THE BLACK PHALANX
“Awake, awake, put on thy strength, O Zion.”
The decade 1830 to 1840 was one of the severest seasons of trial through
which the black American ever passed. The great economic change which
made slavery the corner-stone of the cotton kingdom was definitely
finished and all the subtle moral adjustments which follow were in full
action. New immigrants took advantage of the growing prejudice which
found a profitable place for the Negro in slavery, and was determined to
keep him in it. They began to crowd the free Northern Negro in a fierce
economic battle. With a precarious social foothold, little economic
organization, and no support in public opinion, the Northern free Negro
was forced to yield. In Philadelphia from 1829 to 1849 six mobs of
hoodlums and foreigners cowed and murdered the Negroes. In the Middle
West and, especially in Ohio, severe Black Laws had been enacted in 1804
to 1807 providing that (_a_) No Negro should be allowed to settle in
Ohio unless he could within twenty days give bond to the amount of $500
signed by two bondsmen, who should guarantee his good behavior and
support; (_b_) The fine for harboring or concealing a fugitive was at
first $50, then $100, one-half to go to the informer and one-half to the
overseer of the poor in the district; (_c_) No Negro was allowed to give
evidence in any case where a white man was a party.[167]
These laws, however, were dead letters until 1829, when increased Negro
immigration induced the Cincinnati authorities to enforce them. The
Negroes obtained a respite of thirty days and sent a deputation to
Canada. They were absent for sixty days, and when the whites saw no
effort to enforce the law further, they organized a riot. For three days
Negroes were killed in the streets until they barricaded their homes and
shot back. Meantime the governor of upper Canada sent word that he
“would extend to them a cordial welcome.” He said: “Tell the republicans
on your side of the line that we royalists do not know men of their
color. Should you come to us you will be entitled to all the privileges
of the rest of His Majesty’s subjects.”[168]
On receipt of this, fully two thousand Negroes went to Canada and
founded Wilberforce; while a national convention of Negroes was called
in Philadelphia in 1830—the first of its kind. This convention at an
adjourned session in 1831 addressed the public as follows:
“The cause of general emancipation is gaining powerful and able friends
abroad. Britain and Denmark have performed such deeds as will
immortalize them for their humanity, in the breasts of the
philanthropists of the present day; whilst as a just tribute to their
virtues, after-ages will yet erect imperishable monuments to their
memory. (Would to God we could say thus of our own native soil.)
“And it is only when we look to our own native land, to the birthplace
of our fathers, to the land for whose prosperity their blood and our
sweat have been shed and cruelty extorted, that the convention has had
cause to hang its head and blush. Laws as cruel in themselves as they
were unconstitutional and unjust, have in many places been enacted
against our poor unfriended and unoffending brethren; laws (without a
shadow of provocation on our part) at whose bare recital the very savage
draws him up for fear of the contagion, looks noble, and prides himself
because he bears not the name of a Christian. But the convention would
not wish to dwell long on this subject, as it is one that is too
sensibly felt to need description....
“This spirit of persecution was the cause of our convention. It was this
that induced us to seek an asylum in the Canadas; and the convention
feels happy to report to its brethren, that our efforts to establish a
settlement in that province have not been made in vain. Our prospects
are cheering; our friends and funds are daily increasing; wonders have
been performed far exceeding our most sanguine expectations; already
have our brethren purchased eight hundred acres of land—and two thousand
of them have left the soil of their birth, crossed the lines, and laid
the foundation for a structure which promises to prove an asylum for the
colored population of these United States. They have erected two hundred
log-houses, and have five hundred acres under cultivation.”
A college “on the manual labor system” was planned: “For the present
ignorant and degraded condition of many of our brethren in these United
States (which has been a subject of much concern to the convention) can
excite no astonishment (although used by our enemies to show our
inferiority in the scale of human beings); for, what opportunities have
they possessed for mental cultivation or improvement? Mere ignorance,
however, in a people divested of the means of acquiring information by
books, or an extensive connection with the world, is no just criterion
of their intellectual incapacity; and it has been actually seen, in
various remarkable instances, that the degradation of the mind and
character, which has been too hastily imputed to a people kept, as we
are, at a distance from those sources of knowledge which abound in
civilized and enlightened communities, has resulted from no other causes
than our unhappy situation and circumstances.”[169]
The convention met again in 1833 and resolved on further plans for
settling in Canada. These conventions continued to assemble annually for
five years, when they were succeeded by the convention of the American
Moral Reform Society which met two years longer. Meantime Nat Turner had
terrorized Virginia and the South and sent a wave of repression over the
North that led to the disfranchisement of Pennsylvania Negroes in 1837.
Notwithstanding all this the Negroes were struggling on. Beside the
general conventions arose the Phœnix Societies, which “planned an
organization of the colored people in their municipal subdivisions with
the special object of the promotion of their improvement in morals,
literature and the mechanic arts.” Lewis Tappan refers to them in his
biography. The “Mental Feast,” which was a social feature, survived
thirty years later in some of the interior towns of Pennsylvania and the
West.[170]
The first Negro paper, _Freedom’s Journal_, had been established in 1827
and organizations like the Massachusetts General Colored Association
were coöperating with the Abolitionists. The news of emancipation in the
British West Indies cheered the Negroes, and indeed without the long
effective and self-sacrificing efforts of the Northern freed Negroes,
the Abolition movement in the United States could not have been
successful. Garrison’s first subscriber to _The Liberator_ was a black
man of Philadelphia, and before and after the Negroes were admitted to
membership in the anti-slavery societies, their aid was invaluable. In
the West, despite proscription, a fight for schools was carried on from
1830 to 1840, which finally resulted in a wide system of Negro schools
partially supported by public funds. Toward 1840 signs of promise began
gradually to appear. A West Indian endowed a Negro school in
Philadelphia in 1837. The Negro population increased from two and
one-third to two and nine-tenths millions in the decade, and evidences
of economic success were seen among the free Negroes. Philadelphia had
in 1838 one hundred small beneficial societies; Ohio Negroes owned ten
thousand acres of land in 1840, while the Canada refugees were beginning
to prosper. The mutiny on the _Creole_, the establishment of the Negro
Odd Fellows, and the doubling, in ten years, of the membership of the
African Methodist Episcopal Church, all pointed to an awakening after
the long period of distress.
