Kevin Overton: 2012-10-14

US Marine Corps History

On this Date, October 18, 1859 via Wikipedia (mostly)

President James Buchanan orders US Marines to capture John Brown at Harper's Ferry, West Virginia.

Colonel Robert E. Lee, US Army

The Raid was led by a Rising Star in the United States Army (COL. Robert E. Lee)!!

John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry (also known as John Brown's raid or The raid on Harpers Ferry; in many books the town is called "Harper's Ferry" with an apostrophe-s.^[1]) was an attempt by white abolitionist John Brown to start an armed slave revolt by seizing a United States Arsenal at Harpers Ferry in Virginia in 1859. Brown's raid was defeated by a detachment of U.S. Marines led by Col. Robert E. Lee. John Brown had originally asked Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass, both of whom he had met in his formative years as an abolitionist in Springfield, Massachusetts, to join him when he attacked the armory, but illness prevented Tubman from joining him, and Douglass believed that his plan would fail and thus did not join.^[2]

In 1794, George Washington selected Harpers Ferry as the best site for the second of two United States Federal Arsenals. The first site selected – for the Springfield Armory in 1777 – was a hilltop in Springfield, Massachusetts, next to which John Brown lived during his formative years as an abolitionist. In 1825, the soldier John H. Hall was contracted to manufacture his famous rifle, the M1819 rifle, at Harper's Ferry.

October 18

Illustration of the interior of the engine house immediately before the door is broken down

Lee first offered the role of attacking the engine house to the local militia units on the spot. Both militia commanders declined, and Lee turned to the Marines. On the morning of October 18, Col. Lee sent Lt. J.E.B. Stuart, serving as a volunteer aide-de-camp, under a flag of truce to negotiate a surrender of John Brown and his followers. Lee instructed Lt. Israel Greene that if Brown refused, he was to lead the marines in storming the engine house. Stuart told Brown that his men would be spared if they surrendered. Brown refused and Stuart signaled to Lt. Greene and his men. Two marines armed with sledgehammers tried in vain to break through the door. Greene found a wooden ladder, and 10 marines used it as a battering ram to knock the front doors in. Greene was the first through the door and with the assistance of Lewis Washington identified and singled out John Brown. Greene later recounted what happened next:

"Quicker than thought I brought my saber down with all my strength upon [Brown's] head. He was moving as the blow fell, and I suppose I did not strike him where I intended, for he received a deep saber cut in the back of the neck. He fell senseless on his side, then rolled over on his back. He had in his hand a short Sharpe's cavalry carbine. I think he had just fired as I reached Colonel Washington, for the Marine who followed me into the aperture made by the ladder received a bullet in the abdomen, from which he died in a few minutes. The shot might have been fired by some one else in the insurgent party, but I think it was from Brown. Instinctively as Brown fell I gave him a saber thrust in the left breast. The sword I carried was a light uniform weapon, and, either not having a point or striking something hard in Brown's accouterments, did not penetrate. The blade bent double."^[10]

The action inside the engine house happened very quickly. In three minutes, all of the raiders still alive were taken prisoner and the action was over.

[edit]October 19

Robert E. Lee made a summary report of the events that took place at Harpers Ferry. According to Lee's notes Lee believed John Brown was insane, "...the plan [raiding the Harpers Ferry Arsenal] was the attempt of a fanatic or madman." Lee also believed that the African Americans used in the raid were forced to by John Brown himself. "The blacks, whom he [John Brown] forced from their homes in this neighborhood, as far as I could learn, gave him no voluntary assistance." Lee attributed John Brown's "temporary success" by creating panic and confusion and by "magnifying" the number of participants involved in the raid.^[11]

[edit]Aftermath

John Brown wrote his last prophecy on December 2 of 1859.

Colonel Lee and Lt. Greene searched the surrounding country for fugitives who had participated in the attack. John Brown was taken to the court house in nearby Charles Town for trial. He was found guilty of treason against the commonwealth of Virginia and was hanged on December 2. (This execution was witnessed by the actor John Wilkes Booth, who would later assassinate President Abraham Lincoln.) On the day of his execution, Brown wrote his last prophecy, which said,

“I John Brown am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty, land: will never be purged away; but with Blood. I had as I now think: vainlyflattered myself that without very much bloodshed; it might be done.”

Four other raiders were executed on December 15 and two more on March 16, 1860.

John Brown was the first white man to use violence in an attempt to end slavery. This first use of violence by a white man scared many in the South, leading the Southern state militias to begin training for defense against further raids and, consequently, to the militarization of the South in preparation for a Northern invasion.^{[citation needed]}

The first Northern antislavery reaction to Brown's Raid was one of baffled reproach. William Lloyd Garrison called the raid "misguided, wild, and apparently insane." But through the trial, Brown transformed into a martyr. Henry David Thoreau, in A Plea for Captain John Brown, said, "I think that for once the Sharp's rifles and the revolvers were employed in a righteous cause. The tools were in the hands of one who could use them," and said of Brown, "He has a spark of divinity in him."^[12] Though "Harper's Ferry was insane," wrote the religious weekly the Independent, "the controlling motive of his demonstration was sublime." To the South, he was a murderer who wanted to deprive them of their property. The North "has sanctioned and applauded theft, murder, and treason," said De Bow's Review.^[13]^[14]

[edit]Casualties

[edit]John Brown's raiders

John Brown in 1859.

