Danver Steven L. (Edited). Revolts, Protests, Demonstrations, and Rebellions in American History: An Encyclopedia (ENG)
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a system that was itself based on violence. Southern planters rejected the abolition-
ists’ view that slavery was sinful. Instead, they cited biblical passages that seemed
to support slavery and argued that nearly every society since the dawn of human civ-
ilization had practiced some form of bonded labor. Using racist arguments about the
inferiority of African Americans, planters said that their slaves were childlike and
needed the guidance and protection of benevolent, Christian masters.
The moral debate over slavery took place alongside an equally explosive politi-
cal conflict over the spread of slavery into new American terri tories in the West.
Southerners, fearful that the organization of new free states would increase
northern power in Congress to the point where their system would be threatened,
demanded t hat slavery be allowed to expand i nto regions like California, New
Mexico, and Kansas. While the vast ma jority of northern polit icians rejected the
immediate abolition of slavery, they were nevertheless reluctant to support the cre-
ation of new slave states in the West. Not only would new slave states increase the
power of the South in Congress, but it would also discourage the migration of free
laborers to a region dominated by slavery. In 1856, this debate erupted into outright
violence as proslavery and antislavery settlers in the Kansas Territory took up arms
to promote their own vision of the territory’s future. Among the antislavery mili-
tants in Kansas was John Brown, whose May 1856 massacre of proslavery settlers
at Pottawatomie Creek demonstrated the escalating brutality of the conflict.
The political debate over the extension of slavery into the West also led to the
realignment of American politics. The death of the Whig Party in the mid-1850s,
for example, was caused by its inability to balance northern and southern views.
Its rapid demise paved the way for the emergence of the Republicans, who vehe-
mently opposed slavery’s growth. Southerners viewed the Republicans, who drew
support only in the Nor th, with intense suspic ion, and they threatened to secede
from the Union should a Republican candidate win the pre sidency. Al though
Republican John C. Fre
´
mont fell just short of winning in the 1856 election, a split
between the northern and southern wings of the Democratic Party ensured the vic-
tory of the Republicans four years later. Their candidate, Abraham Lincoln, w as
unacceptable to the South not only because he was a Republican, but also because
he had publicly stated his view that American could not remain forever “half slave
and half free.” The combination of John Brown’s raid and the election of a new
president with explicitly antislavery views convinced southern leaders that their
region was no longer safe in the United States.
Abraham Lincoln was not an abolitionist, but his pledge to restrict slavery to the
states where it already existed was enough to convince seven sta tes in the Lower
South to secede from the Union following his election. When Lincoln called for
75,000 volunteers to suppress the southern rebellion after the fall of Fort Sumter,
Virginia led four more states in the Upper South into the new Confederacy. By
426 Harpers Fer ry Raid (1859)
the summer of 1861, the Union and the Confederacy were poised to fight a terrible
civil war.
—Paul E. Teed
Further Reading
Freehling, William W. Road to Disunion, Volume I: Secessionists at Bay, 1776–1854.New
York: Oxford University Press, 1991.
Freehling, William W. Road to Disunion, Volume II: Secessionists Triumphant,
1854–1861. New York: Oxford University Press, 2007.
McPherson, James M. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1988.
Potter, David M. The Impending Crisis, 1848–1861. New York: Harper and Row, 1963.
Lee, Robert E. (1807–1870)
The life of Robert E. Lee stands in marked contrast to that of John Brown. Born in
Westmoreland Country, eastern Virginia, on January 19, 1807, the young Lee
entered a world of social privilege and an America that knew and revered his fam-
ily name. The son of “Light Horse Harry” Lee, a Revolutionary War he ro and a
three-term governor of Virginia, Robert grew up a mong the Tidewater elite of
planter aristocrats whose land and slaves h ad made them the state’s ruling class.
Although his father’s notorious financial recklessness and early death undermined
the family’s wealth, Robert’s social and political connections as well as his intelli-
gence and personal discipline gained him access to an elite education. Attending
the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, he accomplished the herculean feat of
graduating without a single demerit. He moved easily among his social equals
and demonstrated a gift for mathematics. In 1831, he married Mary Randolph Cus-
tis, whose father was the adopted son of George Washington.
Lee’s military career before the Civil War was distinguished but not spectacular.
