The daylight hours of Sunday, October 16, 1859, were quiet ones at the
Kennedy farm as the long period of inactivity and uncertainty neared its
climax. Early in the morning John Brown held worship services, the
impending attack invoking “deep solemnity” upon the gathering. After
breakfast and roll call a final meeting was held and instructions were
given. Then everything was in readiness.
About 8 p.m. Brown turned to his followers. “Men,” he said, “get on your
arms; we will proceed to the Ferry.” The men, ready for hours, slung
their Sharps rifles over their shoulders, concealing them under long,
gray shawls that served as overcoats, and waited for the order to march.
A horse and wagon were brought to the door of the farmhouse. In the
wagon the men placed a few items that might be needed for the work
ahead: a sledge hammer, a crowbar, and several pikes. Owen Brown,
Barclay Coppoc, and Meriam were detailed to remain at the farm as a
rearguard. In the morning they were to bring the rest of the weapons
nearer the town where they could be passed out to the slave army Brown
expected to raise.
Donning his battered old Kansas cap, symbol of the violence to which he
had contributed in that strife-torn territory, Brown mounted the wagon
and motioned his men to move out. From the farmhouse the group moved
down the lane and onto the road leading to Harpers Ferry. Tidd and Cook,
who were best acquainted with the route, preceded the main body as
scouts. Upon reaching the town they were to cut the telegraph lines on
both the Maryland and Virginia sides of the Potomac.
[Illustration: Owen Brown]
[Illustration: Francis J. Meriam]
[Illustration: Barclay Coppoc]
[Illustration: Brown used this schoolhouse near Harpers Ferry as an
arsenal after the raid began. The drawing was made about 1859 by
David Hunter Strother, known to readers of _Harper’s New Monthly
Magazine_ as “Porte Crayon,” one of the most popular illustrators of
mid-19th century America.]
For more than 2 hours the men tramped along behind the wagon, strictly
adhering to Brown’s order to maintain silence. About 10:30 p.m. they
reached the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad bridge that would carry them
into Harpers Ferry. It was a long wooden-covered structure that spanned
the Potomac River a little upstream from where the Shenandoah comes
spilling in from the south. Kagi and Stevens entered first and
encountered watchman William Williams, who approached with a lantern.
They quickly took Williams prisoner. The rest of the raiders, except for
Watson Brown and Stewart Taylor who were told to stay on the Maryland
side as a rearguard, fastened cartridges boxes to the outside of their
clothing for ready access and followed the wagon onto the bridge.
Crossing quickly, the raiders stepped from the tunnel’s black throat
into the slumbering town. Before them lay a large structure that doubled
as the railroad depot and the Wager House. Just beyond, to the left, was
the U.S. Arsenal buildings where thousands of guns were stored. To the
right the armory shops stretched in a double row along the Potomac.
Brown turned the horse and wagon toward the armory.
Daniel Whelan, the armory’s nightwatchman, heard the wagon coming down
the street from the depot. Thinking it was the head watchman, he came
out from his station in the fire enginehouse (a one-story, two-room
brick building that doubled as a guard post just inside the armory
grounds) to find several rifles pointed at him. “Open the gate!” someone
yelled. Out of sheer cussedness, or perhaps fright, Whelan refused. One
of the raiders took the crowbar from the wagon and twisted it in the
chain until the lock snapped. The gate was thrown open and the wagon
rolled into the yard. To his prisoners, Whelan and Williams, Brown
announced his purpose:
I came here from Kansas, and this is a slave state; I want to free all
the Negroes in this state; I have possession now of the United States
armory, and if the citizens interfere with me I must only burn the
town and have blood.
Once in control of the armory, Brown detailed his men to other
objectives. Oliver Brown and William Thompson were sent to watch the
bridge across the Shenandoah River, while Hazlett and Edwin Coppoc moved
into the unguarded arsenal. Another group of raiders under Stevens made
its way down Shenandoah Street to the rifle factory on Lower Hall
Island. Again the watchman was surprised and easily captured. Telling
Kagi and Copeland to watch the rifle works—Leary would join them
later—Stevens marched the watchman and several young men picked up on
the street back to the armory grounds.
