Ohio History Journal
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Comments, Notes and Reviews. 375
Mr. Sherman was one of the first members of the Ohio State Archaeo- logical and Historical Society, and for some years took a personal in- terest in its proceedings. For ten years past, and at the time of his death, he was one of the trustees.
JOHN BROWN-A REVIEW. In American history there are few, if any characters, the story of whose life is so erratic, dramatic or so tragic, as that of John Brown. As |
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he spent his youth and many years of his manhood as a resident of Ohio (see account of the Hudson Centennial in the previous pages of this Quarterly) he is a proper subject for our consideration. His life has recently been written and published by William Elsey Connelley, a life member of the Ohio Archaeological and Historical Society, the author of several valuable historical works, now a resi- dent of Topeka, Kansas, where he improved un- usual facilities for obtaining accurate knowledge concerning the career of John Brown in that state. Indeed, the work of Mr. Connelley deals mostly with the Kansas portion of Brown's efforts in behalf of freedom for the slaves. The author rather slight- |
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ingly passes over the youth and formative period of John Brown, but does ampler justice to the latter part of his life. John Brown was the direct de- scendant of Peter Brown, an English Puritan, and one of the Pilgrim fathers, in the Mayflower, who landed on Plymouth Rock, December 22, 1620. Owen Brown, father of the famous John, was a Revolu- tionary hero, a tanner and a shoemaker, and lived at Torrington, Con- necticut, where John was born, May 9, 1800. In the year 1805 the family moved to Hudson, Ohio. Owen Brown was an ardent aboli- tionist, and religiously encouraged similar sentiments in the minds of his children. John was taught from earliest childhood to "fear God and keep his commandments." He received no more education than fell to the lot of the average boy on the pioneer man's frontier, where schools were few and necessarily inferior. He had an exceptionally studious and reflective disposition. He read such books as came within his reach. They were mainly "AEsop's Fables," "Life of Franklin," "Pilgrim's Pro- gress," "Plutarch Lives," "Life of Oliver Cromwell," "Baxter's Saint's Rest," Dr. Watts' Hymns, and above all and constantly the Bible. He learned little at school but something of mathematics and the principles of surveying. He never became much of a scholar. Thoreau has quaintly said of him, "He did not go to Harvard. He was not fed on the pap that is there furnished. As he phrased it, 'I know no more grammar than one of your calves,' but he went to the University of the West, |
376 Ohio Arch. and His. Society Publications.
where he studied the science of liberty;
and, having taken his degree,
he finally commenced the public practice
of humanity in Kansas. Such
were his humanities--he would have left
a Greek accent slanting the
wrong way and righted up a falling
man." He swore eternal enmity to
slavery. About 1837 he assembled his
household and devoutly laid be-
fore them the burden of his heart. The
time for action had come.
Henceforth he was to enlist in the war
for freedom. His first soldiers
were to be, like the converts of
Mahomet, members of his own family.
Three of his sons, then old enough,
consecrated themselves to this work
by prayer. In this service the father
was seen for the first time to
kneel in supplication, his uniform
attitude previously having been that
of "standing with reverence before
the throne." We can not follow in
detail the incidents of Brown's life as
narrated by Mr. Connelley. He
moved many times from Ohio to the East
and back, and was engaged
in many vocations. He was not a success
in business enterprises. He
failed several times, often at the
expense of his friends. His honesty
of purpose and integrity of conduct were
not questioned. In 1840 he
was residing at Hudson, Ohio, and
engaged in the wool business. In
1842 he moved to Richfield, where he was
involved in transactions with
Heman Oviatt (see Hudson Centennial,
ante). Mr. Oviatt and others
became his sureties and were obliged to
pay many thousand dollars in
his behalf. This led to a law suit,
which is fully reported in Oviatt
v. Brown, 14 Ohio, 286. Yet Mr. Oviatt,
grandfather of the writer of
this incident, wrote subsequently,
"from boyhood I have known him
(John Brown), I have known him through
manhood; and through life
he has been distinguished for his
truthfulness and integrity; he has
ever been esteemed, by those who have
known him, as a very conscien-
tious man."
In 1844 John Brown moved to Akron, Ohio;
in 1846 he went to
Springfield, Massachusetts. He then made
a tour through Europe, in
which he particularly studied the battle
fields of Napoleon. In 1849 he
moved to North Elba, Essex county, New
York. It was about this
time that Gerritt Smith offered to
colored settlers his wild lands in that
district of the Adirondack wilderness.
Many accepted his offer. John
Brown offered to live with them and aid
them. It is well known this
experiment was a failure on the part of
the negroes, though through
no fault of John Brown's. Then came May
25, 1854, the passage by
Congress of the bill providing for the
organization of the Kansas and
Nebraska territories and the repeal of
the Missouri compromise (1820).
The existence of slavery was left to the
decision of the people of the
state when admitted. Emigrants from
Arkansas and Missouri imme-
diately began to move into Kansas to
hold the state for the pro-slavery
party. On the other hand the
Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Society sent
out colonies to keep slavery out of the
state. The "Kansas struggle"
then began. All the details of this
political discussion and warlike dis-
turbance are fully told by Mr.
