Raid On The Town John Brown Analysis

It is done! On December 2, 1859, John Brown was hung for his crimes of treason and murder. The raid on Harpers Ferry did not have quite the results he was looking for. The reaction spoke load words in the North and the South. Some of his speech he gave prior to his sentencing basically said “what I did was trying to free slaves, nothing any man in this court would deem worth reward, not punishment . . . now it is deemed necessary that I should forfeit my life furtherance of the ends of justice. . . I say let it be done”.1 Theodore Parker was moved by Brown’s words saying “not only a martyr . . . but a saint” and they inspired Ralph Waldo Emerson to prophesy “make the gallows as glorious as the cross”2
Northerner’s called him the second Christ, which brown compared himself to, there was church bells ringing, ministers preached, and people bowed their heads in silent the day he was hung.3 I think the raid on Harper’s Ferry, led by Brown, started the war in motion, but his words and views were praised in the North, but added fire to the South. The South was up in arms of the whole situation. The day after the funeral, Jefferson Davis of Mississippi, gave a speech on the Senate floor, saying “if we would allow him to take our niggers off without a fuss about it, he would not kill anybody”. The feelings in the South were not just about

Beauregard called for the “execution of abolition prisoners” after the 1st of January. Davis, on January 12th 1863 pronounced the Proclamation “the most execrable measure in the history of guilty men”. He wanted to turn captures of to the states for their punishment as “criminals engaged in inciting servile insurrections” Second thoughts came about and most of the prisoners were “dealt with red-handed on the field or immediately thereafter. May 30 1863, Confederate congress were in favor of a trial, but thought it should be handled in military