So far Brown’s occupation of the town had been quiet and peaceful. It
did not last. About midnight another watchman, Patrick Higgins, a Sandy
Hook resident, arrived at the Maryland end of the B & O bridge to
relieve Williams. Finding the structure dark he called out loudly; he
was answered quietly by Taylor and Watson Brown, who took him prisoner.
As he was being escorted across the bridge, Higgins suddenly lashed out,
struck Brown in the face, and raced toward the town. Taylor fired after
him. The ball grazed the watchman’s scalp, but he reached the Wager
House safely. The first shot of the raid had been fired.
About this same time Stevens led several raiders on a special mission to
capture Col. Lewis W. Washington, the 46-year-old great-grandnephew of
George Washington. The colonel, a small but prosperous planter, lived
near Halltown just off the Charles Town Turnpike about 5 miles west of
Harpers Ferry. He owned a pistol presented to General Washington by the
Marquis de Lafayette and a sword reportedly presented by the Prussian
King Frederick the Great. Brown wanted these weapons. When he struck the
first blow to free the slaves he rather fancied the idea of wearing the
sword and brandishing the pistol once owned by the man who had led the
fight to free the American colonists from a similar kind of tyranny.
Battering down Washington’s door, Stevens, Tidd, Cook, and three
Negroes—Anderson, Leary, and Green—summoned the colonel from his bed.
Washington offered no resistance. Calmly surrendering the sword and
pistol, he then dressed and climbed into his carriage for the trip to
Harpers Ferry. The raiders and Washington’s three slaves crammed into
the colonel’s four-horse farm wagon and followed along behind the
carriage.
[Illustration: “Beallair,” the home of Col. Lewis Washington. Late
on the night of October 16, several raiders broke into this house in
search of a pistol and sword once owned by the colonel’s great
grand-uncle, George Washington. Colonel Washington (inset) was taken
hostage.]
[Illustration: HARPERS FERRY 1859]
[Illustration: HARPERS FERRY 1859]
LEGEND
A Armory Employee Dwellings
P Private Dwellings
V Vacant at Time of Raid
On the way the procession stopped at the home of another slaveholder,
John Allstadt, just west of Bolivar Heights. Again using a fence rail to
gain entrance, the raiders forced Allstadt and his 18-year-old son into
the wagon while the terror-stricken women of the house shrieked
“Murder!” from the upstairs windows. Allstadt’s four slaves were also
added to the group.
While Stevens’ party was gathering hostages, the first note of tragedy
was sounded. At 1:25 a.m. the Baltimore and Ohio passenger train
eastbound for Baltimore arrived at Harpers Ferry and was stopped by a
clerk from the Wager House who told conductor A. J. Phelps of the recent
“startling” events. Phelps refused to allow the train to cross the
bridge until it had been checked, and he sent engineer William McKay and
baggagemaster Jacob Cromwell out to investigate. They were halted by
Brown’s guards, who turned them back at gunpoint.
Hayward Shepherd, the station baggageman, heard the commotion and walked
out to see what was going on. Shepherd, a free Negro, was highly
respected and well-liked by all who knew him. As he approached the
bridge a raider told him to halt. Instead, Shepherd turned around and
started back toward the station. A shot rang out and he fell gravely
wounded. He dragged himself back to the station where he died the next
afternoon. The first person to die at the hands of the men who had come
to free the slaves was, in fact, a Negro already free.
[Illustration: “Porte Crayon’s” drawing of Hayward Shepherd, the
free Negro baggageman killed by one of Brown’s men on October 17, is
the only known portrait of this tragic figure.]
Between 4 and 5 a.m. the caravan containing Colonel Washington and the
Allstadts arrived at the armory. Brown armed the frightened slaves with
pikes and told them to guard the prisoners, who were placed in the
enginehouse and now numbered about a half-dozen. “Keep these white men
inside,” he said. Turning to Washington, Brown explained that he had
taken him hostage because “as the aid to the Governor of Virginia, I
knew you would endeavor to perform your duty, and perhaps you would have
been a troublesome customer to me; and, apart from that, I wanted you
particularly for the moral effect it would give our cause, having one of
your name our prisoner.” As dawn approached the number of Brown’s
prisoners increased as unsuspecting armory employees reporting for work
were seized as they passed through the gate. Perhaps as many as 40
hostages were eventually jammed into the two rooms of the enginehouse.
