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ROBBERY AND MURDER ON THE POTTAWATOMIE

A blush as of roses Where rose never grew! Great drops on the bunch-grass But not of the dew! A taint in the sweet air For wild bees to shun! A stain that will never Bleach out in the sun!

Back, steed of the prairies! Sweet song bird, fly back! Wheel hither, bald vulture! Gray wolf, call thy pack! The foul human vultures Have feasted and fled; The wolves of the Border Have crept from the dead.

—From Le Marais du Cygne. Whittier.

From a rude home in the bleak mountains of northern New York, John Brown went to Kansas; not for the purpose of fighting, but inspired by the hope of bettering his shattered fortunes; a hope that withered in the budding, and gave place to feelings of deep disappointment and discouragement. He wrote February 1st:

It is now nearly six weeks that the snow has almost constantly been driven, like dry sand, by the fierce winds of Kansas. By means of the sale of our horse and wagon, our present wants are tolerably well met; so that, if health is continued to us, we shall not probably suffer much. … Thermometer on Sunday and Monday at twenty-eight to twenty-nine below zero. Ice in the river, in the timber, and under the snow, eighteen inches thick this week. … Jason down again with the ague, but he was some better yesterday. Oliver was also laid up by freezing his toes—one great toe so badly frozen that the nail has come off. He will be crippled for some days yet. Owen has one foot frozen. We have middling tough times (as some would call them) but have enough to eat, and abundant reason for the most unfeigned gratitude. … [110]

These were hard conditions. It would be difficult to imagine circumstances of greater discomfort and hopelessness. But what about the future—the future for himself and for the wife and the daughters depending upon him for the necessaries of life, for whose benefit he had come to Kansas? Did Brown think of them? Present inconvenience and privation may be borne with fortitude if the future holds out a promise of betterment. In his case we may reasonably assume that the problems of the future, rather than the present conditions and discouragements, engrossed his thoughts. It is altogether unreasonable to suppose that this unscrupulous man of affairs—this restless, aggressive speculator—sat listlessly, amid his environment of discomfort and poverty, and permitted the dreary months to pass without thinking of his precarious financial condition, and of the incessantly urgent family responsibilities impending; and of the possibilities of bettering his fortunes in the immediate future. His biographers have wisely avoided discussion of the practical side of Brown's condition at this time, preferring to wander in more intangible fields, and to speculate upon the emotional and metaphysical phenomena they seek to involve in the situation. The record of his life at this time, however, reveals the fact that Brown did think of the future and of its responsibilities; and that he did mature a plan to better his financial condition. Also, that his plan was in harmony with his latest and best biographer's estimate of his character: "It was not only that he was visionary as a business man,"[111] says Mr. Villard, "but that he developed the fatal tendency to speculate; doubtless the outgrowth of his restlessness, and the usual desire of the bankrupt for a sudden coup to restore his fortune," To his wife he wrote as follows:

Brown's Station, K. T., April 7, 1856.

Dear Wife and Children, Every One—I wrote you last week, … We do not want you to borrow trouble about us, but trust us to the care of "Him who feeds the young ravens when they cry." I have, as usual, but little to write. We are doing off a house for Orson Day, which we hope to get through with soon; after which we shall probably soon leave this neighborhood, but will advise you further when we leave. It may be that Watson can manage to get a little money for shearing sheep if you do not get any from Connecticut. I still hope you will get help from that source. We have no wars as yet, but we still have abundance of "rumors." We still have frosty nights, but the grass starts a little. There are none of us complaining much just now, all being able to do something. John has just returned from Topeka, not having met with any difficulty; but we hear that preparations are making in the United States Court for numerous arrests of Free State men. For one, I have no desire (all things considered) to have the slave power cease from its acts of aggression. "Their foot shall slide in due time." May God bless and keep you all.

Your affectionate husband and father,

John Brown.

This letter foreshadows the turning point in John Brown's career. It discloses the fact that he and his sons intended to engage in an enterprise that was related to danger, against which he sought to quiet his wife's apprehensions. The letter also foreshadows the fact that as a result of what they intended to do, they would probably leave the neighborhood; but as to either the nature of the undertaking which they had in view, or the time at which the venture would be executed, she would not be informed until they left the country. It discloses further the significant fact, that his attitude toward the Free-State cause had undergone a change. That instead of treasuring in his heart a patriotic desire to win freedom for Kansas by peaceable means, he had assumed a hostile attitude. He now desired, not peace, but war.

Three important facts appear at this point in Brown's history: That he had decided to do something of a dangerous character and leave the neighborhood; that he desired a revival of pro-slavery aggressions; and that he had disbanded the "Liberty Guards."

On the 16th of April, 1856, John Brown, Jr., was in command of the "Pottawatomie Rifles."[112] He said: "During the winter of 1856, I raised a company of riflemen, from the Free-State settlers who had their homes in the vicinity of Osawatomie and Pottawatomie Creek."[113] James Townsley, in his "confession," made December 6, 1879, said: "I joined the Pottawatomie Rifle Company at its reorganization in May, 1856, at which time John Brown, Jr., was elected captain."

Why Brown should desire a revival of pro-slavery aggressions, if he intended to leave the neighborhood; and what he intended to do, are important questions in this analysis which his versatile biographers have failed to attempt to explain. Brown could not have desired a provocation from the pro-slavery people because he wanted an opportunity to fight—to march against them at the head of the "Liberty Guards," and "stagger the slave-power by the driving force of his iron will;"—for he intended to leave the neighborhood; he intended to go away from the scene of the prospective aggressions. He was no longer "Captain of the Liberty Guards," but a private citizen; therefore, he must have desired an outbreak of pro-slavery hostility for personal reasons; for reasons relating to operations which he intended to engage in with Henry Thompson as an associate; who wrote, equivocally, to his wife in May, 1856, that "Upon Brown's plans would depend his own, until School is out."