John Brown – The Life of …
By
John C Abercrombie
We have heard of John Brown and the raid on Harper’s Ferry, but do we really know the man John Brown?
Do we know what his motives?
Do we know what he contributed to the freedom that many of us enjoy today?
John Brown was an abolitionist and did not believe in non-violence. How did he reach this point in his life?
John Brown was the 4th of 8 children born to Owen Brown and Ruth Mills. John was born May 9th, 1800 in Torrington, Connecticut. The family tree can be traced back to 17th century English Puritans.
The family moved to Hudson, Ohio where his father opened a tannery in 1805. Hudson was very involved in the anti-slavery movement and was a center of activity and debate. John’s father Owen was active and offered his home as a safe house for the Underground railroad. Keep in mind that the Fugitive Slave Laws made it a crime to offer sanctuary to Blacks seeking freedom.
At the age of 12, John Brown saw a Black boy being beaten with a shovel. This picture haunted him the rest of his life and helped him form his own fight against slavery.
Slaves were treated worse than animals. Imagine beating a horse with a shovel. Slaves were considered less than human and often viewed only as revenue producing machines and profit centers.
There was no high school in Hudson, so John studied at the school of abolitionist Elizur Wright father of Elizur Wright in Tallmadge.
Elizur Wright was a mathematician and abolitionist described as the father of life insurance and campaigned that life insurance companies keep reserves and provide surrender values.
Owen Brown was one of he founders of the school in Hudson, the Western Reserve College and Preparatory school. The school became involved in the issue of slavery and eventually was torn apart over the issue.
John Brown’s religion is documented in the papers of Rev Clarence Gee, an expert on the brown family. The papers are held in the Hudson, Ohio Library and Historical Society.
John Brown wanted to become a Congregational minister and left the family and enrolled in a preparatory program. Suffering from eye inflammations, he was forced to leave.
Returning to Ohio, he worked briefly in his father’s tannery before opening his own tannery. In 1820, he married Dianthe Lusk. In 1825 he moved the family to New Richmond, Pennsylvania seeking a safer location for fugitive slaves.
He bought 200 acres which he cleared and built a house and tannery which held a secret room to hide escaping slaves. It is estimated that Brown aided 2,500 slaves.
In 1837, at the news of the murder of Elijah Lovejoy, a Presbyterian minister, journalist, newspaper editor and abolitionist, shot and killed by a pro-slavery mob in Alton, Illinois attacking a warehouse where Lovejoy’s press and abolitionist materials were stored. Brown vowed in public “Here, before God, in the presence of these witnesses, from this time, I consecrate my life to the destruction of slavery!”.
Brown met Frederick Douglass the famed orator and abolitionist in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1847. He also met Sojourner Truth.
In 1849, Brown settled in North Elba, New York a Black community created on land provided by Gerrit Smith a philanthropist.
Gerrit Smith was a social reformer, abolitionist, politician and philanthropist who ran for President of the United States 3 times. In Congress he belonged to the Free-Soil Party.
Smith spent a great deal of money working on social progress, making substantial donations to create Timbuctoo, a Black community in North Elba, New York.
He was a member of the Secret Six as discussed in the book section below.
Timbuctoo, located near Lake Placid, New York was the place John Brown moved to. Timbucktoo is named after Timbuktu, a center of learning in the 13th century under Askia Mohammad I’s rule is in the Mali Empire on the continent of Africa.
Work continues today on cataloging the scholarly legacy of Timbuktu’s many manuscripts. The Africans of Timbuktu considered literacy and books symbols of wealth, power and blessings. Books were the primary concern of scholars.
The early Greeks acknowledge obtaining their education in Timbuktu.
In 1850, the United States passed the Fugitive Slave Act, requiring authorities even in free states to aid in the return of escaped slave and imposing penalties on anyone who helped them escape.
Brown started an organization to aid in their escape. Brown founded a militant group, The League of Gileadites, based on the place in the bible where only the bravest Israelites gathered to face the invading enemy.
Brown is quoted “Nothing so charms the American people as personal bravery…”. After forming the League of Gileadites, no one was ever taken back into slavery from the town.
The John Brown Tannery site is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
This post focus on the life of John Brown. Brown is most widely known for the Raid on Harpers Ferry, the subject of the next post, coming next week.
The 3rd post will feature an overlooked part of history that will surely surprise you. An unlikely alliance with John Brown and history that is overlooked. We will also focus on how history has suffered from this oversight. Stay tuned.
The raid on Harpers Ferry played an instrumental role in the start of the Civil War.
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Continue to scroll for fascinating Videos and Books to enhance your learning experience.
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John Brown’s Holy War: Terrorist or Heroic Revolutionary?
