“John Brown’s body lies a mould’ring in the grave, his soul goes marching on.” This is what Thomas Brigham Bishop said about John Brown after he was hanged for his abolitionist actions. John Brown was a Militant extremists abolitionist who is famous for his actions before the Civil War and being a godlike figure to people in the North. He helped in the Underground Railroad and was a boost morale for north. The background of John Brown is not known by many, but his raids and actions changed many people's thoughts on the war and thoughts on him. The life of John Brown. John Brown was born on May 9th, 1800 in Torrington Connecticut. John Brown spent most of his boyhood in Ohio. His family dislike slavery ever since he was born.(History.com, Childhood). …show more content…
The purpose of this raid was to get all of the Pro-Slavery families out of Kansas which would soon become known as Bleeding Kansas. John brown heard rumors about other abolitionist being attack due to Kansas becoming a free state or a slave state due to Stephen Douglas deciding to make an act where they do a popular sovereignty to decide if it will be a slave state or a free state. So Pro slavery families and anti slavery families were moving there to try and make slave or free. Due to this, John brown started raiding houses and killing the men of the families. So he started to raid Pro-Slavery family houses. At the Doyle home, the father James and his two sons William and Drury tried to runaway but got caught. They shot James, and then for the two sons they chopped them to death. At the house of Allen Wilkinson, John Brown ignored the winning of the children and the sick wife not to kill him. They took Mr.Wilkinson prisoner but soon cut his head off with a sword. At the final home which was William Sherman's, they killed him with their swords then threw his body into the creek. After these actions some thought of John Brown as a Christian warrior but some thought as him as a demented devil. He started to become known and would make his last raid where he gets caught and dies. …show more content…
John Brown did this raid to start a slave revolution to get slaves to revolt against their owners for them to try to get freedom. In October 1859, John brown led a small army of 18 which include some of his followers, freed blacks, and three of his sons. Him and his group headed down to Harper's ferry Virginia were the federal complex was. They marched right into it with little resistance from the army and seized it. He sent out patrols to get slaves to help them out ( They never got any). He had no escape plan or food for this attack. Brown collected a lot of hostages including the great grandnephew of George Washington. Local southerners and militias surrounded him and started exchanging fire. There were two casualties from the southerners and eight of Browns troops were shot and killed. One of the two people who died was a freed black man even though John Brown was trying to help them out. The upcoming General of the Confederacy Robert E. Lee, sent troops to arrest Brown and his remaining followers. He was tried for treason and was to be hanged on December 2, 1859. The Harper's ferry raid (slave rebellion) only lasted for thirty-six hours.The some people in the north thought of this as a madman act but other abolitionist and northerns recognized him for his zeal and courage to help make slaves free. But southerners thought of him as a Demented devil and still to this day people still hate him. (“