The tragedy of a country founded on freedom engaging in a war
to keep some of its citizens enslaved and the tragedy of Americans fighting
Americans, with hundreds of thousands of men killed by their fellow countrymen challenges
our comprehension. Perhaps these two facts help illustrate the tragedy: on a
single day in September 1862 at the Battle of Antietam, more than 23,000 men
were killed or injured. This totals more
than all of the causalities in all of the battles that the United States had fought
up to that time. During the four years
of the Civil War, over 600,000 men died -- with 360,000 killed from the North
and 258,000 from the South. Many more died of their injuries in the months and
years after combat. The legacy of the
Civil War continues as its sites still attract tourists from around the country
and the world, as its battle tactics are still studied, and even after 150
years, as its causes and effects still stir heated debates.
 |
| Volunteer Burt leads a tour of Harpers Ferry to a group of tourists (Photo by Hunner) |
A conflict that engulfed millions of people and lasted four
years took a long time to develop. Driven by History will focus on the causes
of the conflict over the next few weeks and has already posted a history of
slavery in New York City at African Burial Ground For now, let’s focus on the beginnings of the armed
conflict that occurred in Kansas and Harpers Ferry.
Harpers Ferry sits at the confluence of the Potomac and
Shenandoah Rivers. Thomas Jefferson passed by the valley with his daughter in
1783 on his way to serve in the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. He wrote
in his Notes on the State of Virginia
that it was “one of the most stupendous scenes in nature” and “worth a trip
across the ocean” to witness.
 |
| The Thomas Jefferson Rock overlooking Harpers Ferry. (Photo by Hunner) |
President George Washington established a federal
armory and arsenal there. In 1803, Meriwether Lewis obtained guns, powder
horns, bullet molds, knives, and an iron frame for a portable boat to take on
the Voyage of Discovery. It was an important place in the 19th century.
 |
| A replica of Lewis's steel framed boat which he had made at Harpers Ferry (Photo by Hunner) |
Dennis Frye, the Chief of Interpretation at Harpers Ferry, laid
out its importance for me. First, Harpers Ferry was one of the earliest industrial
centers in the U.S. The falls at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah
Rivers provided ample water power for the mills that produced manufactured
goods for the new republic. In 1819, John Hall used his government contract to
make guns at Harpers Ferry with a revolutionary idea of manufacturing interchangeable
parts that fit every musket.[1]
 |
| Muskets made at the Armory at Harpers Ferry (From exhibit at Visitors' Center) |
Second, transportation innovations that transformed the
United States came to Harpers Ferry in the 1830s. From Baltimore, the
Chesapeake and Ohio Canal and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad raced to the west
through Harpers Ferry to tap into the verdant region in Ohio. The route through
this valley continues as trains screeched by my RV park day and night in nearby
Brunswick, Maryland.
 |
| Harpers Ferry and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad bridge over the Potomac River (From the exhibit at the Visitors' Center) |
Third, the military importance of the gap through the Blue
Ridge Mountains manifested itself even before the Civil War when John Brown
raided the armory and arsenal at Harpers Ferry to supply a slave revolt. Some
say that the Civil War started then. During the war, the town changed hands eight
times since it served as a strategic gateway to both the Shenandoah Valley and as
an invasion route to the north for the Confederates. Harpers Ferry had more
than 1,400 days of contest during the Civil War, even more if you factor in
John Brown’s raid in 1859. By comparison, the battles of Antietam and Gettysburg
lasted one and three days respectively.
 |
| Troops crossing the Potomac on a temporary bridge during the Civil War (From the exhibit at the Visitors' Center) |
And fourth, civil rights in the 20th century got
a start here with the Niagara Movement in 1906 that helped found the NAACP in
1909. From industrialization to transportation to war to civil rights,
Harpers
Ferry saw some of the most significant events in our nation’s history in the 19th
and early 20th century. So Harpers Ferry played an important role both
before and after the Civil War. It is a town anchored in many of the main
developments in our nation’s past.
 |
| Students at Storer College in Harpers Ferry (From exhibit at the Visitors' Center) |
Let’s focus on the beginning of the Civil War with John
Brown and his raid. For an opportunistic attack on a nexus of the nation that targeted
slavery, Harpers Ferry was ideal for Brown.
