against John Brown's execution. "Think of a republic," he indignantly
exclaimed, "murdering a liberator!" and when the bloody deed was done
the illustrious Frenchman flung back the prophetic challenge: "The time
will come when your John Brown will be greater than your George
Washington."
Among Brown's men in the attack on Harper's Ferry there were two Quaker
brothers, Edwin and Barclay Coppock, stalwart young abolitionists from
Iowa, whose unfaltering devotion to the cause, heroic self-sacrifice and
tragic death constitute one of the most thrilling and inspiring chapters
in American history.
Edwin, the elder brother, was captured with his leader and shared his
fate on the gallows. Barclay made good his escape with Owen Brown, to be
killed later as a lieutenant, while recruiting a regiment for the war
which had then actually begun.
Edwin and Barclay Coppock were born of Quaker parents near Salem, Ohio,
Edwin on June 30, 1835, and Barclay on January 4, 1839, so that Edwin
was 24 and Barclay not quite 21 when the attack was made on Harper's
Ferry.
Salem was at that time the center of abolitionism in that section. It
was settled by Quakers and they were strongly anti-slavery in sentiment.
The headquarters of the "Western Anti-Slavery Society" was located here,
and here also was published the "Anti-Slavery Bugle," official organ of
the movement, of which Benjamin S. Jones, Oliver Johnson and Warren R.
Robertson were editors. They waged uncompromising warfare against
slavery, attacked the United States constitution as it was then being
interpreted, and denounced the churches that would not come out openly
in favor of abolition. They were called "Disunion Abolitionists,"
"Covenanters" and "Infidels." But nothing daunted, they demanded the
unconditional surrender of the slave power.
During one of the annual conventions held at the Hicksite Friends'
church in Salem and in the midst of a violent speech that was being
delivered against the encroachments of slavery on Northern soil under
the fugitive slave law, an excited man entered with a telegram in his
hand and announced breathlessly that the four o'clock train, due in
thirty minutes, had aboard of it a southern man and his wife and a
colored slave girl as a nurse. It was at once proposed that they proceed
to the depot in a body and meet the train on arrival. The meeting was
hastily adjourned. Intense enthusiasm prevailed. They marched to the
depot cheering as they went and when the train pulled in they boarded
it, took the slave girl without protest from her master and mistress and
marched back to the hall with her in triumph. The liberated girl was
christened Abby Kelly Salem, in honor of Abby Kelly Foster, one of the
speakers at the convention, and the city of Salem. The girl grew up to
splendid womanhood and was highly esteemed by all who knew her.
The old town hall, still standing, is where many an anti-slavery meeting
was held in that day. The most stirring and eloquent appeals were made
in this old meeting house by such noted abolitionists as William Lloyd
Garrison, Wendell Phillips, Susan B. Anthony, Parker Pillsbury, Horace
Mann, John Pierpont, Gerrit Smith, Fred Douglas, Lucretia Mott,
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Owen Lovejoy, Abby Kelly Foster, George Thompson
of England, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Robert Collyer, John P. Hale and many
others.
The walls of the old town hall resounded daily and nightly with the
patriotism and love of freedom of Quaker Salem.
It was in this atmosphere and under the influence of these impassioned
teachings that the Coppock brothers, sons of a nearby Quaker farmer,
grew up to young manhood. It had been ingrained into their very nature
that all men were created equal and that slavery was a crime against God
and man, and with this conviction they resolved to shoulder their
muskets and go out and fight to liberate the slaves.
The family moved to Iowa in the meantime and it was here that these
young Quaker enthusiasts first met John Brown, who was then waging his
warfare against slavery in the free soil conflict in that state. From
now on their die was cast. They would follow the grim old chief to
victory or death. It proved to be death for them both and when it came
they met it with a calmness and resignation possible only to the
loftiest heroism.
