Harpers Ferry Raid (Channing, 1922)

[John Brown] asserted that ‘twenty in the Alleghanies could break slavery in pieces in two years’ –  precisely how is not clear.  It is clear, however, that it was his intention to free the slaves, not to excite a slave insurrection – although it is difficult to understand how the former could be accomplished without bringing on the latter; it is also clear that his project met with strong disapproval many persons to whom he applied for money.  On the 16th of October, 1859, he suddenly appeared at Harper's Ferry, Virginia, at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers, with nineteen followers.  He seized the United States arsenal at that place, but allowed a train to pass on its way to Washington.  He was captured with all but two of his followers, indicted, tried, convicted, and executed on a charge of treason and conspiracy with slaves and others to rebel and murder.