Edwin Coppoc (Villard, 1910)

Edwin Coppoc, brother of Barclay, was captured with Brown in the engine house, tried immediately after him, sentenced on November 2, and hung with Cook on December 16, 1859. The father of the Coppocs died when Edwin was six, the latter having been born June 30, 1835. For nine years thereafter Edwin lived with John Butler, a farmer, near Salem, Ohio, removing then with his mother to Springdale, Iowa. This place he left in the spring of 1858, to become a settler in Kansas. He took no part in the Territorial troubles, and returned to Springdale in the autumn of 1858, when he became acquainted with Brown. He always bore an excellent reputation as an honest, brave, straightforward, well-behaved man, and his death was particularly lamented by many friends. An exemplary prisoner, there were many Southerners who hoped for his pardon. He was buried first in Winona [later in Salem, Ohio], after a public funeral, attended by the entire town. In jail he regretted his situation, wrote his mother of his sorrow that he must die a dishonorable death, and explained that he had not understood what the full consequences of the raid would be. He died with absolute fortitude.