The decade of 1840 to 1850 was a new era—an era of self-assertion and
rapid advance for the free Northern Negro. For the first time conscious
leadership of undoubted ability appeared. In Boston there was De Grasse,
a physician, trained in this country and in France and a member of the
Massachusetts Medical Society. Robert Morris was a member of the bar, as
was E. R. Walker, whose “Appeal” in 1829 startled the country. William
Wells Brown and William Nell were writing, while Charles Lennox Remond
was one of the first of the Abolition orators. In New York were the
gifted preacher, Henry Highland Garnet; the teachers, Reason and
Peterson who made the Negro schools effective; and the physician, McCune
Smith, one of the best trained men of his day. In Philadelphia were
Robert Purvis, the Abolitionist; William Still, of the Underground
Railroad; the three men who made the catering business—Dorsey, Jones and
Minton; and the rich Negro lumber merchant, Stephen Smith, whose
magnificent endowment for aged Negroes stands to-day at the corner of
Girard and Belmont Avenues and is valued at $400,000. In western
Pennsylvania were Vashon and Woodson, and in the West were Day,
librarian of the Cleveland library; the three Langstons of Oberlin, and
the merchants Boyd and Wilcox of Cincinnati. Elsewhere appeared the
unlettered, but brave and shrewd leaders of the fugitive slaves. It is
said that 500 black messengers of this sort were passing backward and
forward between the slave and the free states in this decade, and
noticeable among them were Harriet Tubman and Josiah Henson, who brought
thousands to the North and to Canada. Foremost of all came Frederick
Douglass, born in 1817 and reborn to freedom in 1838. He made his first
speech in 1841 and took a prominent part in the anti-slavery campaign of
the next decade. In 1845–6, he was in England and, returning in 1847, he
established his paper and met John Brown. From that time on he was
Brown’s chief Negro confidant, and in his house Brown’s Eastern campaign
was started and largely carried on. The churches also were training men
in social leadership in the persons of their bishops, like John Brown’s
friend Loguen and the noble Daniel Payne.
About 1847 new life appeared in the free Negro group. The Odd Fellows,
under Peter Ogden, maintained their independence against aggressions of
the whites, and the first of a new series of national colored
conventions assembled at Troy, N. Y. “The first article in the first
number of Frederick Douglass’s _North Star_, published January, 1848,
was an extended notice of this convention held at the Liberty Street
Church, Troy, N. Y., 1847.”
The next year, 1848, Cleveland welcomed a similar national convention.
Nearly seventy delegates assembled there on September 6th, “the sessions
alternating between the Court-House and the Tabernacle. Frederick
Douglass was chosen president. As in previous conventions education was
encouraged, the importance of statistical information stated and
temperance societies urged.”[171]
The representative character of the delegates was shown by the fact that
printers, carpenters, blacksmiths, shoemakers, engineers, dentists,
gunsmiths, farmers, physicians, plasterers, masons, college students,
clergymen, barbers, hair-dressers, laborers, coopers, livery-stable
keepers, bath-house keepers and grocers were among the members who were
present.[172]
The same year Frederick Douglass attended a Free Soil convention at
Buffalo, N. Y., and writes: “I was not the only colored man well known
to the country who was present at this convention. Samuel Ringgold Ward,
Henry Highland Garnet, Charles L. Remond, and Henry Bibb were there and
made speeches which were received with surprise and gratification by the
thousands there assembled. As a colored man I felt greatly encouraged
and strengthened for my cause while listening to these men, in the
presence of the ablest men of the Caucasian race. Mr. Ward especially
attracted attention at that convention. As an orator and thinker he was
vastly superior, I thought, to any of us, and being perfectly black and
of unmixed African descent, the splendors of his intellect went directly
to the glory of race. In depth of thought, fluency of speech, readiness
of wit, logical exactness, and general intelligence, Samuel R. Ward has
left no successor among the colored men amongst us, and it was a sad day
for our cause when he was laid low in the soil of a foreign
country.”[173]
The next decade opened with over three and one-half millions of Negroes
in the United States—an enormous increase since 1840—and a remarkable
indication of virility and prosperity despite the new Fugitive Slave
Law. The Canadian Negroes were being organized in the Elgin and other
settlements, the colored Baptists reported 150,000 members, and the
Negroes of New York, replying to the Black Law recommendations of
Governor Ward Hunt, proved unincumbered ownership of $1,160,000 worth of
property. The escape of fugitive slaves was now systematized in the
Underground Railroad and in the secret organization known to outsiders
variously as the “League of Freedom,” “Liberty League,” or “American
Mysteries.” To these were added the fourteen Canadian “True Bands” with
several hundred members each.
State conventions were called in many instances, and the most
representative and intelligent national convention held up to that time
met in Rochester, N. Y., Douglass’s home, in 1853. This convention
developed definite opposition to any hope of permanent relief for the
colored freeman through schemes of emigration. On the contrary, it
directed its energies to affirmative constructive action and planned
three measures:
(1) An industrial college “on the manual labor plan.” Harriet Beecher
Stowe, who was to make a visit to England at the instance of friends in
that country, was authorized to receive funds in the name of the colored
people of the country for that purpose. “The successful establishment
and conduct of such an institution of learning would train youth to be
self-reliant and skilled workmen, fitted to hold their own in the
struggle of life on the conditions prevailing here.”
