and ten or more SO
verely wounded-twice the number killed
and wounded on the part Of the American
force at the battle Of New Orleans.
John Brown failed . excite a general anC
most wicked, bloody and desoiating, servile
and civil war, only because tie slaves anC
non-slaveholding white men of the vicinity
the former twenty thousand in number
would not rise. He had prepared arms anC
ammunition for fifteen hundred men, and cap
tured at the first blow, enough to arm NOR,
than fifty thOusand and yet he had les;
than 80 men-more, nevertheless, than hav,
begun half the revolutions and conspiracie:
which history records. But he had not tam
pered with slaves, nor solicited the non
slaveholdiug whites around him, because h,
! really believed that the moment the blow
was struck they would gather to his stand
| ard, and expecting, furthermore, the prom
Used reinforcements instantly from the Nortl
and West. This was the basis upon which
the whole conspiracy was planned; and hat
his belief been well founded, be would IN
questionaby have succeeded i'm stirring NJ
the most formidable Instruction, possibl,
involving the peace of the whole country
and requiring, certainly, great armies anC
| vast tire ,sures to suppress il.