1859

On October 16, 1859, John Brown leads 21 men — including five Black men, among them Dangerfield Newby and Osborne Anderson — in seizing the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, hoping to spark a general slave uprising. The raid fails; Brown is captured by Robert E. Lee, tried for treason, and hanged December 2. His martyrdom accelerates the march to Civil War.

On October 16, 1859, John Brown led 21 men — 16 white, 5 Black — in seizing the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, intending to trigger a general slave uprising. Brown held the armory for 36 hours before being overwhelmed by U.S. Marines under Robert E. Lee. Ten of Brown's men were killed; Brown was captured, tried for treason, and hanged December 2. Five co-conspirators were also executed. Brown's raid terrified the South into believing the North intended insurrection. His calm at execution and his statement that 'the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood' made him a martyr to abolitionists. The raid accelerated Southern secession planning.

John Brown led 21 men — including five Black men: Dangerfield Newby, Osborne Anderson, Lewis Sheridan Leary, John Copeland, and Shields Green — in seizing the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, hoping to trigger a slave rebellion. US Marines under Colonel Robert E. Lee stormed the engine house on October 18. Newby was killed first; Leary died of wounds; Copeland and Green were captured and executed. Only Anderson escaped to write a memoir.

John Brown was tried for treason, murder, and conspiring with slaves, and hanged at Charles Town, Virginia. His composed demeanor during trial and execution — "I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood" — made him a martyr in the North. Bells tolled in Northern cities. In the South, the raid intensified fears of slave revolt and hardened secession sentiment.

On March 2–3, 1859, at the Ten Broeck Race Course outside Savannah, Georgia, 436 enslaved people — men, women, children, and infants — were sold over two days to settle the debts of Pierce Butler, a Philadelphia socialite. It was the largest single slave auction in American history. The enslaved people had been held at the track in horse stalls for days beforehand in cold and rain. Reporter Mortimer Thompson of the New York Tribune attended and documented the auction. Families begged to be sold together; some requests were granted, most were not. The auction grossed over $300,000. Survivors called it 'the Weeping Time.' Butler used proceeds to pay gambling debts.

John Brown's failed raid to arm the enslaved pushes the nation toward civil war.