He served for three years as the assistant chief engineer of the U.S. Army and con-
tributed to the improvement of American defenses in St. Louis, Baltimore, and
New York City. In an army where promotions came very slowly, he became a cap-
tain of engineers in 1838, but would have to wait almost two decades longer before
achieving the rank of colonel. In the meantime, Lee demonstrated his abilities as a
leader under fire during the Mexican-American War of 1846–1848. As an engi-
neering officer, he was responsible for reconnaissance and the preparation of trans-
portation routes in advance of the American army. Working closely with
commanding general Winfield Scott, Lee was praised for his effectiveness and
Harpers Ferry Raid (1859) 427
daring at Vera Cruz, Cerro Gordo, and Mexico City. In 1852, partly in recognition
of his service during the war, he was appointed as superintendent of West Point,
where he taught young men, like J. E. B. Stuart, who would serve under him as
officers in the Confederate Army of North ern Virginia. But by the mid-1850s,
his career seemed stalled. After being promoted to lieutenant colonel in the Sec-
ond U.S. Cavalry, he spent months at a time cut off from his family while serving
in faraway Texas.
Lee was home in Virginia on leave when the news of John Brown’s raid on
Harpers Ferry reached him. It came in the form of a letter from the U.S. War
Department or dering him to take command of a company of Marines and recap-
ture the armory from Brown and his raiders. Lee not only supervised the storming
of the armory and the capture of Brown, but he also brought four companies of
troops to John Brown’s execution at Charles Town, Virginia, on December 2,
1859. In his report to the military following the episode, Lee described Brown as
a “madman or fanatic” whose plan had no chance of succeeding. He exulted that
slaves in the surrounding area had not given any assistance to the raiders.
During the Civil War, Robert E. Lee served as the commanding general of the
Army of Northern Virginia, the Confederacy’s largest and most successful military
unit. After taking command of the force in the spring of 1862, Lee demonstrated
an offensive style of command that repeatedly took his Union counterparts by sur-
prise. At the Seven Days Battles and the Second Ba tt le of Manassas during the
summer of 1862, and at the Battle of Chancellorsville in May 1863, Lee either neu-
tralized or defeated Union forces much larger than his own. Beyond their military
importance, such victories were extremely important in shoring up southern civilian
support for the war and in gaining international credibility for the Confederate
government. Lee also in vaded Union territory twice in the Antietam and Gettysburg
campaigns with much less success. Despite these defeats, however, Lee’s military
daring and his disciplined personal character became central symbols of the
Confederate cause for many in the South. Even as his army dwindled in size and
effectiveness during the last year of the war, Confederate civilians cont inued to
believ e that the cause could be won because Lee remained in the field.
After the surrender of his army to General U. S. Grant in April 1865, Lee moved
to Lexington, Virginia, where he became president of w hat would later be called
Washington and Lee University. Lee died on October 12, 1870.
—Paul E. Teed
Further Reading
Freeman, Douglas S. Lee. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1991.
Gallagher, Gary W. The Confederate War: How Popular Will, Nationalism and Military
Strategy Could Not Stave Off Defeat. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997.
428 Harpers Fer ry Raid (1859)
Marrin, Albert. Virginia’s General: Robert E. Lee and the Civil War.NewYork:
Atheneum, 1994.
Nolan, Alan T. Le e Consi dered: G enera l Robert E. Lee and Civi l War His tory. Chapel
Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1991.
“Secret Six”
The six men who supported John Brown’s plan to raid the Harpers Ferry Armory
were all reformers and intellectuals who had considerable experience in the fight
against slavery. Two of them, Theodore Parker and Thomas Wentworth
Higgin son, were Unitarian ministers who preached to large, urban congregations
in Massachusetts. Parker was the older of the two, and he was one of America’s
most controversial religious and social reformers. Both Parker and Higginson were
militant opponents of the Fugitive Slave Act in Boston, even facing criminal pros-
ecution for their roles in the attempted rescue of the fugitive slave Anthony Burns
in 1854. Each of them met John Brown for the first time in early 1857, and they
had supported his antislavery work in Kansas.
Franklin Sanborn and George Luther Stearns were also products of eastern
Massachusetts society and culture. Sanborn was a young schoolteacher in Concord,
Massachusetts, where he met Ralph Waldo Emerson and other transcendentalists.
Idealistic and romantic, Sanborn was deeply interested in Brown’s exploits against
proslavery forces in Kansas, which he had read about in the press. In the process
of promoting Brown’s cause, Sanborn introduced him to George Luther Stearns, a
wealthy Massachusetts mill owner and businessman who had been drawn into the
antislavery movement after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. With an
income of some $20,000 a year at a time when most working people earned less than
$600, Stearns was in a position to do a great deal for Brown’s expedition.
