The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1874-01-10
The Her. Of Harper,s Ferry.

Last evening Frederick Douglass lectured in
City Hall on John Brown, the hero of Harper's
Ferry. The house was thin, partly because of
the Union meeting at State street church and
the NJ. c. NJ. A. lecture at their hall, and part
ly because it isn't the fashion to go to lecture
unless it is in a course. The majority of the
people don't 60 to lecture to hear it, but be-
cause it the correct thing to 60. On no other
theory can one explain the neglect of the peo-
pie to avail then selves of the opportunity of
hearing one of the very best lectures ever de-
livered from an American platform.
In substance the lecture was admirable. In
manner of delivery it was indispensable. The
kindly presence of the man, the great name of
white hair pushed back from the forehead, the
keen eyes lighted up by smile, the rich deep
voice with its undertone of sadness, all COM
bined to make more effective the lofty flights
of eloquence, the touches of simple pathos the
cutting sarcasm which made up his sketch of
the stern old Puritan of 1852 who went forth
with sword in one hand and bible in the other,
to liberate an enslaved and loug suffering race
Mr. Douglass began by saying that sectional
luminosity was dying away he hoped forever
and now was the time to vindicate the fame of
a man who made a bold attempt to liberate the
colored race. Aside from the rebellion there is
no event in our history more notable than the
bloody drama at Harper's Ferry, October 10Th,
1859. Nineteen men, fourteen white and five
colored, seized the arsenal at Harper's Ferry,
gathered fifty slaves proclaimed emancipation,
and held the place for thirty hours. Finally
they were overpowered, and most of them kill
ed Three men were taken alive, one of whom
was John Brown, the leader of the expedition.
He was hurried to Charlestown and hung.
Such is the simple story of Harper's Ferry,-a
story not to soOth, but to shock. The people,
North and South, were shocked; for the knife
is always an offense. But this act of violence
must not be judged alone. The seed time and
the harvest must BE- classed togethe The
bloody scene at Harpers Ferry was the legiti-
mate out-coming of two centuries of oppression.
The wild cry of alarm which rang out in the
October night by the banks Of the Potomac was
the natural consequence of those cries which
rang out by the banks of the Congo when
Christian men surprised some African village.
The speaker said he himself was considera-
bly, mixed up in the events preceding John
Browns expedition. After Browns capture
he received pressing invitation from United
States marshal to visit Charlestown, but as he
had left home about six hours before he could
not accept. Though the story of John Brown
has been told in prose and verse, there still re
mains something to say. Slavery is dead, but
it mas left long black shadow stretching
across the land The gallant soldier who led our
armies to the freeing of the black sets in the
Presidential chair, but the memory of John
Brown, the man who. undertook the same thing
on small scale, is still under ban. Time
and the centuries will do him justice
The speaker then proceeded to give an &C.
count of his acquaintance with Brown, sketch
ing with powerful words the simple, honest,
rugged character of the man, and of the cir
cumstances preceding the attempt to liberate
the Virginia blacks. The North could scarcely
believe, until told by John Browns own lips,
that the expedition was else than an expedition
to plumber. Virginia knew better from the
first, for her conscience was touched, and the
little band of nineteen men caused her to trem-
BILE from one border line to the other.
The country was benumbed by slavery, and
needed man to awaken it; so John Brown
Captain John Brown, who struck the first
blow in the war, which ended in the liberation
of four millions of slaves. The first gun was
fred, not in South Carolina, but in Virginia.
The South knew that she must hold the euor-
nous powers of the government or go to the
wall. She attempted it and failed ;and when the
struggle ended it was seen that it was not the
cause of John Brown who persisted on the scat
fold, but that of the men who hanged him that
was the "lost cause