John Brown: Murderer or Martyr?
John Brown was a white abolitionist from Torrington, Connecticut. Brown was born into a very religious home in 1800. His father, who was antislavery, molded his son's view on slavery. Brown could be viewed as both a murderer or a martyr because there is compelling evidence for both.
It wasn't until 1855 that Brown become a significant player in the antislavery movement. Brown followed five of his sons to Kansas where he became the leader of an antislavery guerrilla group. He then fought a proslavery attack on Lawrence, Kansas, an antislavery town. In 1856, Brown led another attack on a proslavery town and killed five of its settlers.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p1550.html
John Brown wanted to discreetly invade the South with his followers and establish a black free state as a sanctuary. Brown believed that armed insurrection would be the only way to overthrow slavery in the United States. So thinking that his beliefs would hold true, he planned to arm the slaves with weapons from which he and his followers seized from the federal arsenal in Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Brown had 5 blacks and 16 whites to help him raid the federal arsenal. Brown's plan did not work out because of local farmers, militiamen, and Marines who were led by Robert E. Lee. Within a day and a half of the battle Brown's followers were either captured or killed.
During the raid Brown was severely wounded and captured. Brown was taken to Charlestown, Virginia where he was put on trial. After the seven day trial Brown was found guilty by jury on three counts; treason, murder, and conspiracy to lead a slave rebellion. On December 2, 1859 hours before he was sentenced to hang he wrote this.
"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."
Many thought John Brown's actions were inappropriate and unconstitutional but others thought of him as a hero who started the war that ended slavery. Frederick Douglass said this about Brown, "If John Brown did not end the war that ended slavery, he did at least begin the war that ended slavery…. Until this blow was struck, the propect for freedom was dim, shadowy and uncertain. The irrepressible conflict was one of words, votes and compromises. When John Brown stretched forth his arm the sky was cleared. The time for compromises was gone – the armed hosts of freedom stood face to face over the chasm of a broken Union – and the clash of arms was at hand. The South staked all upon getting possession of the Federal Government, and failing to do that, drew the sword of rebellion and thus made her own, and not Brown's, the lost cause of the century."
This picture, called "The Last Moments of John Brown", portrays Brown as a martyr sacrificing himself for the slaves.
James Brewer Stewart, a historian, calls Brown a, "Christian sacrificial lamb on the alter of slavery." As seen in this video... http://video.pbs.org/viralplayer/2298116411/
Meanwhile others detested Brown and his doings. In this painting called "The Tragic Prelude" Brown is depicted larger than life with a crazy look on his face.
In one hand he is holding a Bible and in the other he is holding a gun. There are two /people, presumably one white and one a slave, cowering at his feet. This painting is showing that Brown is crazy and that everyone is afraid of him. This painting could be looked at as a form of patriotism.