Professor Blight narrates the momentous events of 1857, 1858, and 1859. The lecture opens with an analysis of the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858. Next, Blight analyzes the Dred Scott decision and discusses what it meant for northerners–particularly African Americans–to live in “the land of the Dred Scott decision.” The lecture then shifts to John Brown. Professor Blight begins by discussing the way that John Brown has been remembered in art and literature, and then offers a summary of Brown’s life, closing with his raid on Harpers Ferry in October of 1859.
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Biographies and Memoirs
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The Secret Six: The True Tale of the Men Who Conspired with John Brown
Most Americans know that John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia — a raid he believed would ignite a bloody slave revolution — was one of the events that sparked the Civil War. But very few know the story of how Brown was covertly aided by a circle of prosperous and privileged Northeasterners who supplied him with money and weapons, and, before the raid, even hid him in their homes while authorities sought Brown on a murder charge. These men called themselves the Secret Six.
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The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights (2005)
The two most noted screen portrayals of Brown have both been given by actor Raymond Massey. The 1940 film Santa Fe Trail, starring Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland, depicted Brown completely unsympathetically as an out-and-out villainous madman, and Massey added to that impression by playing him with a constant, wild-eyed stare. The film gave the impression that it did not oppose African-American slavery, even to the point of having a black “mammy” character say, after an especially fierce battle, “Mr. Brown done promised us freedom, but… if this is freedom, I don’t want no part of it”. Massey portrayed Brown again in the little-known, low-budget Seven Angry Men, in which he was not only unquestionably the main character but was depicted and acted in a much more restrained, sympathetic way.[88]
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Bath and Shower
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The Secret Six: John Brown and the Abolitionist Movement
The Secret Six: John Brown and the Abolitionist Movement, including Notes, Bibliography, and Index, 375 pages. (First Edition, New York Times Book Co., 1979. Second Edition, The Foundation for American Education, 1987, as The Secret Six: The Fool as Martyr. Third Edition, Uncommon Books, Seattle, Wash., 1993, as The Secret Six: John Brown and the Abolitionist Movement.)
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The Legend of John Brown: Biography, History, Facts, Quotes
Abolitionist John Brown (May 9, 1800 – December 2, 1859) was a white American abolitionist who believed armed insurrection was the only way to overthrow the institution of slavery in the United States.
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The Zealot and the Emancipator: John Brown, Abraham Lincoln, and the Struggle for American Freedom
Gifted storyteller and bestselling historian H. W. Brands narrates the epic struggle over slavery as embodied by John Brown and Abraham Lincoln—two men moved to radically different acts to confront our nation’s gravest sin.
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Harpers Ferry and John Brown
This Outlook program focuses on Harpers Ferry, West Virginia (previously Virginia). The first section explores the birth and history of this pre-civil war, industrial town. The second section focuses on the abolitionist, John Brown, and his raid on the armory and town of Harpers Ferry. Produced by Bob Wilkinson, Cecelia Mason, and Larry Dowling.
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John Brown, Abolitionist: The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights
A cultural biography of John Brown, the controversial abolitionist who used violent tactics against slavery and single-handedly changed the course of American history. Reynolds brings to life the Puritan warrior who gripped slavery by the throat and triggered the Civil War. Reynolds demonstrates that Brown’s most violent acts—including his killing of proslavery settlers in Kansas and his historic raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia–were inspired by the slave revolts, guerilla warfare, and revolutionary Christianity of the day. He shows how Brown seized public attention, polarizing the nation and fueling the tensions that led to the Civil War. Reynolds recounts how Brown permeated American culture during the Civil War and beyond, and how he planted the seeds of the civil rights movement by making a pioneering demand for complete social and political equality for America’s ethnic minorities.
ABH – The Man Who Killed Slavery
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🇺🇸 1859 THE STORY OF JOHN BROWN: THE LIBERATOR OF SLAVES #LESTWEFORGET
Before his execution in 1895, John Brown wrote a series of prison letters that – along with his death itself – helped to cement the abolitionist aesthetic of emancipatory.
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Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War
A New York Times Notable Book for 2011 A Library Journal Top Ten Best Books of 2011 A Boston Globe Best Nonfiction Book of 2011 Late on the night of October 16, 1859, John Brown launched a surprise raid on the slaveholding South. Leading a biracial band of militant idealists, he seized the massive armory at Harpers Ferry, freed and armed slaves, and vowed to liberate every bondsman in America.
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🇺🇸 1859 THE STORY OF JOHN BROWN: THE LIBERATOR OF SLAVES #LESTWEFORGET
Before his execution in 1895, John Brown wrote a series of prison letters that – along with his death itself – helped to cement the abolitionist aesthetic of emancipatory.
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