The Potomac, having flowed more than two hundred miles through
beautiful gorges and the finest scenery of these mountains, finally
breaks out at Harper's Ferry, receiving here its chief tributary, the
Shenandoah, coming up from Virginia, the Potomac River passage of the
Blue Ridge being described by Thomas Jefferson as "one of the most
stupendous scenes in nature." The Shenandoah--its name meaning "the
stream passing among the spruce-pines"--flows through the fertile and
famous "Valley of Virginia," noted for its many battles and active
movements of troops during the Civil War, when the rival forces, as
fortunes changed, chased each other up and down the Valley; and
Harper's Ferry, at the confluence of the rivers, and the towering
Maryland Heights on the northern side and the Loudon Heights on the
Virginia side, the great buttresses of the river passage, being
generally held as a northern border fortress. These huge mountain
walls rise fifteen hundred feet above the town, which has a population
of about two thousand.
Harper's Ferry was also the scene of "John Brown's raid," which was
practically the opening act of the Civil War, although actual
hostilities did not begin until more than a year afterwards. "Old John
Brown of Osawatomie" was a tanner, an unsettled and adventurous spirit
and foe of slavery, born in Connecticut in 1800, but who, at the same
time, was one of the most upright and zealous men that ever lived. In
his wanderings he migrated to Kansas in 1855, where he lived at
Osawatomie, and fought against the pro-slavery party. His house was
burnt and his son killed in the Kansas border wars, and he made bloody
reprisals. Smarting under his wrongs, he became the master-spirit of a
convention which met at Chatham, Canada, in May, 1859, and organized
an invasion of Virginia to liberate the slaves. Having formed his
plans, he rented a farmhouse in July about six miles from Harper's
Ferry, and gathered his forces together. On the night of October 16th,
with twenty-two associates, six being negroes, he crossed the bridge
into Harper's Ferry, and captured the arsenal and armory of the
Virginia militia, intending to liberate the slaves and occupy the
heights of the Blue Ridge as a base of operations against their
owners. A detachment of United States marines were next day sent to
the aid of the militia, and, after two days' desultory hostilities,
some of his party were killed, and Brown and the survivors were
captured and given up to the Virginia authorities for trial. His
final stand was made in a small engine-house, known as "John Brown's
Fort," which was exhibited at the Chicago Exposition in 1893. Brown
and six of his associates were hanged at the county-seat, Charlestown,
seven miles southwest of Harper's Ferry, on December 2d, Brown facing
death with the greatest serenity. His raid failed, but it was
potential in disclosing the bitter feeling between the North and the
South, and it furnished the theme for the most popular and inspiring
song of the Civil War:
"John Brown's body lies mouldering in the grave,
But his soul goes marching on."