Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1874-03-04

story OF MS escape, OF tHtt oohil 'oiu ny :"
enough of his fathers plans to give a dig
nitv to the attempt at Harper's Ferry G
which confess it had never before seemed
to me, in nv ignorance, to have. John t
Brown, Jr., was at home in Ashtabula t
county, Ga, at the time of the attack. He
had Just returned from Canada, where he {
had been organizing the pluckiest and
most trustworthy of the escaped slaves, at
some of the bCrler towns. He would have !
been at Harper's Ferry, if his father had {
not been driven to begin operations before (
the appointed time. The reason for strik-
inc the blow so soon was that he had been
BETRAYED to the government. Moreover,
the people in the neighborhood begun to
suspect him. John Browns entire plan has
never, think, been published. His OBJ
iect. as his friends know, was to make
slave-holding so unsafe and unstable us to
render it improbable, and so to lead to its
abolition. He and his company had
already in effect driven slavery out OF
Kansas, and lessened the value of slaves IN
Missouri and the border states to the
amount of at least million dollars. This
had been done by handful OF men, with
the combined power and influence OF the
government against them. John Brown
remembered that the Seminoles were
never fairly conquered, and had, twenty
wears before, while surveying in the neigh
borbood Of Harper's Ferry, resolved to
make the Allegheny and Cumberland |
mountains and the Dismal swamp his
everglades. The least he expected the
government to send against him was an
army of twenty thousand; and his plans
were so laid that they could never capture
over one hundred of his men at a time,
and of these all but two or three should be
fugitive slaves. The risings We're planned
to take place in q dozen different directions
in a night, the companies to be kept sep
arate. The slaves were not to be taken to
the North, but drilled and taught to con-
auer their homes in the South. They were
to be of1icered by men who had proved
worthy, and who We're to restrain them
from acts of violence. The shareholders
were to be taken prisoners where they
stood in the way, and injured personally
only ifthev resisted. 1t was John Browns
desire to Show the shareholders from the
first the humanity of his intentions, that
caused him to delay his escape from the
engine house ut Harper's Ferry until 1t was
too late. Hundreds of men We're sworn to
be there, and, if he could have waited until
the time in the spring agreed upon for the
attack. it would probably have been snc-
ccssful. The courage and fortltnde OF the
wonderful old man have been allowed
even by his enemies. 1t was hard for the
Viroinians, as it would have been hard for
most men. to whom every black man
counted a thousand dollars, to recognize
the RIGHT of revolution in four millions of
human beings, but they did acknowledge
that John Brown was all through the stuff
of which his answers We're made when
Gov. Wise and Senator Mason questioned
him. wounded and bleeding upon the en-
oine-house floor; and that was just the
sort of insanity, it seems to me, that heroes
and refoImers have been made of, ever
since the world began. He had waited
twenty wears he was too old to wait twenty
wears longer. The blow, he thought
must be struck then or never. 70 him
and his men life was nothing in compari
son with what had been so long the absorb
inc object of it. Even as it was, If he ha'
y cared less for the feelings fthe wives an'
e children of his prisoners, and had gone L
u the mountains when he could have gone
: and he accursed himself of the mistake
IL without duplicating his friends ut tn
= North.-the war would certainly hav
Va lasted longer, and would not have close
y so disastrouslv This last statement coul
st have, | believe. no better confirmation
'r than is in the fact of the remarkable escap
It of Owen Brown and his little band, wit
Il thousands of dollars upon their heads, an
Z hundreds of thousands OF people eager t
- catch them.
III In his fathers will and published letter,
- Owen Brown is spoken of as cripple
T. He injured his right arm in throwing
III stone when a boy. and has since had onl
ay the partial use of it. He is a bachelor, an
n
wav from his brothers farmhouse, that
lu wrote down. from his own lips, the follow
I" inc account of his escape from Harper
III Ferry. Upon the wall just above my hea
ny hung an overcoat once worn by his IA hel
Hi and on a bench beneath the window at III
ch q side lay the gun used, believe, by II
us old warrior at the fight of Ossawattomi
io The place. indeed, was full of mementO
'er Most of the homely furniture was, | thin
heroic in its way, like the whole fami
eo - None of us said Owen Brown, with h
ny usual deliberation, stroking his full beal
ch and looking at his fathers gun, when
IN; interrupted his narrative to ask if he we
trd trd not afraid on u certain perilous occasio
no 'none of us ever made much pretensl'
"a VI to being scared.
nI He had not told the story before,
u, assured me, in twelve years. The homes
Ut NJ and modesty are so ingrained In the M
y" that any one. imagine, who had llsten
t to him, would have been willing to swe
zoe that Owen Brown was telling what he /
the lieyed to be the truth. Where he did II
ore know of his own personal knowledge, a
aeH even when statement had the authori
Iuil of Trustworthy record, he would invaral
ce' say Il have heard; | do not know,
lel have heard Names of men and plao
ny he had strangely forgotten in their h1
aI orv wandering in the mountains, he n
no his little company had even lost their rec
iue oning of the days of the week; yet
lier strong is the woodsman in him, that
'me rave me not only the direction and prol
tiie bic extent of every mountain and vail
tLe he passed, night or day, but the matt
; AT and quality of the timber almost eve
to where in his way. l found him entir'
i!oii free from malice even against the bitt
Tire ness of his old enemies. He passed o.
the most dangerous and dramatic parts
'ute his story without the least emphasis, g
ons' ing them to me often by the way of par'
lef' thesis. In his dcliberation and tones d
onh look there were qualities that evapor
his ,,t;,.rl, of oonrSe frop, the written n,,.
rVl- tive. The only substitute | can think
the fo, tho ro.dor;s tb,t ho shall hear 3
OF stantlv in mind what kind of men
ger John Brown told the Massachusetts 1t
one islature he wanted with him. men v
win fear God too much to fear anything huma
Try. And Owen Brown was one of them
'alk Ra1ph Keeler, IN March atlantic.
can
ever rro,, tho ponu,ar Science Mon,b,v
., rny y Apparent Death-..SOme Strange Stor
card In the islands OF the Greek archlpeE'
with where the business OF gathering spon
3