(2) A registry of colored mechanics, artisans, and business men
throughout the Union, and also, “of all the persons willing to employ
colored men in business, to teach colored boys mechanic trades, liberal
and scientific professions and farming; also a registry of colored men
and youth seeking employment or instruction.”
(3) A committee on publication “to collect all facts, statistics and
statements; all laws and historical records and biographies of the
colored people and all books by colored authors.” This committee was
further authorized “to publish replies of any assaults worthy of note,
made upon the character or condition of the colored people.”[174]
The radical stand of this assembly against emigration caused a call for
a distinct emigration Negro convention in 1854. This convention was held
under the presidency of the same man who afterward presided at the
Chatham conclave of John Brown, and with some of the same Negroes
present. The account of it continues:
“There were three parties in the emigration convention, ranged according
to the foreign fields they preferred to emigrate to. Dr. Delaney headed
the party that desired to go to the Niger Valley in Africa, Whitfield
the party which preferred to go to Central America, and Holly the party
which preferred to go to Haiti.
“All these parties were recognized and embraced by the convention. Dr.
Delaney was given a commission to go to Africa, in the Niger Valley,
Whitfield to go to Central America, and Holly to Haiti, to enter into
negotiations with the authorities of these various countries for Negro
emigrants and to report to future conventions. Holly was the first to
execute his mission, going down to Haiti in 1855, when he entered into
relations with the Minister of the Interior, the father of the late
President Hyppolite, and by him was presented to Emperor Faustin I. The
next emigration convention was held at Chatham, Canada West, in 1856,
when the report on Haiti was made. Dr. Delaney went off on his mission
to the Niger Valley, Africa, via England, in 1858. There he concluded a
treaty signed by himself and eight kings, offering inducements to Negro
emigrants to their territories. Whitfield went to California, intending
later to go thence to Central America, but died in San Francisco before
he could do so. Meanwhile [James] Redpath went to Haiti as a John
Brownist after the Harper’s Ferry raid, and reaped the first fruits of
Holly’s mission by being appointed Haitian Commissioner of Emigration in
the United States by the Haitian government, but with the express
injunction that Rev. Holly should be called to coöperate with him. On
Redpath’s arrival in the United States, he tendered Rev. Holly a
commission from the Haitian government at $1,000 per annum and traveling
expenses to engage emigrants to go to Haiti. The first load of emigrants
were from Philadelphia in 1861.”[175]
In 1853 when the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed, Negroes like
Purvis and Barbadoes, trained in the Negro convention movement, were
among its founders. By 1856 the African Methodist Church had 20,000
members and $425,000 worth of property.
Of all this development John Brown knew far more than most white men and
it was on this great knowledge that his great faith was based. To most
Americans the inner striving of the Negro was a veiled and an unknown
tale: they had heard of Douglass, they knew of fugitive slaves, but of
the living, organized, struggling group that made both these phenomena
possible they had no conception.
From his earliest interest in Negroes, John Brown sought to know
individuals among them intimately and personally. He invited them to his
home and he went to theirs. He talked to them, and listened to the
history of their trials, advised them and took advice from them. His
dream was to enlist the boldest and most daring spirits among them in
his great plan.
When, therefore, John Brown came East in January, 1858, his object was
not simply to further his campaign for funds, but more especially
definitely to organize the Negroes for his work. Already he had
disclosed his intentions to Thomas Thomas of Springfield and to
Frederick Douglass. He now determined to enlist a larger number and he
particularly had in mind the Negroes of New York and Philadelphia, and
those in Canada. At no time, however, did John Brown plan to begin his
foray with many Negroes. He knew that he must gain the confidence of
black men first by a successful stroke, and that after initial success
he could count on large numbers. His object then was to interest a few
leaders like Douglass, organize societies with wide ramifications, and
after the first raid to depend on these societies for aid and recruits.
During his stay with Douglass in February, 1858, he wrote to many
colored leaders: Henry Highland Garnet and James N. Gloucester in New
York; John Jones in Chicago, and J. W. Loguen of the Zion Church. The
addresses of Downing of Rhode Island, and Martin R. Delaney were also
noted. On February 23d, after he had been in Boston and Peterboro he
notes writing to Loguen, one of the closest of his Negro friends: “Think
I shall be ready to go with him [to Canada] by the first of March or
about that time.”[176]
On March 10th, John Brown and his eldest son, Henry Highland Garnet,
William Still and others met at the house of Stephen Smith, the rich
Negro lumber merchant, of 921 Lombard Street, Philadelphia. Brown seems
to have stayed nearly a week in that city, and probably had long
conferences with all the chief Philadelphia Negro leaders. On March
18th, he was in New Haven where he wrote Frederick Douglass and J. W.
Loguen, saying: “I expect to be on the way by the 28th or 30th inst.”
After a flying visit home, involving a long walk to save expense, he
appeared again at Douglass’s in April. Gloucester collected a little
money for him in New York and he probably received some in Philadelphia;
at last he turned his face toward Canada.
He had long wished to see Canada, and had planned a visit as far back as
1846. Hither he had sent one of the earliest of his North Elba refugees,
Walter Hawkins, who became Bishop of the British African Church. On
April 8th, John Brown writes his son: “I came on here direct with J. W.