Barclay Coppock was barely twenty years of age at the time of the attack
on Harper's Ferry. His escape was almost a miracle. A heavy reward was
offered for him dead or alive. After weeks of the most intense privation
and suffering, lying concealed in the brush during the day and moving
chiefly by night, he picked his way back to the family home at
Springdale, Iowa. The governor of Virginia issued a requisition for his
return, which was not granted. The young men at Springdale and that
vicinity organized to protect young Coppock and served notice on the
Virginia officers who were on his track that "Springdale is in arms and
is prepared at a half hour's notice to give them a reception of 200
shots."
In the following spring Barclay returned to Salem and here again the
Virginia authorities renewed their efforts to capture him. But Barclay,
now among his old neighbors and friends, defied them. He sent word to
the officers in pursuit of him as to where he might be found, but they
wisely refrained from attempting to take him.
It was at this time that Barclay was a guest of the Bonsall family of
Salem, the elder Bonsall being one of the leading abolitionists of that
day. Charles Bonsall, his son, who still lives at Salem, knew the
Coppock brothers well and has a distinct recollection of Barclay's stay
at his father's home.
"During Barclay's sojourn at our home," writes Charles Bonsall in a
personal letter, "a detective of Salem heard of his being in our
neighborhood and boasted of his intention to arrest Barclay and secure
the reward there was on his head. Barclay heard of the boast and wrote a
letter to the detective informing him that he might select five other
men and he would meet them all single-handed and alone at any point
outside the city that he might name, and they could have the privilege
of capturing him and securing the reward. The detective did not
undertake the job.... Barclay Coppock never knew what fear was. When a
boy in his teens he often went to the woods and slept alone all night on
the ground, under the trees, from the sheer love of adventure. He was
the best shot with his eight-inch Colt I ever saw. On one occasion, in
his uncle's woods south of Salem, with his revolver, he shot a grey
squirrel from a big oak tree and put two more balls through its body
before it reached the ground. His nerves were as calm and steady in a
fight as in his sleep, and while with us his trusted "navy" was always
strapped under his coat, while in his coat-pocket he carried a small
pistol ready for any emergency at close quarters. It would have been
impossible to capture him alive."
Barclay Coppock's escape and the execution of his brother but
intensified his hatred and horror of slavery. He was now thoroughly
aroused and intent upon plunging anew into the fight. Returning to Iowa,
and convinced that civil war was now inevitable, he prepared actively
for the conflict.
"Now comes one of those remarkable facts of super-epochal history,"
continues Bonsall, "which go to show that when revolutionary periods
focalize, revolutions in public sentiment are brought about in almost a
twinkling. In the spring of 1861, just about one year from the time the
United States Government was offering a reward of one thousand dollars
for Barclay Coppock, dead or alive, the same government lifted its hat
and humbly bowed to him, and begged him to accept a first lieutenant's
commission in Company C, Third Kansas volunteers. He accepted the
commission and at once proceeded to organize his company. Captain Allen
of Ashtabula of the same company, came to Salem to recruit volunteers
and the writer, together with half a score of other abolition boys,
enlisted in Coppock's company.... Soon after Lieutenant Coppock was on
his way from Springdale to Fort Leavenworth to join his regiment there.
The rebels in Missouri, hearing of his coming, burned the railroad
bridge across the Little Platte river near St. Joseph, and the train
carrying the troops was precipitated into the river in the darkness of
night and brave Lieutenant Coppock was killed in the wreck."
Thus perished, still in his boyhood, as heroic a heart, as noble a soul,
as ever gave up his life in the cause of freedom. Had he been spared he
would without doubt have become one of the famed heroes of the war of
the rebellion.
Edwin Coppock was executed from the same gallows as his old chief, but
two weeks later. His trial, like that of Brown, was a farce. Conviction,
sentence and execution of all of Brown's men that were captured was a
foregone conclusion.
While awaiting the execution of his sentence, Edwin wrote to Mrs.
Brown, wife of his dead leader:
"I was with your sons when they fell. Oliver lived but a very few
moments after he was shot. He spoke no word, but yielded calmly to his
fate. Watson was shot at ten o'clock Monday morning and died about three
o'clock Monday afternoon.... After we were taken prisoners he was placed
in the guardhouse with me. He complained of the hardness of the bench on
which he was lying. I begged hard for a bed for him, or even a blanket,
but could obtain none. I took off my coat and placed it under him and
held his head in my lap, in which position he died without a groan or
struggle."