Connelley, and this portion of his book
Comments, Notes and Reviews. 377
is a well digested resume of that
important period. In 1854 the four
eldest sons of John Brown, named John,
Jr., Jason, Owen and Fred-
erick, all children by his first wife,
then living in Ohio, determined to
move to Kansas. The removal, with two
other sons and a son-in-law,
was completed in 1855. The family
settled near the Pottawattomie,
a little stream in southern Kansas, in
Lykins county, about eight miles
distant from the site of Ossawattomie,
which the deeds of his family, as
Redpath says, subsequently converted
into "classic ground." We can not
dwell upon the exciting scenes that
occurred in "Bleeding Kansas." Brown
and his brave boys did not shrink from
the conflict. In 1857 Brown,
carrying with him the memory of his son
Frederick, murdered at Ossa-
wattomie, returned to his home at Elba.
But he immediately began a
crusade throughout New England in behalf
of abolition, and in prep--
aration for his contemplated
insurrection at Harper's Ferry. This pro-
ject was put in operation in the summer
of 1859, which he spent in mov-
ing the arms and other articles from
Ohio and various points to the
vicinity of Harper's Ferry. Early in
July he located with his little force,
in disguise as farmers, upon the farm of
Dr. Booth Kennedy, some five
miles from Harper's Ferry, on the
Maryland side of the Potomac. The
little band at the Kennedy farm grew
slowly, until it finally consisted
of twenty-three, three of whom were his
sons. They had adopted (earlier
in the year in Chatham, Canada) a
provisional government with a con-
stitution. In compliance with this
pretentious organization Captain John
Brown was made commander-in-chief; John
Henry Kagi, secretary of
war; Richard Realf, secretary of state,
and Owen Brown, treasurer.
This government was to be proclaimed
throughout the country round
about, with the idea that accessions
would swarm to it from the slaves
and freedom sympathizers. A guerilla
warfare was to be waged against
the slave owners; slaves were to be
liberated, armed and turned against
their masters, etc. On Sunday, October
16 (1859) the little band, under
cover of evening darkness, proceeded to
Harper's Ferry, and during the
night took possession of the armory by
forcing the door and overcoming
the watchman. By one o'clock on the
morning of the 17th, Brown had
complete possession of Harper's Ferry,
and all the arms of the Federal
government, then at that place. The
subsequent events are well known
history; how Colonel Robert E. Lee, of
the U. S. army, was sent from
Washington to suppress the invaders; how
the door was forced, and
Brown overcome with saber cuts and
bayonet thrusts; his son Watson
wounded and his son Oliver killed. Then
followed the tragic and far-
cical trial at Charlestown, seat of
Jefferson county, Virginia (now West
Virginia), and the final scene at the
scaffold, December 2, 1859. The
north stood aghast. The slave power with
malignant brutality had
crushed John Brown and his movement, but
they had stirred the North
and aroused the slumbering sentiment
that burst forth in the flames of
Civil War. Mrs. D. A. Randall, daughter
of Heman Oviatt, the mother
of the writer of this review, was
throughout life an intimate personal
378 Ohio Arch. and His. Society Publications.
friend and ardent admirer of and deep
sympathizer with John Brown.
He wrote her a letter the night before
his execution, expressing his
appreciation of her long friendship and
his perfect resignation to his
fate. Well do we remember, though at
that time but a child of eight,
how on the morning of December 2, after
the breakfast meal, that
mother at the morning invocation, broke
forth in a fervent prayer that
Divine Providence would sustain John
Brown in the ordeal through
which, in a few hours he was to pass,
and bless the cause for which he
was to die. Thousands of such petitions
ascended throughout the land.
John Brown's execution was a triumphant
apotheosis. He suffered
death upon the scaffold. It was an
unparalleled exhibition of consecrated
heroism in behalf of the cause of
freedom. His soul went marching on
and led the armies of liberty and
humanity to the sublimest victory
the world has ever witnessed.
John Brown is one of the great
characters of history. He had a
prophetic soul, the fortitude and faith
of the Christian martyrs. His
life and deeds will shine brighter and
brighter throughout the ages. The
story of his life, with all its
undercurrents and its subtle influences and
tendencies, has not yet been told. Mr.
Von Hoist has touched upon
the philisophy of his life. Mr. Sanborn
has thrown much light upon
the events of his career. Mr. Redpath
has concisely related the main
facts. But the proper historian of John
Brown has not yet appeared, per-
haps he is not yet born. Mr. Connelley's
book admirably accomplishes
the purpose for which it was put forth.
It should be read by all students
of John Brown. It is published by Crane
& Co., Topeka, Kansas.
BURKE AARON HINSDALE.
Burke Aaron Hinsdale, born at Wadsworth,
Ohio, March 31, 1837,
died at Atlanta, Georgia, November 29,
1900. His ancestors were New
England Puritans. His parents came from
Connecticut to the Western
Reserve in 1812. Burke was raised upon
the farm. He had an irre-
sistible desire for scholarship. At the
age of sixteen he made his way
to Hiram Hill, where the Western Reserve
Eclectic Institute (afterwards
Hiram College) had been opened three
years before. For thirty years,
as student and professor, Mr. Hinsdale
was identified with this insti-
tution. Young Garfield was a fellow
student, and there sprang up be-
tween them a firm and sympathetic
friendship, broken only by the tragic
death of Garfield. Professor Hinsdale
was a close and accurate scholar.
Possessed of a remarkable memory and an
omniverous reader, he be-
came a man of most extensive and useful
information. He was a
natural educator. He became President of
Hiram College (1870), was
ordained to the Christian ministery. For
years associate editor of the
Christian Standard. His capacity for
work and powers of endurance,
almost incredible. He lectured,
preached, edited, talked and wrote books