Loguen the day after you left Rochester. I am succeeding, to all
appearance, beyond my expectations. Harriet Tubman hooked on his whole
team at once. He (Harriet) is the most of a man, naturally, that I ever
met with. There is the most abundant material, and of the right quality,
in this quarter, beyond all doubt. Do not forget to write Mr. Case (near
Rochester) at once about hunting up every person and family of the
reliable kind about, at, or near Bedford, Chambersburg, Gettysburg, and
Carlisle, in Pennsylvania, and also Hagerstown and vicinity, Maryland,
and Harper’s Ferry, Va.”[177]
He stayed at St. Catherines until the 14th or 15th, chiefly in
consultation with that wonderful woman, Harriet Tubman, and sheltered in
her home. Harriet Tubman was a full-blooded African, born a slave on the
eastern shore of Maryland in 1820. When a girl she was injured by having
an iron weight thrown on her head by an overseer, an injury that gave
her wild, half-mystic ways with dreams, rhapsodies and trances. In her
early womanhood she did the rudest and hardest man’s work, driving,
carting and plowing. Finally the slave family was broken up in 1849,
when she ran away. Then began her wonderful career as a rescuer of
fugitive slaves. Back and forth she traveled like some dark ghost until
she had personally led over three hundred blacks to freedom, no one of
whom was ever lost while in her charge. A reward of $10,000 for her,
alive or dead, was offered, but she was never taken. A dreamer of dreams
as she was, she ever “laid great stress on a dream which she had had
just before she met Captain Brown in Canada. She thought she was in ‘a
wilderness sort of place, all full of rocks, and bushes,’ when she saw a
serpent raise its head among the rocks, and as it did so, it became the
head of an old man with a long white beard, gazing at her, ‘wishful
like, jes as ef he war gwine to speak to me,’ and then two other heads
rose up beside him, younger than he,—and as she stood looking at them,
and wondering what they could want with her, a great crowd of men rushed
in and struck down the younger heads, and then the head of the old man,
still looking at her so ‘wishful!’ This dream she had again and again,
and could not interpret it; but when she met Captain Brown, shortly
after, behold he was the very image of the head she had seen. But still
she could not make out what her dream signified, till the news came to
her of the tragedy of Harper’s Ferry, and then she knew the two other
heads were his two sons.”[178]
In this woman John Brown placed the utmost confidence. Wendell Phillips
says: “The last time I ever saw John Brown was under my own roof, as he
brought Harriet Tubman to me, saying: ‘Mr. Phillips, I bring you one of
the best and bravest persons on this continent—General Tubman, as we
call her.’ He then went on to recount her labors and sacrifices in
behalf of her race.”[179]
Only sickness, brought on by her toil and exposure, prevented Harriet
Tubman from being present at Harper’s Ferry.
From St. Catherines John Brown went to Ingersoll, Hamilton and Chatham.
He also visited Toronto, holding meetings with Negroes in Temperance
Hall, and at the house of the “late Mr. Holland, a colored man, on Queen
Street West. On one occasion Captain Brown remained as a guest with his
friend, Dr. A. M. Ross, who is distinguished as a naturalist, as well as
an intrepid Abolitionist, who risked his life on several occasions in
excursions into the South to enable slaves to flee to Canada!”[180]
Having finally perfected plans for a convention, Brown hurried back to
Iowa for his men. During his three months’ absence they had been working
and drilling in the Quaker settlement of Springdale, Ia., as most
persons supposed, for future troubles in “bleeding Kansas.” On John
Brown’s arrival they all hurriedly packed up—Owen Brown, Realf, Kagi,
Cook, Stevens, Tidd, Leeman, Moffett, Parsons, and the colored man
Richardson, together with their recruits, Gill and Taylor. The Coppocs
were to come later. “The leave-taking between them and the people of
Springdale was one of tears. Ties which had been knitting through many
weeks were sundered, and not only so, but the natural sorrow at parting
was intensified by the consciousness of all that the future was full of
hazard for Brown and his followers. Before quitting the house and home
of Mr. Maxon, where they had spent so long a time, each of Brown’s band
wrote his name in pencil on the wall of the parlor, where the writing
still can be seen by the interested traveler.” They all immediately
started for Canada by way of Chicago and Detroit. At Chicago they had to
wait twelve hours, and the first hotel refused to accommodate Richardson
at the breakfast table. John Brown immediately sought another place. The
company arrived shortly in Chatham and stopped at a hotel kept by Mr.
Barber, a colored man. While at Chatham, John Brown, as Anderson
relates, “made a profound impression upon those who saw or became
acquainted with him. Some supposed him to be a staid but modernized
‘Quaker’; others a solid business man, from ‘somewhere,’ and without
question a philanthropist. His long white beard, thoughtful and reverent
brow and physiognomy, his sturdy, measured tread, as he circulated about
with hands, portrayed in the best lithograph, under the pendant
coat-skirt of plain brown tweed, with other garments to match, revived
to those honored with his acquaintance and knowing his history the
memory of a Puritan of the most exalted type.”[181]
John Brown’s choice of Canada as a centre of Negro culture, was wise.
There were nearly 50,000 Negroes there, and the number included many
energetic, intelligent and brave men, with some wealth. Settlements had
grown up, farms had been bought, schools established and an intricate
social organization begun. Negroes like Henson had been loyally assisted
by white men like King, and fugitives were welcomed and succored. Near
Buxton, where King and the Elgin Association were working, was Chatham,
the chief town of the county of Kent, with a large Negro population of
farmers, merchants and mechanics; they had a graded school, Wilberforce
Institute, several churches, a newspaper, a fire-engine company and
several organizations for social intercourse and uplift. One of the
inhabitants said:
“Mr. Brown did not overestimate the state of education of the colored
people. He knew that they would need leaders, and require training. His
great hope was that the struggle would be supported by volunteers from
Canada, educated and accustomed to self-government. He looked on our
fugitives as picked men of sufficient intelligence, which, combined with
a hatred for the South, would make them willing abettors of any
enterprise destined to free their race.”