In a letter to friends in Iowa, under date of November 22d, three weeks
before his execution, he wrote:
"Eleven of our little band are sleeping now in their bloody garments
with the cold earth above them. Braver men never lived; truer men to
their plighted word never banded together."
Rigidly true to their convictions were all these young heroes. Not one
showed the white feather in the last hour. Serenely and without a quiver
each of them met his cruel fate.
John Brown had trained up his men in the strictest discipline. Not a
drop of liquor was allowed in his camp. Tobacco was tabooed. Profane
language was forbidden.
These men were in deadly earnest and their asceticism attested their
single-hearted fidelity to their cause. They were profoundly convinced
that slavery was a national crime and that it was their patriotic duty,
at whatever cost, to wipe that insufferable stigma from the land.
And who shall say that they were not right; or that they forfeited their
brave lives in vain?
A few days before the gallows claimed him, John Brown wrote to his
family, "I feel no consciousness of guilt and I am perfectly certain
that very soon no member of the family will feel any possible
disposition to blush on my account."
The Coppock brothers were typical of all the brave young abolitionists
who banded together to strike a blow that rocked this nation as if
Jehovah in his wrath had laid hold on it. Quaker lads, "grave, quiet,
reserved, even rustic in their ways," they lived bravely up to their
convictions and sealed their devotion to the cause of freedom with their
precious young life blood.
The noble character of Edwin Coppock is revealed in the following
pathetic letter written to his uncle on the eve of his execution. There
is no bitterness in his heart at the last hour. Like the great Galilean
who also perished for sympathizing with the lowly and oppressed, he was
calm and resigned in the presence of his fate. Like all such souls he
was gifted with prophetic vision, as his letter shows:
Charleston, December 13, 1859.
Joshua Coppock:
My Dear Uncle--I seat myself by the stand to write for the first
and last time to thee and thy dear family. Though far from home and
overtaken by misfortune, I have not forgotten you. Your generous
hospitality towards me, during my short stay with you last spring,
is stamped indelibly upon my heart, and also the generosity
bestowed upon my brother who now wanders, an outcast from his
native land. But thank God, he is free. I am thankful it is I who
has to suffer instead of him.
The time may come when he will remember me. And the time may come
when he may still further remember the cause in which I die. Thank
God the principles of the cause in which we were engaged will not
die with me and my brave comrades. They will spread wider and wider
and gather strength with each hour that passes. The voice of truth
will echo through our land, bringing conviction to the erring and
adding members to the glorious army who will follow its banner. The
cause of everlasting truth and justice will go on conquering and to
conquer until our broad and beautiful land shall rest beneath the
banner of freedom. I had fondly hoped to live to see the principles
of the Declaration of Independence fully realized. I had hoped to
see the dark stain of slavery blotted from our land, and the libel
of our boasted freedom erased, when we can say in truth that our
beloved country is the land of the free and the home of the brave;
but that cannot be.
I have heard my sentence passed; my doom is sealed. But two more
short days remains for me to fulfill my earthly destiny. But two
brief days between me and eternity. At the expiration of those two
days I shall stand upon the scaffold to take my last look of
earthly scenes. But that scaffold has but little dread for me, for
I honestly believe I am innocent of any crime justifying such
punishment. But by the taking of my life and the lives of my
comrades, Virginia is but hastening on that glorious day, when the
slave will rejoice in his freedom and say, "I, too, am a man, and
am groaning no more under the yoke of oppression."
But I must now close. Accept this short scrawl as a remembrance of
me. Give my love to all the family. Kiss little Joey for me.
Remember me to all my relatives and friends. And now farewell for
the last time.
From thy nephew, EDWIN COPPOCK.