Killed

John Henry Kagi (Shot and killed while crossing a river. First buried in common grave at Harpers Ferry; reburied 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York...)
Jeremiah G. Anderson (At age 26, was mortally wounded and killed by a Marine's bayonet during the final assault on the engine house. Body claimed by Winchester Medical College as a teaching cadaver; last resting place unknown.)
William Thompson (First buried in common grave at Harpers Ferry; reburied 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)
Dauphin Thompson (Killed in the storming of the engine house. First buried in common grave at Harpers Ferry; reburied 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)
Oliver Brown (At age 21, being the youngest of John Brown’s three sons to participate in the action, he was mortally wounded on the 17th inside the engine house, resulting in a death the next day. He was first buried in common grave at Harpers Ferry; reburied in 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)
Watson Brown (At age 24, was mortally wounded outside the engine house while carrying a white flag, trying to negotiate with the responding militia, resulting in death two days later. The body was claimed by Winchester Medical College as a teaching cadaver which caused the college to be burned by Union troops. Reburied in 1882 in a grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)
Stewart Taylor. (First buried in common grave at Harpers Ferry; reburied 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)
William Leeman (Shot while trying to escape across the Potomac River. First buried in common grave at Harpers Ferry; reburied 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)
Lewis Sheridan Leary (At age 24 being a free African-American, was mortally wounded while attempting escape across the Shenandoah River. He was stationed in the rifle factory with Kagi. Alleged to be buried at John Brown gravesite at North Elba, New York. Cenotaph memorial in Oberlin, Ohio.)
Dangerfield Newby (At about 35, being born into slavery [despite father being white and not his master], had permission to move to Ohio along with his mother and siblings, but when he tried to attain freedom for his wife and children, the owner refused, leading Newby to join Brown’s raid. He was the first raider killed [body was mutilated]. His ears, for example, were cut off by someone in the crowd as souvenirs. First he was buried at Harpers Ferry; reburied in 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)

Captured

John Brown (also wounded) Hanged December 2, 1859 in nearby Charles Town.
Aaron Dwight Stevens (shot and captured October 18. Hanged March 16, 1860 in Charles Town. First buried in New Jersey; reburied 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)
Edwin Coppock (At age 24, he shot and killed Harpers Ferry mayor Fontaine Beckham during the raid. He was later executed at Charles Town on December 16, 1859 and was buried in Salem, Ohio.)
John Anthony Copeland, Jr. (At age 25, being a free African American, joined the raiders along with his uncle Lewis Leary. He was captured during the raid and executed on December 16, 1859 in Charles Town. The body was claimed by Winchester Medical College as a teaching cadaver. The last resting place is unknown. Cenotaph memorial in Oberlin, Ohio.)
Shields Green (At about age 23, Green was an escaped slave from South Carolina; captured in the engine house on October 18, 1859 and hanged December 16, 1859 in Charles Town. The body was claimed by Winchester Medical College as a teaching cadaver. The last resting place is unknown. Cenotaph memorial in Oberlin, Ohio.)
John Edwin Cook (Escaped into Pennsylvania but soon captured. Hanged December 16, 1859 in Charles Town. Body sent to New York.)
Albert E. Hazlett (Escaped into Pennsylvania but soon captured. Hanged March 16, 1860. Buried at Eagleswood Mansion in Perth Amboy, New Jersey;^[15] reburied 1899 in a common grave near John Brown at North Elba, New York.)
A.D. Stevens (Buried at Eagleswood Mansion in Perth Amboy, New Jersey; disinterred 1899)

^[15])

Four raiders escaped and were captured about six months later.

Escaped and never captured

Barclay Coppock (Died during US Civil War.)
Charles Plummer Tidd (Died during US Civil War.)
Osborne Perry Anderson (Served as an officer in Union Army, and penned a memoir about the raid.)
Owen Brown
Francis Jackson Meriam (Served in the army as a captain in the 3rd South Carolina Colored Infantry.)

[edit]Others

Civilians

Hayward Shepherd (African-American B&O baggage handler; killed.)
Thomas Boerly (Townsperson; killed.)
George W. Turner (Townsperson; killed.)
Fontaine Beckham (Town mayor; killed.)
A slave belonging to Col. Washington was killed.
A slave belonging to hostage John Allstad was killed.

(Some claim the two slaves voluntarily joined Brown's raiders, others say Brown forced them to fight. Regardless, one was killed trying to escape across the Potomac River, the other was wounded and died in the Charles Town prison.)

9 other civilians were wounded.

Marines