There were many white Abolitionists near by, but they distrusted Brown
and in this way he gained less influence among the Negroes than he
otherwise might have had. Martin R. Delaney, who was a fervid African
emigrationist, was just about to start to Africa, bearing the mandate of
the last Negro convention, when John Brown appeared. “On returning home
from a professional visit in the country, Mrs. Delaney informed him that
an old gentleman had called to see him during his absence. She described
him as having a long, white beard, very gray hair, a sad but placid
countenance. In speech he was peculiarly solemn. She added, ‘He looked
like one of the old prophets. He would neither come in nor leave his
name, but promised to be back in two weeks’ time.’”
Finally Delaney met John Brown who said:
“‘I come to Chatham expressly to see you, this being my third visit on
the errand. I must see you at once, sir,’ he continued, with emphasis,
‘and that, too, in private, as I have much to do and but little time
before me. If I am to do nothing here, I want to know it at once.’”
Delaney continues:
“Going directly to the private parlor of a hotel near by, he at once
revealed to me that he desired to carry out a great project in his
scheme of Kansas emigration, which, to be successful, must be aided and
countenanced by the influence of a general convention or council. That
he was unable to effect in the United States, but had been advised by
distinguished friends of his and mine, that, if he could but see me, his
object could be attained at once. On my expressing astonishment at the
conclusion to which my friends and himself had arrived, with a nervous
impatience, he exclaimed, ‘Why should you be surprised? Sir, the people
of the Northern states are cowards; slavery has made cowards of them
all. The whites are afraid of each other, and the blacks are afraid of
the whites. You can effect nothing among such people,’ he added, with
decided emphasis. On assuring him if a council was all that was desired,
he could readily obtain it, he replied, ‘That is all; but that is a
great deal to me. It is men I want, and not money; money I can get
plentiful enough, but no men. Money can come without being seen, but men
are afraid of identification with me, though they favor my measures.
They are cowards, sir! Cowards!’ he reiterated. He then fully revealed
his designs. With these I found no fault, but fully favored and aided in
getting up the convention.”[182]
Meantime John Brown proceeded carefully to sound public opinion, got the
views of others, and, while revealing few of his own plans, set about
getting together a body who were willing to ratify his general aims. He
consulted the leading Negroes in private, and called a series of small
conferences to thresh out preliminary difficulties. In these meetings
and in the personal visits, many points arose and were settled. A member
of the convention says:
“One evening the question came up as to what flag should be used; our
English colored subjects, who had been naturalized, said they would
never think of fighting under the hated ‘Stars and Stripes.’ Too many of
them thought they carried their emblem on their backs. But Brown said
the old flag was good enough for him; under it freedom had been won from
the tyrants of the Old World, for white men; now he intended to make it
do duty for the black men. He declared emphatically that he would not
give up the Stars and Stripes. That settled the question.
“Some one proposed admitting women as members, but Brown strenuously
opposed this, and warned the members not to intimate, even to their
wives, what was done.
“One day in my shop I told him how utterly hopeless his plans would be
if he persisted in making an attack with the few at his command, and
that we could not afford to spare white men of his stamp, ready to
sacrifice their lives for the salvation of black men. While I was
speaking, Mr. Brown walked to and fro, with his hands behind his back,
as was his custom when thinking on his favorite subject. He stopped
suddenly and bringing down his right hand with great force, exclaimed:
‘Did not my Master Jesus Christ come down from Heaven and sacrifice
Himself upon the altar for the salvation of the race, and should I, a
worm, not worthy to crawl under His feet, refuse to sacrifice myself?’
With a look of determination, he resumed his walk. In all the
conversations I had with him during his stay in Chatham of nearly a
month, I never once saw a smile light upon his countenance. He seemed to
be always in deep and earnest thought.”[183]
The preliminary meeting was held in a frame cottage on Princess Street,
south of King Street, then known as the “King Street High School.” Some
meetings were also held in the First Baptist Church on King Street. In
order to mislead the inquisitive, it was pretended that the persons
assembling were organizing a Masonic Lodge of colored people. The
important proceedings took place in “No. 3 Engine House,” a wooden
building near McGregor’s Creek, erected by Mr. Holden and other colored
men.
The regular invitations were issued on the fifth:
“_Chatham, Canada, May 5, 1858._
“MY DEAR FRIEND:
“I have called a quiet convention in this place of true friends of
freedom. Your attendance is earnestly requested....
“Your friend,
“JOHN BROWN.”
The convention was called together at 10 A. M., Saturday, May 8th, and
opened without ceremony. There were present the following Negroes:
William Charles Monroe, a Baptist clergyman, formerly president of the
emigration convention and elected president of this assembly; Martin R.
Delaney, afterward major in the United States Army in the Civil War;
Alfred Whipper, of Pennsylvania; William Lambert and I. D. Shadd, of
Detroit, Mich.; James H. Harris, of Cleveland, O., after the war a
representative in Congress for two terms from North Carolina; G. J.
Reynolds, an active Underground Railroad leader of Sandusky City; J. C.
Grant, A. J. Smith, James M. Jones, a gunsmith and engraver, graduate of
Oberlin College, 1849; M. F. Bailey, S. Hunton, John J. Jackson,
Jeremiah Anderson, James M. Bell, Alfred Ellisworth, James W. Purnell,
George Aiken, Stephen Dettin, Thomas Hickerson, John Cannel, Robinson
Alexander, Thomas F. Cary, Thomas M. Kinnard, Robert Van Vauken, Thomas
Stringer, John A. Thomas, believed by some to be John Brown’s earlier
confidant and employee at Springfield, Mass., afterward employed by
Abraham Lincoln in his Illinois home and at the White House also; Robert
Newman, Charles Smith, Simon Fislin, Isaac Holden, a merchant and
surveyor and John Brown’s host; James Smith, and Richard Richardson.