Two days later the slave state of Virginia hung Edwin Coppock by the
neck until he was dead. The gallant John E. Cook went to the scaffold
with him. The account says:
"After the cap had been placed on their heads, Coppock turned toward
Cook and stretched forward his hand as far as possible. At the same
time Cook said, 'Stop a minute--where is Edwin's hand?' They then shook
hands cordially and Cook said, 'God bless you.' The calm and collected
manner of both was very marked.... They both exhibited the most
unflinching firmness, saying nothing, with the exception of bidding
farewell to the ministers and the sheriff."
More than half a century has passed since John Brown and his faithful
followers gave up their lives to set the black men free, but history has
yet to do them justice. Some day the hatred and prejudice will all have
died away and then these men, summoned to the bar of enlightened
judgment, will be crowned as the greatest heroes in American history.
THE SOCIAL SPIRIT.
Appeal to Reason.
We need to grow out of the selfish, sordid, brutal spirit of
individualism which still lurks even in Socialists and is responsible
for the strife and contention which prevail where there should be
concord and good will. The social spirit and the social conscience must
be developed and govern our social relations before we shall have any
social revolution.
If there are any among whom the social spirit should find its highest
expression and who should be bound fast in its comradely embrace and
give to the world the example of its elevating and humanizing influence,
it is the Socialists. They of all others have come to realize the
hardening and brutalizing effect of capitalist individualism in the
awful struggle for existence and it is to them a cause of unceasing
rejoicing that they live at a time in the world's historic development
when the very conditions which resulted from this age-long struggle
forbid its continuance and proclaim its approaching termination.
The rule of individualism which has governed society since the days of
primitive communism has effectually restrained the moral and spiritual
development of the race. It has brought out the baser side of men's
nature and set them against each other as if the plan of creation had
designed them to be mortal enemies.
* * * * *
Typical capitalists are barren of the social spirit. The very nature of
the catch-as-catch-can encounter in which they are engaged makes them
wary and suspicious, if not downright hateful of each other, and the
latent good that is in them dies for the want of incentive to express
itself.
The other day I saw two such capitalists shake hands. It was pitiable.
Their hearts had no part in the purely perfunctory ceremony. They
happened to meet and could not avoid each other. And so they
mechanically touched each other's reluctant hands, standing at right
angles to each other for a moment--not face to face--and then passing
on without either looking the other in the eyes.
This cold and heartless ceremony typified the relation begotten of
capitalist individualism in which men's interests are competitive and
antagonistic and in which each instinctively looks out for himself and
is on the alert to take every possible advantage of his fellow-man.
The result of this system is inevitably a race of Ishmaelites.
How differently two Socialist comrades shake hands! Their hearts are in
their palms and the joy of greeting is in their eyes. They have the
social spirit. Their interests are mutual and their aspirations kindred.
If one happens to be strong and the other weak, the stronger shares the
weakness and the weaker shares the strength of his comrade. The base
thought of taking a mean advantage, one of the other, does not darken
their minds or harden their hearts. They are joined together in the
humanizing bonds of fellowship. They multiply each other and they
rejoice in their comradely kinship. The best there is in each, and not
the worst, as in the contact of individualism, is appealed to and
brought forth for the benefit of both.
What an elevating, enlarging and satisfying relation!
And this is the "dead level" of mediocrity and servitude to which we are
to sink when this relation becomes universal among men as it will in the
International Socialist Republic!
So at least we are told by those who in the present system have
acquired the instincts and impulses of animals of prey in the
development of their imagined superiority by draining the veins and
wrecking the lives of their vanquished competitors, but we are not
impressed by the virtues of the system of which they stand as the
shining examples.
* * * * *
Thru all the ages past men, civilized men, so-called, have been at each
other's throats in the struggle for existence, and the spirit of
individualism this struggle has begotten, the spirit of hard, sordid,
brutal selfishness, has filled this world with unutterable anguish and
woe.
But at last the end of the reign of anarchistic individualism is in
sight. The social forces at work are undermining and destroying it and
soon its knell will be sounded to the infinite joy of an emancipated
world.
