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1882–84. Medium. Oil on canvas. Dimensions. 196.5 cm × 168.3 cm (77.4 in × 66.3 in) Location. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City. The Last Moments of John Brown is a late 19th-century painting by Irish-American artist Thomas Hovenden. Done in oil on canvas, the painting depicts American abolitionist John Brown being led to his execution.
- 196.5 cm × 168.3 cm (77.4 in × 66.3 in)
- Thomas Hovenden
- 1882–84
The Last Moments of John Brown. Thomas Hovenden American, born Ireland. 1882–84. On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 762. In 1859 John Brown, the controversial abolitionist, led a raid on a federal armory in Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia), intending to arm enslaved African Americans. Brown had come to believe that the only ...
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e. John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry [nb 1] was an effort by abolitionist John Brown, from October 16 to 18, 1859, to initiate a slave revolt in Southern states by taking over the United States arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (since 1863, West Virginia ). It has been called the dress rehearsal for, or tragic prelude to, the American Civil War.
- October 16–18, 1859
- Government victory
- Overview
- Who was John Brown?
- The growing sectional divide of the 1850s
- The raid at Harpers Ferry
- John Brown in American memory
- Additional resources:
by Dr. Kimberly Kuntz Elliott
“I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood.”
Martyr. Murderer. Prophet. Madman. All of these words have been used to describe John Brown, the fiery abolitionist who led violent attacks against supporters of slavery in the years before the U.S. Civil War. A white man born into a deeply religious family of Connecticut
in 1800, Brown dedicated his life to a holy war against slavery. He scorned the tactic of
then in vogue among northern abolitionists, believing that only armed uprising could counter the evil of slavery. In 1859, he and a group of followers attempted to seize the
, Virginia (now West Virginia) and distribute weapons to enslaved people so they could rise up against slaveholders. The plan failed and Brown was captured, tried, and executed amidst a media frenzy.
From some perspectives, Brown could be considered a failure: his plan to bring about a massive uprising of enslaved people never came to fruition, and he was hanged for treason years before the Thirteenth Amendment outlawed slavery. But from other perspectives, Brown succeeded beyond his wildest dreams: his execution elevated him to the level of an abolitionist martyr, garnering sympathy for the cause he was willing to die for. His actions contributed to such paranoia among slaveholders about the future of slavery in the United States that
when anti-slavery candidate Abraham Lincoln was elected president, putting in motion the events that ultimately would lead to slavery’s downfall.
In the first half of the 19th century, the U.S. government worked to maintain the balance of political power between free and slave states by ensuring that their numbers remained equal. But, as the country expanded west to territories across the Mississippi River, with American settlers displacing the Indigenous inhabitants and forming new states, that balance began to falter. Several events in the 1850s contributed to a growing belief among anti-slavery activists that the “Slave Power,” as they called it, had gained control of the U.S. government: the introduction of a brutal Fugitive Slave Law (1850) required northern citizens to assist in the capture of enslaved people who had escaped; the Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854) repealed an earlier ban on slavery in new territories north of the
line; and the Supreme Court decision in Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857) ruled that Black Americans were not U.S. citizens.
John Brown first became a nationally known figure in 1856 through his actions in the Kansas Territory, three years before the raid on Harpers Ferry. Kansas was then the site of a territorial civil war known as Bleeding Kansas, the result of the Kansas-Nebraska Act’s provision allowing the residents of the territory to vote on whether to allow slavery. Pro- and anti-slavery settlers attempting to sway the vote flooded the region, and quickly came to blows. Among the ranks of “Free-Staters” were John Brown and five of his sons, who had come to Kansas to take up arms in defense of abolition.
In May 1856, Brown led his sons and three other men in what came to be known as the Pottawatomie Massacre, a three-day rampage during which they murdered five members of the pro-slavery territorial district court in front of their families, hacking them to death with broadswords. Brown was enraged by two recent attacks on abolitionists by pro-slavery forces—the violent attack on the town of Lawrence, Kansas, then an abolitionist center, and the caning of abolitionist Charles Sumner on the Senate floor.The Pottawatomie Massacre escalated the violence in Kansas to a fever pitch, drawing federal troops to the territory. Brown and his allies engaged in battle with pro-slavery forces throughout the summer of 1856, becoming a ruthless leader whom southern slaveholders feared and northern abolitionists admired.
Although he was under indictment for the Pottawatomie murders, Brown managed to evade capture and make his way to the northeast, where he was received enthusiastically by abolitionists. Brown had long cherished the idea of leading a large-scale rebellion of enslaved people, like the
or
, and he spent several years traveling through New England and Canada, raising money, gathering weapons, and preparing for battle.
Brown eventually determined that he would lead a team of men to the federal armory at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, distributing its weapons as he marched south to liberate enslaved Black people from
. Harpers Ferry was a strategic location not only because of its firearms cache but also for its position as a major rail and river junction (railroads and rivers were then the easiest ways to transport people and goods long distances). Brown believed that he would grow an ever larger army as the freed people joined him. He consulted with notable Black abolitionists about his plan, including
—who counseled him against the action—and
Although abolitionists praised Brown, many Republican politicians—including Abraham Lincoln—sought to distance themselves from him. [2] But once the Civil War was underway, Brown’s courageous fight against slavery took on new resonance. The song “John Brown’s Body,” a Civil War marching song, provided the inspiration for “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.”
Brown’s complex legacy has been viewed in different lights in the century and a half since his death. Frederick Douglass, who had to flee to England to escape possible retribution for his knowledge of Brown’s plans, later gave a speech praising him, saying that “If John Brown did not end the war that ended slavery, he did at least begin the war that ended slavery.” [3] During the
era, when mainstream American memory of the Civil War downplayed the importance of emancipation, many white historians portrayed Brown as a zealot and a madman, although Black intellectuals and artists, like
and Jacob Lawrence, portrayed him sympathetically. Controversy over John Brown’s actions, and whether it’s acceptable to use violence to challenge social injustice, remains with us today.
Notes:
1.Quoted in R. Blakeslee Gilpin, John Brown Still Lives!: America’s Long Reckoning with Violence, Equality, & Change (UNC Press, 2011), 154.
Through his dedication to John Brown and similar consideration of historical topics- Toussant L’Ouverture in 1937, Harriet Tubman in 1938/39, Frederick Douglass in 1939/40, and the Migration of the Negro in 1941 -- Lawrence received acknowledgement as an important artist with a strong voice when he was just a young man.
Faced with charges of murder, conspiring with enslaved people to rebel and treason against the state of Virginia, John Brown's trial began October 27 and lasted just five days. Jurors took only 45 minuts to reach a decision — guilty of all charges. On November 2 Brown was sentenced to hang on the gallows.
Brown and son awaiting examination, Harper's Weekly, November 5, 1859 Gov. Wise and others examining the prisoners, Leslie's , October 29, 1859 Guard room with wounded prisoners,