Hinton says: “There is no evidence to show that Douglass, Loguen,
Garnet, Stephen Smith, Gloucester, Langston, or others of the prominent
men of color in the states who knew John Brown, were invited to the
Chatham meeting. It is doubtful if their appearance would have been
wise, as it would assuredly have been commented on and aroused
suspicion.”[184]
The white men present were: John and Owen Brown, father and son; John
Henri Kagi, Aaron Dwight Stevens, still known as Charles Whipple; John
Edwin Cook, Richard Realf, George B. Gill, Charles Plummer Tidd, William
Henry Leeman, Charles W. Moffett, Luke F. Parsons, all of Kansas; and
Steward Taylor of Canada, twelve in all. It has been usually assumed
that Jeremiah Anderson was white but the evidence makes it possible that
he was a mulatto. John J. Jackson called the meeting to order and Monroe
was chosen president. Delaney then asked for John Brown, and Brown spoke
at length, followed by Delaney and others.
The constitution was brought forward and, after a solemn parole of
honor, was read. It proved to be a frame of government based on the
national Constitution, but much simplified and adapted to a moving band
of guerrillas. The first forty-five articles were accepted without
debate. The next article was: “The foregoing articles shall not be so as
in any way to encourage the overthrow of any state government, or the
general government of the United States, and look to no dissolution of
the Union, but simply to amendment and repeal, and our flag shall be the
same that our fathers fought for under the Revolution.”
To this Reynolds, the “coppersmith,” one of the strongest men in the
convention, objected. He felt no allegiance to the nation that had
robbed and humiliated him. Brown, Delaney, Kagi and others, however,
earnestly advocated the article and it passed. Saturday afternoon the
constitution was finally adopted and signed. Brown induced James M.
Jones, who had not attended all the sittings, to come to this one, as
the constitution must be signed, and he wished his name to be on the
roll of honor. As the paper was presented for signature, Brown said,
“Now, friend Jones, give us John Hancock bold and strong.”
The account continues:
“During one of the sittings, Mr. Jones had the floor, and discussed the
chances of the success or failure of the slaves rising to support the
plan proposed. Mr. Brown’s scheme was to fortify some place in the
mountains, and call the slaves to rally under his colors. Jones
expressed fear that he would be disappointed, because the slaves did not
know enough to rally to his support. The American slaves, Jones argued,
were different from those of the West India Island of San Domingo, whose
successful uprising is a matter of history, as they had there imbibed
some of the impetuous character of their French masters, and were not so
overawed by white men. ‘Mr. Brown, no doubt thought,’ says Mr. Jones,
‘that I was making an impression on some of the members, if not on him,
for he arose suddenly and remarked, “Friend Jones, you will please say
no more on that side. There will be a plenty to defend that side of the
question.” A general laugh took place.’
“A question as to the time for making the attack came up in the
convention. Some advocated that we should wait until the United States
became involved in war with some first-class power; that it would be
next to madness to plunge into a strife for the abolition of slavery
while the government was at peace with other nations. Mr. Brown listened
to the argument for some time, then slowly arose to his full height, and
said: ‘I would be the last one to take the advantage of my country in
the face of a foreign foe.’ He seemed to regard it as a great insult.
That settled the matter in my mind that John Brown was not insane.”[185]
At 6 P. M. the election of officers under the constitution took place,
and was finished Monday, the tenth. John Brown was elected
commander-in-chief; Kagi, secretary of war; Realf, secretary of state;
Owen Brown, treasurer; and George B. Gill, secretary of the treasury.
Members of congress chosen were Alfred Ellisworth and Osborne P.
Anderson, colored.
After appointing a committee to fill other offices, the convention
adjourned. Another and a larger body was also organized, as Delaney
says: “This organization was an extensive body, holding the same
relation to his movements as a state or national executive committee
holds to its party principles, directing their adherence to fundamental
principles.”[186]
This committee still existed at the time of the Harper’s Ferry raid.
With characteristic reticence Brown revealed his whole plan to no one,
and many of those close to him received quite different impressions, or
rather read their own ideas into Brown’s careful speech. One of his
Kansas band says: “I am sure that Brown did not communicate the details
of his plans to the members of the convention, more than in a very
general way. Indeed, I do not now remember that he gave them any more
than the impressions which they could gather from the methods of
organization. From those who were directly connected with his movements
he solicited plans and methods—including localities—of operations in
writing. Of course, we had almost precise knowledge of his methods, but
all of us perhaps did not know just the locality selected by him, or, if
knowing, did not comprehend the resources and surroundings.”[187]
“John Brown, never, I think,” said Mr. Jones, “communicated his whole
plan, even to his immediate followers. In his conversations with me he
led me to think that he intended to sacrifice himself and a few of his
followers for the purpose of arousing the people of the North from the
stupor they were in on this subject. He seemed to think such sacrifice
necessary to awaken the people from the deep sleep that had settled upon
the minds of the whites of the North. He well knew that the sacrifice of
any number of Negroes would have no effect. What he intended to do, so
far as I could gather from his conversation, from time to time, was to
emulate Arnold Winkelried, the Swiss chieftain, when he threw himself
upon the Austrian spearmen, crying, ‘Make way for Liberty.’”[188]
Delaney in his own bold, original way assumed that Brown intended
another Underground Railway terminating in Kansas. Delaney himself was
on his way to Africa and could take no active part in the movement.