The final two members of the group were Samuel Gridley Howe and Gerrit
Smith. Howe was a Bay State social reformer with a long history of support for
rev olutionary movements. As a young man, he had fought for six years in the Greek
War of Independence against the Ottoman Empire, and he had recei v ed a knighthood
for his services. Along with his wife Julia, Ho we had also done pioneering work on
the education of the blind. But of all the conspirators, Gerrit Smith was closest to
John Brown and had the most experience working with him. A wealthy upstate
New York landowner, Smith was an abolitionist and a founder of the Liberty Party,
an antislavery political organization. In 1848, John Brown had purchased a farm
from Smith in North Elba, New York, where the reformist landowner was building
a community of free black property owners. Brown and Smith shared a deep belief
Harpers Ferry Raid (1859) 429
that slavery was a violation of both divine law and the U.S. Constitution, and they
remained open to the use of violence to end it.
Despite their support for Brown, several of the consp irators were distraught
when newspaper reports and a Senate investigation exposed their involvement
in the failed raid. Gerrit Smith became so anxious about the possibility of arrest
and imprisonment that he was briefly committed to a state mental asylum in
Utica, New York. Howe and Stearns fled to Canada even before Brown’s trial
commenced. Sanborn joined them there after destroying all correspondence with
Brown that might be used in a criminal prosecution. Thomas Wentworth Higgin-
son resisted the temptation to flee and even considered the possibility of trying to
rescue Brown before his execution. Instead, Higginson ma d e good on Brown’s
legacy by taking up command of a black regiment during the Civil War. The last
of the secret six, Theodore Parker, had left the country many months before the
raid. Dying of tuberculosis, Parker vainly sought to regain his health in the
warmer climates of the Caribbean and southern Europe. In a lett er written only
a few days before Brown’s execution, however, Parker told a friend that “the
road to heaven is as short from the gallows as it is from the throne; perhaps, also,
as easy.”
—Paul E. Teed
Further Reading
Commager, Henry S., ed. Theodore Parker: An Anthology. Boston: Beacon Press, 1960.
Gura, Philip F. American Transcendentalism: A History. New York: Hill and Wang, 2007.
Oates, Stephen B. To Purge This Land with Blood: A Biography of John Brown. New York:
Harper and Row, 1970.
Renehan, Ed ward. The S ecret Six: The True Tale of the Men W ho Conspired with John
Brown. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1997.
Reynolds, David S. John Brown, Abolitionist. New York: Knopf, 2005.
Rossbach, Jeffrey. Ambivalent Conspirators: John Brown, the Secret Six and a Theory of
Slave Violence. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982.
Stauffer, John. The Black Hearts of Men: Radical Abolitionists and the Transformation of
Race. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002.
John Brown’s Last Speech to the Court and
Last Statement before Execution (1859)
On November 2, 1859, John Brown made the following statement before the court that con-
demned h im for mur der, treason, and incitement of slave rebell ion for his actions in the raid
on Harpers Ferry, Virginia, in October 1859. Also reproduced below is a final written statement
that Brown handed to his guards just before his execution on December 2, 1859.
430 Harpers Fer ry Raid (1859)
I have, may it please the court, a few words to say.
In the first place, I deny everything but what I have all along admitted, of a design on
my part to free the slaves. I intended, certainly, to have made a clean thing of that matter,
as I did last winter when I went into Missouri and there took slaves without the snapping
of a gun on either side, moved them through the country, and finally leaving them in Can-
ada. I designed to have done the same thing again, on a larger scale. That was all I
intended to do. I never did intend murder, or tre ason, or the destruction of property,
or to excite or incite the slaves to rebellion, or to make insurrection.
I have another objection, and that is that it is unjust that I should suffer such a penalty.
Had I interfered in the manner which I admit, and which I admit has been fairly proved—
for I admire the truthfulness and candor of the greatest portion of the witnesses who
have testified in this case—had I so interfered on behalf of the rich, the powerful, the
intelligent, the so-called great, or in behalf of any of their friends, either father, mother,
brother, sister, wife, or children, or any of that class, and suffered and sacrificed what I
have in this interference, it would have been all right; and every man in this court would
have deemed it an act worthy of reward rather than punishment.
This court acknowledges, too, as I suppose, the validity of the law of God. I see a book
kissed here which I suppose to be the Bible, or at least the New Testament, which teaches
me that all things whatsoever I would that men should do to me, I should do even so to
them. It teaches me, further, to remember them that are in bonds as bound with them. I
endeavored to act upon that instruction. I say I am yet too young to understand that
God is any respecter of persons. I believe that to have interfered as I have done—as I have
always freely admitted I have done—in behalf of His despised poor is not wrong but right.
