San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1890-04-18
JOHN BROWNS CLOTHES.
They Have Been in Brooklyn for
Thirty Years.

VI OSSdWdIOlulei WAS uduReu are Ill
the possession of a Brooklyn I'M
= dertaker, Jacob NJ. Hopper, and his
, coffin was also here until twelve
months ago, when it was chopped up
by mistake.
l The story that connects the rugged
fighter, free sOiler and abOlitiOnist
with this city is part of the secret
history of the North during the anti
slavery agitation which preceded the
} civil war. John Brown, who was
born with the century, at Torrington,
in Connecticut, early devoted
himself to systematic study
OF the slave question and the
consideration of plans to alleviate it's
mseries and finally abolish it. lie
was prominent figure in that move
ment, emanating from the North,
which was set on foot to bring the
Territory OF Kansas into the roll of
free States and lay barrier across
the westward and nOrthward path of
the slave power. He was in constant
communication with friends of the
cause in New England while living
in Ohio and Pennsylvania. John
Brown and several of his sons went
to Kansas in 1870 and settled near
| Ossawatomie, whence the name which
he afterward bore. The family plunged
at once into the political tur-
moil which was incident to the
evolution of the territory into state. |
John Brown carried on the contest for
free soil, as his opponents did tor
slavery, by blOOdshed and DELHI |
crate assassination. John Brown, led |
by his own hopes and melted by the |
expectations of Northern dreamers, |
went to Virginia and attempted to es-
tablsh systematic liberation CT |
| slaves. 1t was, perhaps, the idea of
making an armed center of offense in |
the enemy's country which led HIM
to the act that caused his death. On
June 8, 1858, John Brown left Boston,
where he had been in consultation
with the northern leaders, with $500
in gold and in possession of POO |
rifles, bought with northern money.
Less than year later he settled
near Harper's Ferry, in Virginia, and
on Sunday evening, October IS, 1859,
with eighteen men, John Brown
captured the United States arsenel at
Harper's Ferry and seized several
planters in the vicinity and liberated
their slaves.
The news of the outbreak reached
Washington Oh the day following,
and Col. Robert f. Lee, afterward
COMMUNICATIVE chief of the confederate
army, appeared before the arsenal on
Monday evening with company OF
United States marines. After a siege
in which two of John Browns
sons were killed and his forces
reduced to half dozen follow
ers and himself supposed to be
dying, he was captured, "cut thrust
and bleeding" as Gov. Wise of Nir-
ginia, who arrived few hours latter
with body of several hundred Vir.
ginia militia, describes him. John
Brown was tried before Virginia
court. The influence of northern
friends followed him here and he was
defended by council from Massachu-
sets. He was executed in Charleston,
Va, on December >, 1859. How John |
Browns body was conveyed north
and reached its final resting place at
North Elba, n. Y, was not known at
the time. The project was one which
might have exposed those engaged in
it to assault, and the dead John
Brown to vandalism.
After hanging the body in the same |
ragged. shOt-rldded clothes in which
John Brown had made his last fight,
1t was placed in walnut.cOffin, and |
given in charge Of a Charleston un-
dertaker. Through the influence of
the Northern friends the coffin vas
secretly shipped on board a northern
bound steamer, and in due time ar
rived in New York. There Jacob
Hopper was on hand to receive it and :
remove the coffin to his New York |
rooms, 1913 BOwery. John Browns
body was properly reclotheu by the
undertaken and a new casket make
for it and shipped to North EIbp,
where it was buried. The old coffin
and the tattered clothes were brought
from New York and secreted in the
cellar Of Undertaken Hopper's rooms
in Brooklyn. There they remained
for nearly thirty years. until. in a
clearing up which was instituted in
the cellar during Mr. HOpper's alb
sence, the coffin was broken TO pieces
and carried away. The clothes are
still in the undertaker's possession.
81 VIII swear to the part | had in
the disposal OF John Browns EOdv,n
said Dir. Hopper, yesterday. 1T is
fact. His body was not mutilated,
but his clothes were torn as if thew
had been cut with bayOnets."
THEfact, only too apparent, andyet
obscured by sensational journalism.
is of late finding recognition, "that if
IS the business of newspaper to
print the news, not to manufacture