The constitution adopted by the convention was an instrument designed
for the government of a band of isolated people fighting for liberty.
The preamble said:
“Whereas slavery, throughout its entire existence in the United States,
is none other than a most barbarous, unprovoked and unjustifiable war of
one portion of its citizens upon another portion—the only conditions of
which are perpetual imprisonment and hopeless servitude or absolute
extermination—in utter disregard and violation of those eternal and
self-evident truths set forth in our Declaration of Independence:
“Therefore, we, citizens of the United States, and the oppressed people
who, by a recent decision of the Supreme Court, are declared to have no
rights which the white man is bound to respect, together with all other
people degraded by the laws thereof, do, for the time being, ordain and
establish ourselves the following provisional constitution and
ordinances, the better to protect our persons, property, lives, and
liberties, and to govern our actions.”[189]
The Declaration of Independence referred to was probably designed to be
adopted July 4, 1858, when, as originally planned, the blow was to be
actually struck. It was a paraphrase of the original declaration and
ended by saying:
“Declaring that we will serve them no longer as slaves, knowing that the
‘Laborer is worthy of his hire,’ We therefore, the Representatives of
the circumscribed citizens of the United States of America, in General
Congress assembled, appealing to the supreme Judge of the World, for the
rectitude of our intentions, Do in the name, & by authority of the
oppressed Citizens of the Slave States, Solemnly publish and Declare:
that the Slaves are, & of right ought to be as free & as independent as
the unchangeable Law of God requires that All Men Shall be. That they
are absolved from all allegiance to those Tyrants, who still persist in
forcibly subjecting them to perpetual ‘Bondage,’ and that all friendly
connection between them and such Tyrants, is & ought to be totally
dissolved, And that as free and independent citizens of these states,
they have a perfect right, a sufficient and just cause, to defend
themselves against the Tyrrany of their oppressors. To solicit aid from
& ask the protection of all true friends of humanity and reform, of
whatever nation, & wherever found; A right to contract all Alliances, &
to do all other acts and things which free independent Citizens may of
right do. And for the support of the Declaration, with a firm reliance
on the protection of divine Providence: We mutually pledge to each
other, Our Lives, and Our sacred Honor.”[190]
The constitution consisted of forty-eight articles. All persons of
mature age were admitted to membership and there was established a
congress with one house of five to ten members, a president and
vice-president and a court of five members, each one of whom held
circuit courts. All these officials were to unite in selecting a
commander-in-chief, treasurer, secretaries, and other officials. All
property was to be in common and no salaries were to be paid. All
persons were to labor. All indecent behavior was forbidden: “The
marriage relation shall be at all times respected, and families kept
together, as far as possible; and broken families encouraged to reunite,
and intelligence offices established for that purpose. Schools and
churches established, as soon as may be, for the purpose of religious
and other instructions; and the first day of the week regarded as a day
of rest, and appropriated to moral and religions instruction and
improvement, relief of the suffering, instruction of the young and
ignorant, and the encouragement of personal cleanliness; nor shall any
person be required on that day to perform ordinary manual labor, unless
in extremely urgent cases.”[191] All persons were to carry arms but not
concealed. There were special provisions for the capture of prisoners,
and protection of their persons and property.
John Brown was well pleased with his work and wrote home: “Had a good
Abolition convention here, from different parts, on the 8th and 10th
inst. Constitution slightly amended and adopted, and society
organized.”[192]
Just now as everything seemed well started, came disquieting news from
the East. Forbes had been there since November, growing more and more
poverty-stricken and angry, and his threats, hints and visits were
becoming frequent and annoying. He complained to Senator Wilson, to
Charles Sumner, to Hale, Seward and Horace Greeley, and to the Boston
coterie. He could not understand why these leaders of the movement
against slavery, as he supposed, should leave the real power in the
hands of John Brown, and neglect an experienced soldier like himself
after raising false expectations. John Brown had dealt with Forbes
gently but firmly, and had sought to conciliate him, but in vain. Brown
was apparently determined to outwit him by haste; he had written his
Massachusetts friends to join him at the Chatham Convention, but Sanborn
and Howe had already received threatening letters from Forbes which
alarmed them. He evidently had careful information of Brown’s movements
and was bent on making trouble. He probably was at this time in the
confidence of McCune Smith and the able Negro group of New York who had
developed a not unnatural distrust of whites, and a desire to foster
race pride. Using information thus obtained, Forbes sought to put
pressure on Republican leaders to organize more effective warfare on
slavery, and to discredit John Brown. Sanborn wrote hastily: “It looks
as if the project must, for the present, be deferred, for I find by
reading Forbes’s epistles to the doctor that he knows the details of the
plan, and even knows (what very few do) that the doctor, Mr. Stearns,
and myself are informed of it. How he got this knowledge is a mystery.
He demands that Hawkins [John Brown] be dismissed as agent, and himself
or some other be put in his place, threatening otherwise to make the
business public.”[193] Gerrit Smith concluded, “Brown must go no
further.” But Higginson wisely demurred. “I regard any postponement,” he
said, “as simply abandoning the project; for if we give it up now, at
the command or threat of H. F., it will be the same next year. The only
way is to circumvent the man somehow (if he cannot be restrained in his
malice). When the thing is well started, who cares what he says?”[194]
Further efforts were made to conciliate Forbes but he wrote wildly: “I
have been grossly defrauded in the name of humanity and anti-slavery....
I have for years labored in the anti-slavery cause, without wanting or
thinking of a recompense. Though I have made the least possible parade
of my work, it has nevertheless not been entirely without fruit....