Now, if it is deemed necessary that I should forfeit my life for the furtherance of the
ends of just ice and mingle my blood further with the blood of my children and with the
blood of millions in this slave country whose rights are disregarded by the wicked, cruel,
and unjust enactments—I say, let it be done!
Let me say one thing further.
I feel entirely satisfied with the treatment I have received on my trial. Considering all
the circumst ances, it has been more ge nerous that I e xpected. But I feel no conscious-
ness of guilt. I have stated from the first what was my intention and what was not. I never
had any design against the liberty of any person, nor any disposition to commit treason,
or excite slaves to rebel, or make any general insurrection. I never encouraged any
man to do so but always discouraged any idea of that kind.
Let me say, also, in regard to the statements made by some of those who were con-
nected with me. I fear it has been stated by some of them that I have induced them to join
me. But the contrary is true. I do not say this to injure them but as regretting their weak-
ness. Not one but joined me of his own accord, and the greater part at their own
expense. A number of them I never saw and never had a word of conversation with till
the day they came to me; that was for the purpose I have stated.
Now, I am done.
Source: Testimonies of Capt. John Brown, at Harpers Ferry, with his Address to the Court, Anti-
Slavery Tracts, No. 7 (New York: American Anti-Slavery Society, 1860), 15–16.
Harpers Ferry Raid (1859) 431
Charlestown, Va., 2d December, 1859
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: vainly flattered myself that without
very much bloodshed; it might be done.
Source: Ruchames, L. John Brown: The Making of a Revolutionary. New York: Grosset &
Dunlap, 1969, p. 126.
Southern Editorial Responses to John Brown’s Raid on
Harpers Ferry, Virginia (1859)
In October 1859, the radical abolitionist John Brown led a group of black and white supporters in
a raid on the federal arsenal in the town of Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia). Brown
planne d to u se the weapons stored there to initiate a slave rebellion across the South. Brown
captured several buildings, b ut he and his men were quickly pinned down in the engine house
by the local militia as sisted by armed townsmen. Two days later, federal troops under Colonel
Robert E. Lee stormed the engine house, capturing Brown and killing most of his supporters.
Brown was convicted of treason and hanged on December 2, 1859. Reproduced here are edito-
rials from several southern newspapers reacting to the raid.
Our despatc hes t his morning give us some particulars of a serious outbreak among the
employees o n the government works at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia, in which the negros,
led on by some infuriated abolitionists, have been forced to co-operate. The trains were
stopped and telegraphic wires cut, and, as the despatch informs us, the whole town was
in possession of the insurgents. It will be seen, however, that the most active means have
been put into execution to quell the disturbance; that several companies of artillery and
infantry have proceeded to the scene, and, no doubt, before this reaches the eye of our
readers, perfect quiet has been again establishe d. We regret, however , that our tele-
graphic agent closed his reports so early, as it would h ave been exceedingly gratifying
to learn that the miserable leaders of this unfortunate and disgraceful affair had received
their just deserts.
Source: Mercury (Charleston, SC), October 18, 1859
The telegraphic despatches in another column, concerning the outbreak at Harper’s
Ferry, are stirring eno ugh for ordinary purposes. We believe the affair, however, to be
greatly exaggerated, as such occurrences usually are. There is at least no cause for
uneasiness elsewhere in the State, notwithstanding the reports concerning the complic-
ity of the negroes in the business.—Indeed, we rather incline to the belief that the entire
report of the affair is pretty much of a humbug. That there is something of a riot there,
on the part of a few of the operatives, we have no doubt; but the object of the rebels
is to take possession of the public funds which were deposited there on Saturday.
432 Harpers Fer ry Raid (1859)
Our goodly city was in a state of the liveliest excitement all yesterday even ing. The
military, particularly, were in great commotion. The Governor, we learn, has ordered
the whole volunteer Regim ent to the scene of disturbance. Company “F,” under com-
mand of Col. Cary left at 8 o’clock last night—the Fredricksburg mail train having been
detained for their accommodation. The remainder of the Regimen t, consising of six or
seven companies, will le ave at 6 o’clock this morning. The Governor accompanied Col.
Cary’s company last night—and we slightly incline to the opinion that Harper’s Ferry will
be captured, and the rebels put down, especially as the military from the surrounding
country and Old Point, Baltimore Washington, and Alexa ndria, have been ordered to
the scene of action. We think these are almost enough to put an end to the “war” during
the course of the week—provided all hands stand firm, as they no doubt will, with some
exceptions.
