The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1898-06-22
THE EXECUTION
OF JOHN BROWN.
One Of the Guards at the scaffold De-
scribes the Scene.


grower in the San Gabriel valley in
Southern California, is one of the few
persons now living who stood near to
John Brown of OsawatOmie when he
was hanged.
az believe / am the last of the guards
about John Brown and his associates
in the Jail at Charlestown," he says.
He was near relative of Sheriff
Campbell, who had charge of Brown
and seven of his younger associate pris-
oners in the Charlestown Jail. Several
years ago he wrote out his recolleetions
of John Brown in Jail and on the
seaffold, but when il was finished he
destroyed the manuscript. Colonel
Fellows served three years in the Con-
federate army, and was in Richmond
at the time Of the surrender.
al don't mind telling once more, :"
said Colonel Fellows to a reporter,
"my "Reminiscences of poor old John
Brown during his last days on earth.
When I first heard OF the bloody affair
at the engine house at Harper's Ferry,
in the middle of October, 1859, nobody
probably denounced John Brown and
his crazy abolition followers more than
l did. It seemed TO me then that this
shaggy bearded man, Brown, was about
as near human fiend as one could be.
Yet when | came to be associated with
him almost Immediately formed an
attachment for him, so that to this day
L have never quite recovered from my
personal sorrow at his execution-legal
and necessary though it may have
been. A handsome, promising young
cousin of mine was killed in the mill
tia charge on the Harper's Ferry engine
house, and that made my resentment
against Brown and his men the more
intense. But later, in the Charlestown
Jail, John Browns fortitude, amid
pain from his wounds, his integrity,
charity, and simplicity of character,
his stern regard for duty, his Spartan
firmness in the face of overwhelming
odds, and especially his modest brav-
cry, appealed to me- Sheriff Campbell
and ali the guards had sympathy
with our aged prisoner, and no real in
dignity was ever offered John Brown
by any one in Jail, as / kuow-nOt-
withstanding the multitude Of stories.
In all my experience in the war and in
border life, where one meets all sorts of
strange characters, have never known
any one so serene in the midst of fright
ful circumstances as was old John
Brown. He was truly a marvellous
character. AS look back now on the
of the man, he seems to
me to have been more like the heroes
of Scott's 'Ivanhoe' and of the Cru.
sades than any one have ever zaown.
81 was p years old in 1850, and was
made one of the 800 guards about the
jail, Immediately after
John Brown and several of his men
captured in the engine house at Har-
per's Ferry-were brought to Charles
town. The whole country was wildly
excited. l doubt if any event in the
war that ragged through that region
for four years reused people like the in
cident at Harper's Ferry. Governor
Wise of Virginia and thousands of
people in the South believed that John
Brown and his men were encouraged
and secretly hired by abolit:onists, like
Wendell Phillips, Gerrit and Charles
Sumner in the North, and that the
Blue Ridge mountains were teeming
with anti-slavery Northerners, who
were watching for an opportunity to
come down in force upon the Jail and
liberate Brown aud his associates. So
a guard of 800 armed men was called
out. But il was seen later that there
was no need for such force, and / was
chosen by my uncle, Sheriff Campbell,
as one OF the half dozen day guards in
side the jail corridor. | am the only
one now living who was employed in
the Jail at that time. One of Browns
lawyers still lives ia Brooklyn, n. Y.
81 became an inside guard after the
famous trial al Charlestown, and when
Browns execution was. set for one
month later-December Brown oc-
cupied cell with one Of his captured
followers, a young man named Stevens,
who was executed with the other six
a month or six weeks after
their captain. When 1 went on duty
in the Jail John Brown was recovering
from a severe scalp wound that he got
from a sabre in the hands Of his csptor
at Harper's Ferry. / saw the constant
pain the old man was in and the elum-
sy way that he himself had 70 dress the
wound, so helped him, brought fresh
daily and got him ointment
and warm water For al Of this he
was extremely grateful in his reserved,
way. He was n proud,
man, and liked TO show his stoicism-
One day when guard refused to give
him letter from his wife I thought
Iohn Brown would lose eonfrol of him