Patience and mild measures having failed, I reluctantly have recourse to
harshness. Let them not flatter themselves that I shall eventually
become weary and shall drop the subject; it is as yet quite at its
beginning.”[195]
“To go on in face of this is madness,” wrote Sanborn, and John Brown was
urged to come to New York to meet Stearns and Howe. Brown had already
been delayed nearly a month at Chatham by this trouble, but he obeyed
the summons. Sanborn says: “When, about May 20th, Mr. Stearns met Brown
in New York, it was arranged that hereafter the custody of the Kansas
rifles should be in Brown’s hands as the agent, not of this committee,
but of Mr. Stearns alone. It so happened that Gerrit Smith, who seldom
visited Boston, was coming there late in May.... He arrived and took
rooms at the Revere House, where, on the 24th of May, 1858, the secret
committee (organized in March, and consisting of Smith, Parker, Howe,
Higginson, Stearns, and Sanborn) held a meeting to consider the
situation. It had already been decided to postpone the attack, and the
arms had been placed under a temporary interdict, so that they could
only be used, for the present, in Kansas. The questions remaining were
whether Brown should be required to go to Kansas at once, and what
amount of money should be raised for him in the future. Of the six
members of the committee only one (Higginson) was absent.... It was
unanimously resolved that Brown ought to go to Kansas at once.”
As soon as possible after this, on May 21st, Brown visited Boston, and
while there held a conversation with Higginson, who made a record of it
at the time. He states that Brown was full of regret at the decision of
the Revere House council to postpone the attack till the winter or
spring of 1859, when the secret committee would raise for Brown two or
three thousand dollars; he meantime was to blind Forbes by going to
Kansas, and to transfer the property so as to relieve the Kansas
committee of responsibility, they in future not to know his plans.
“On probing Brown,” Higginson goes on, “I found that he ... considered
delay very discouraging to his thirteen men, and to those in Canada.
Impossible to begin in autumn; and he would not lose a day (he finally
said) if he had three hundred dollars; it would not cost twenty-five
dollars apiece to get his men from Ohio, and that was all he needed. The
knowledge that Forbes could give of his plan would be injurious, for he
wished his opponents to underrate him; but still ... the increased
terror produced would perhaps counterbalance this, and it would not make
much difference. If he had the means he would not lose a day. He
complained that some of his Eastern friends were not men of action; that
they were intimidated by Wilson’s letter, and magnified the obstacles.
Still, it was essential that they should not think him reckless, he
said; and as they held the purse, he was powerless without them, having
spent nearly everything received this campaign, on account of delay,—a
month at Chatham, etc.”[196]
There was nothing now for Brown but to conceal his arms, scatter his men
and hide a year in Kansas. It was a bitter necessity and it undoubtedly
helped ruin the success of the foray. The Negroes in Canada fell away
from the plan when it did not materialize and doubted Brown’s
determination and wisdom. His son hid the arms in northern Ohio in a
haymow.
Meantime, a part of the company—Stevens, Cook, Tidd, Gill, Taylor and
Owen Brown—immediately after the adjournment of the convention, had gone
to Cleveland, O., and had found work in the surrounding country. Brown
wrote from Canada at the time:
“It seems that all but three have managed to stop their board bills, and
I do hope the balance will follow the manlike and noble example of
patience and perseverance set them by the others, instead of being
either discouraged or out of humor. The weather is so wet here that no
work can be obtained. I have only received $15 from the East, and such
has been the effect of the course taken by F. [Col. Forbes], on our
Eastern friends, that I have some fears that we shall be compelled to
delay further action for the present. They [his Eastern friends] urge us
to do so, promising us liberal assistance after a while. I am in hourly
expectation of help sufficient to pay off our bills here, and to take us
on to Cleveland, to see and advise with you, which we shall do at once
when we shall get the means. Suppose we do have to defer our direct
efforts; shall great and noble minds either indulge in useless
complaint, or fold their arms in discouragement, or sit in idleness,
when we may at least avoid losing ground? It is in times of difficulty
that men show what they are; it is in such times that men mark
themselves. Are our difficulties such as to make us give up one of the
noblest enterprises in which men ever were engaged?”[197]
Two weeks later the rest of the party, except Kagi, followed to
Cleveland, John Brown going East to meet Stearns. Kagi, who was an
expert printer, went to Hamilton, Canada, where he set up and printed
the constitution, arriving in Cleveland about the middle of June when
Brown returned from the East. Realf says that Brown did not have much
money, but sent him to New York and Washington to watch Forbes and
possibly regain his confidence. Realf, however, had become timid and
lukewarm in the cause and sailed away to England. The rest of the men
scattered. Owen Brown went to Akron, O. Cook left Cleveland for the
neighborhood of Harper’s Ferry; Gill secured work in a Shaker
settlement, probably Lebanon, O., where Tidd was already employed;
Steward Taylor went to Illinois; Stevens awaited Brown at Cleveland;
while Leeman got some work in Ashtabula County. John Brown left Boston,
on the 3rd of June, proceeding to the North Elba home for a short visit.
Then he, Kagi, Stevens, Leeman, Gill, Parsons, Moffett, and Owen were
gathered together and the party went to Kansas, arriving late in June.
Thus suddenly ended John Brown’s attempt to organize the Black Phalanx.
His intimate friends understood that the great plan was only postponed,
but the postponement had, as Higginson predicted, a dampening effect,
and Brown’s chances of enlisting a large Canadian contingent were
materially lessened. Nevertheless, seed had been sown. And there were
millions of human beings to whom the last word of the Chatham
Declaration of Independence was more than mere rhetoric: “Nature is
mourning for its murdered and afflicted children. Hung be the Heavens in
scarlet!”