The largest possible expression of the social spirit should be fostered
and encouraged in the Socialist movement and among Socialists
themselves. In spite of the hindrances which beset us in our present
environments and relations, we may yet cultivate this spirit assiduously
to our increasing mutual good and to the good of our great movement.
In our propaganda, in the discussion of our tactical and other
differences and in all our other activities, the larger faith that true
comradeship inspires should prevail between us. We need to be more
patient, more kindly, more tolerant, more sympathetic, helpful and
encouraging to one another, and less suspicious, less envious, and less
contentious, if we are to educate and impress the people by our example,
and by the effect of our teachings upon ourselves win them to our
movement, and realize our dream of universal freedom and social
righteousness.
ROOSEVELT AND HIS REGIME.
Appeal to Reason, April 20, 1907.
The only time in my life I ever saw Theodore Roosevelt was years before
he became president of the United States. I was aboard of a train in the
far west, where Roosevelt was then said to be following ranch life, and
as he and several companions in cowboy costume entered the car at a
station stop, he was pointed out to me. I did not like him. The years
since have not altered that feeling of aversion except to accentuate it.
I have since seen the nation mad with hero worship over this man
Roosevelt, but I have not been impressed by it. Very "great" men
sometimes shrivel into very small ones and finally vanish in oblivion in
the short space of a single generation.
The American people are more idolatrous than any "heathen" nation on
earth. They worship their popular "heroes," while they last, with
passionate frenzy, and with equal madness do they hunt down the sane
"fools" who vainly try to teach them sense. Theodore Roosevelt and
George Dewey as "heroes" and Wendell Phillips and John Brown as "fools"
are notable illustrations. American history is filled with them.
But my personal dislike of the cowboy in imitation who has since become
president, however justifiable, would scarcely warrant a public attack
upon his official character, and this review, being of such a nature, is
inspired, as will appear, by entirely different motives.
There are those, and they constitute a great majority of the American
people, who stand in awe of their president, supposedly their servant,
but in fact their master; they speak of him with a kind of reverential
adulation as a lordly personage, a superior being to be looked up to and
worshiped rather than a fellowman to be respected and loved. There are
others who betray equal ignorance in a more vulgar fashion by coarse
tirades for which there is often as little excuse as there is for the
extreme adulation.
Regarding the president of the United States, as I do, simply as a
citizen and fellowman, the same as any other, I shall speak of him and
his acts free alike from awe and malice, and if I place him in the
public pillory, where he has placed so many others, to be seen and
despised of men, it will be from a sense that his official acts, so
often in flat denial of his profession, merit the execration of honest
men.
In arraigning President Roosevelt and his administration I have no
private spite nor personal grudge to satisfy, but an obligation to
redeem and a principle to vindicate.
I shall go about it as I would any other moral duty, asking no favors
and prepared to accept all consequences.
In the first place, I charge President Roosevelt with being a hypocrite,
the most consummate that ever occupied the executive seat of the nation.
His profession of pure politics is false, his boasted moral courage the
bluff of a bully and his "square deal" a delusion and a sham.
Theodore Roosevelt is mainly for Theodore Roosevelt and incidentally for
such others as are also for the same distinguished gentleman, first,
last and all the time. He is a smooth and slippery politician, swollen
purple with self-conceit; he is shrewd enough to gauge the stupidity of
the masses and unscrupulous enough to turn it into hero worship. This
constitutes the demagogue, and he is that in superlative degree.
Only a few days ago he appeared in a characteristic role. Rushing into
the limelight, as necessary to him as breath, he shrieked that he and
"Root" were "horrified" because of certain scandalous and revolting
charges made by one of his own former political chums. Of course, he and
"Root" of Tweed fame, the foxiest "fixer" of them all, were "horrified"
because of the shock to their political virtue, but it so happened that
the horror took effect only when they found themselves uncovered. The
taking of Harriman's boodle for corruptly electing him president and
the use of the stolen insurance funds for the same criminal purpose did
not "horrify" the president and "Root," nor would they be "horrified"
yet if they had not been caught red-handed in the act with the booty
upon their persons.