Born in 1800 to a family that farmed the hard hills of
Connecticut, Brown embraced Calvinism, an austere faith that fought sin and
material attachments. He also embraced the precepts of the young nation,
especially the promise that all men are created equal. His fierce belief in
this founding principle fueled a passionate drive to rid the nation of slavery.
 |
| Portraits of John Brown over the years (From the exhibit at the Visitors' Center) |
Brown arrived in Kansas Territory in October 1855. The
Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 had opened up those territories to a popular vote
on slavery. Pro and anti-slavery advocates moved in to contest the vote, and
emotions ran hot. As one pro-slavery newspaper proclaimed: “We will continue to
tar and feather, drown, lynch, and hang every white-livered abolitionist who
dares to pollute our soil.”[2]
In May 1856, 400 “Border Ruffians” attacked the Free State enclave
at Lawrence, Kansas and anti-slavery settlers elsewhere. In retaliation, Brown,
with four sons and two other men, descended on pro-slavery homes along the Pottawatomie
Creek where they hacked to death five men. Violence continued to flare in
Kansas, including the "Battle of Osawatomie" where Brown and forty
men fought with several hundred Border Ruffians. Then Brown, now nationally known
as the fiery abolitionist of Bleeding Kansas, left the territory to hatch a
bigger plan to abolish slavery.
 |
| Tragic Prelude by John Steuart Curry |
Brown wanted to capture the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry
with its 100,000 guns and distribute those weapons to start a slave rebellion. He
recruited men, raised money from abolitionists, and infiltrated the area in
July 1859. Brown declared: “I want to free all the Negros in this state. If the
citizens interfere with me, I must only burn the town and have blood.”[3]
On Sunday evening, October 16, John Brown, two of his sons,
and eighteen other men, including five African Americans, set out from a nearby
farm through the autumnal chill to attack Harpers Ferry. They quickly captured
the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad bridge across the Potomac River, while shooting
Heyward Shepherd, who died the next day. Shepherd, a free black luggage porter
for the B & O, was their first victim.
 |
| A tribute to Heyward Shepherd near where he was killed from the United Daughters of the Confederacy (Photo by Hunner) |
 |
| A replica of the Engine House, Brown's headquarters during the raid. (Photo by Hunner) |
Two future commanders of the Confederate Army responded to
the raid. Lt. Jeb Stuart, a cavalryman with the Army, led the ninety marines
sent to the conflict. From D.C., they arrived by train at Harpers Ferry around
11 pm on the 17th. After
calling for surrender, which Brown ignored, the marines stormed the Engine
House. In his report on the action, future Confederate General Robert E. Lee
commented that in a few minutes, ten of Brown’s men died as well as five hostages,
including the mayor of Harpers Ferry and one marine.[4]
 |
| A drawing of the interior of the Engine House with Brown's raiders and their hostages. (From the exhibit at the Visitors' Center) |
Punishment came swiftly to Brown and his surviving men. One
week after the raid, Brown faced trial in Charlestown. After a week of
testimony, the jury needed only forty-five minutes to convict him of treason
and murder. On Dec. 2, 1859, John Brown was hung.
The raid failed to start a slave rebellion. But it did spark
an increase in abolition action in the north, and in the south, increased fears
of both slave revolts and northern attacks on slavery. Brown’s intention of
forcing the issue of slavery onto center stage worked.
Harpers Ferry continued to see action in the Civil War. In
April 1861, Virginian troops, led by Thomas (later dubbed Stonewall) Jackson,
captured the town and sent it weapons-making machinery south to produce arms
for the Confederacy. In the fall of 1862, Jackson and his troops returned, laid
siege to the town, and forced the surrender of the federal troops there, the
largest such Union surrender during the Civil War.
After the war, Free Will Baptists created Storer College to teach
ex-slaves, which became a center for civil rights struggles in the later
part of the 19th and into the 20th centuries. At the
second meeting of the Niagara Movement at Storer College, W.E.B. DuBois called
for changes, including the vote for African American men; an end to discrimination
in public accommodations; that the 14th and 15th amendments
be honored and that laws be enforced “against the rich as well as the poor…
against white as well as black;” and that “we want our children educated.”[5]
This meeting helped create the NAACP in 1909.
 |
| The second meeting of the Niagara Movement at Storer College. W.E.B. DuBois is seated, fourth from the right. (From the exhibit of the African American Museum at Harpers Ferry) |
Harpers Ferry has played a significant role in our nation’s
history. As a transportation center, a
gateway to the west, a site in the industrial revolution, a flash point for the
Civil War, and a center for civil rights, this place instigated and witnessed
major events in the 19th and 20th centuries. Brown’s raid
on Harpers Ferry helped realize of one of the founding promises of the country,
that all men are created equal. Over the next few weeks, Driven by History will
visit other Civil War parks will explore the history of the bloody conflict.
President Franklin Roosevelt signed legislation creating Harpers
Ferry National Monument on June 29, 1944. It became a National Historical Park
in 1963.
 |
| A monument to John Brown at Harpers Ferry with the Engine House on the left. (Photo by Hunner) |