[Illustration: Brown kept his growing number of hostages in the fire
enginehouse at left, just inside the entrance to the U.S. Armory
grounds. The machine shops where the muskets were assembled are at
the right.]
Near dawn, John Cook, with two raiders and a handful of pike-carrying
Negroes, took the wagon across the bridge into Maryland to bring the
weapons closer to the town to arm the hundreds of slaves soon expected
to join the fight. The rest of Brown’s “army” settled down at their
posts in the waning darkness to await the coming of day, the last for
many of them.
Thus far the citizens of Harpers Ferry had offered no resistance to the
invasion of their town, primarily because most of the townspeople knew
nothing of what was taking place. At the first streak of daylight, Dr.
John Starry, a 35-year-old local physician who had maintained an
all-night vigil beside the dying Hayward Shepherd, began to alert the
people to the danger. After arousing the residents of Virginius Island,
he rode to warn Acting Armory Superintendent A. M. Kitzmiller. Next he
ordered the Lutheran Church bell rung to assemble the citizens and
ascertain what arms were available for defense. Then he sent a messenger
off to Shepherdstown and another to Charles Town to alert their militia
companies of the armed occupation of Harpers Ferry.
Among the townspeople there were only one or two squirrel rifles and a
few shotguns, none of which were really fit for use. All other weapons
were in the arsenal buildings, and they were occupied by the raiders.
Knowing it would be futile to confront Brown’s men unarmed, Dr. Starry
headed for Charles Town, 8 miles away, to hurry its militia along. But
no prompting was necessary. To Charles Town residents the news from
Harpers Ferry was frightening, for it awakened memories of the 1831 Nat
Turner slave rebellion in Virginia’s tidewater region when more than 50
whites, mostly women and children, were murdered before the bloody
uprising was put down. The Jefferson Guards and another hastily formed
company would march as soon as possible.
At daylight on October 17 Brown allowed the B & O passenger train to
continue its journey to Baltimore. Conductor Phelps wasted no time in
sounding the alarm. At Monocacy, Md., at 7:05 a.m. he telegraphed his
superiors about the night’s events, adding:
They say they have come to free the slaves and intend to do it at all
hazards. The leader of those men requested me to say to you that this
is the last train that shall pass the bridge either East or West. If
it is attempted it will be at the peril of the lives of those having
them in charge.... It has been suggested you had better notify the
Secretary of War at once. The telegraph lines are cut East and West of
Harper’s Ferry and this is the first station that I could send a
dispatch from.
John W. Garrett, president of the railroad, saw the message when it came
in and immediately sent word to President James Buchanan and Virginia
Governor Henry A. Wise. At the same time he alerted Maj. Gen. George H.
Stewart, commanding Baltimore’s First Light Division of the Maryland
Volunteers. Word was also flashed to Frederick, Md., and that town’s
militia was soon under arms.
By 7 a.m. the residents of Harpers Ferry had discovered a supply of guns
in a building overlooked by the raiders, and some of the townspeople
began to move against Brown and his men. Alexander Kelly, armed with a
shotgun, approached the corner of High and Shenandoah Streets, about 100
yards from the armory. Before he could fire, several bullets whizzed
past his head, one putting a hole through his hat. Shortly afterwards,
groceryman Thomas Boerly, a man of great physical strength and courage,
approached the same corner and opened fire on a group of Brown’s men
standing in the arsenal yard, diagonally across the street from the
armory gate. A return bullet knocked him down with a “ghastly” wound,
from which he soon died.
A lull followed the shooting of Boerly. Brown, having made no provision
to feed his men and hostages, released Walter Kemp, an infirm Wager
House bartender captured earlier, in exchange for 45 breakfasts. But
when the food came, few ate it. Many, including Washington, Allstadt,
and Brown himself, feared it had been drugged or poisoned.
Meanwhile, Kagi, still at the rifle factory, was anxiously sending
messages to Brown urging him to leave Harpers Ferry while they still had
the chance. Brown ignored the pleas and continued to direct operations
with no apparent thought that outside forces would be moving against him
once the alarm had spread. Why, is anybody’s guess. Up until noon of
October 17, despite the erratic fire from the townspeople, the raiders
could have fought their way to safety in the mountains. Instead, Brown
waited, doing nothing. By mid-day it was too late, and the jaws of the
“steel-trap” foreseen by Frederick Douglass closed swiftly.