The “soldiers” took leave of t heir wives and little ones last night amid such weeping
and wailing, not expecting ever to see them more! It was a heart-rending scene, to be
sure. We endeavored to procure a lock of the hair of several of the “soldiers,” as a
memento of them, in case they should fight, bleed and die in the service of their country;
but they were too much afflicted by the parting scene to pay any attention to our
request. We expect to see half of the “soldiers” back at least. —But good fortune to
them all.
Source: Whig (Richmond, VA), October 18, 1859.
We publish to-day full telegraphic particulars of the riot at Harper’s Ferry, a briefer out-
line of which had heretofore appeared in our columns. The first report attributed the
riot to the fact that a contractor on the Government works had absconded, leaving his
employees unpaid, who had seized the arsenal with the purpose of securing Government
funds and paying themselves. Later accounts seem conclusive that it was a concerted
attempt at insurrection, aided by leading Northern Abolitionists. The papers of Brown,
the leader, are said to have fallen into the hands of Gov. Wise, and to i nclude among
them letters from Gerrit Smith, Fred Douglass and others. We shall hear more in a
few days, when, no doubt, the whole plot will be disclosed.
In the mean time, the facts already before us show that Abolitionism is working out its
legitimate results, in encouraging fanatics to riot and revolution. The “harmless
republicanism” out of which there is se rious talk e ven here of making a national party,
to defeat the Democracy, fosters and sustains, and is formidable only from t he zeal of,
the class within its rank s who incited this insurrection. Of the capacity of the South to
defend and protect herself, we have no doubt. But when called on to do this, as at Harp-
er’s Ferry, she must know who are her friends and who are her enemies. She can have no
political association with men who are only watching a safe opportunity to cut the
throats of her citizens. It will not do for Northern Republicans to attribute this outbreak
to the fanaticism of a few zealots. The Republican party of the North is responsible for it.
It is the legitimate result of Sewardism. It is the commencement of what Seward spoke of
as the “irrepressible conflict.” The South will hold the whole party of Republicans
Harpers Ferry Raid (1859) 433
responsible for the blood-sh ed at Harper’s Ferry. For the fanatics engaged there would
never have dared the attempt at insurrection but for the inflamm atory speeches a nd
writings of Seward, Greeley, and the other Republican leaders. Waiting for the details
before saying more, we refe r the reader to the accounts of the insurrection published
in another place in this paper.
Source: Union and American (Nashville, TN), October 21, 1859.
434 Harpers Fer ry Raid (1859)
New York Draft Riots (1863)
The largest and deadliest city riots in American history took place in New York on
July 13–16, 1863. There was widespread opposition to the institution of the first
draft in American history, and draft riots irrupted all over the Union, but none of
the riots were as violent or as deadly as the ones in New York. Operating mostly
unchecked, rioters first attacked a draft office and then turned their rage on author-
ity figures, the wealthy, and the African Americans in t he city. On major lasting
effect of the r iots was the pushing of African Americans to the edges of the city
and, consequently, the future cr eation of large African American ghettos.
Although authorities never declared martial law, the riots did not cease until a
large number of troops were called in to restore order. Th e riots also had long-
term effects on American conscription policy.
Throughout most of the American Civil War (1861–1865), President Abraham
Lincoln s truggled with the difficulties of raising enough troops to r un the war.
States failed to meet their assigned quotas of volunteers, so to make up the differ-
ence, Lincoln felt constrained to enforce a draft under the powers he believed were
granted to him by the Militia Act of July 17, 1862. Critics questioned the legality
of Lincoln’s actions. So, in a show of support for the president, on March 3, 1863,
the U.S. Congress passed the fi rst national conscription l aw in the country’s his-
tory, which mandated all males between the ages of 20 and 45 eligible to be
drafted into military service. However, Congress was well aware of the popular
antagonism that existed regarding the draft, which many felt violated the principal
of freedom on which the country was founded, so certain compromises were made
and provisions were included to soften the blow. For example, a prospective
draftee could avoid serving by buying a substitute or paying a $300 commutation
fee. Commut ation fees were then used to pay bonuses to volunteers to encourage
voluntary enlistment. However, by 1864, the need for troops and popular protests
forced the U.S. Congress to repeal commutation.
The Emancipation Proclamation (January 1, 1863) freed the slaves in the rebel-
ling states as a military necessity. The Procla mation was intended to weaken the
South by liberating the Confederate Army’s support system. However, many crit-
ics felt that the Proclamation went too far, because it entirely changed the charac-
ter of the war from a war to save the Union to a war against human bondage.
Editorials charged that soldiers would be willing to fight and die to preserve the
435