… John Brown brought his men to Harpers Ferry, Virginia and commandeered the federal arsenal on the late evening of Sunday, October 16, 1859. Their purpose was to secure the guns at the arsenal to arm and free the slaves. He was captured in the engine house the morning of Tuesday, October 18, when a dozen U.S. Marines knocked down the door and captured or killed the raiders.
The raid itself was a failure, but Brown was able to captivate the nation as he was interviewed by many of the nation’s journalists.
By the time of his death by hanging on December 2 in Charles Town, he had become a martyr for the cause. Frederick Douglass said later “If John Brown did not end the war that ended slavery, he did at least begin the war that ended slavery.”
Now 150 years later in 2009 we commemorate the activities and events occurring in this immediate area that were key to the John Brown story. It is certainly appropriate in a year in which we celebrate the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln’s birth, the Centennial of the NAACP, and the Inauguration of our first African American President.
