The details that Brown's biographers have published concerning the concentration of the military stores at his headquarters; his correspondence with his men; the assembling of them in Maryland; his constantly recurring financial embarrassments, and the edited statements concerning the daily life which he and his men led after their arrival at the seat of war, are of little or no public interest or value. They fail to touch upon the vital purpose that led Brown, in the disguise of a farmer or cattle buyer, to take up his residence at the Kennedy farm house. They fail to even hint at the broad purpose of his being there, or of the commanding things which he strenuously sought to promote during the months that he occupied the ground. They trifle with their theme and with their characters. These men had not dedicated their lives to martyrdom "that others might live." Their impromptu metamorphosis from "soiled lives" to consecrated lives is gratuitous. They were _capitalized_ upon "the monstrous wrong which they beheld," and intended to turn it, through a wrong still more monstrous, to a monstrous personal advantage. No maudlin sentiment inspired these men, "with soiled lives behind them" to dare as few ever dared before. Their "hearts throbbed" with a single mighty purpose--an ambition worthy of the desperation of their adventure. Their goal was an empire and its emoluments: their rewards the spoils of conquest of the most promising field that marauders ever planned to plunder.
The time finally agreed upon and fixed for the great catastrophe was the night of October 16th. The party consisted of the following persons:
WHITE: COLORED: John Brown J. A. Copeland, Jr. J. H. Kagi L. S. Leary A. D. Stevens O. P. Anderson J. E. Cook Dangerfield Newby C. P. Tidd Shields Green Albert Hazlett J. G. Anderson William Thompson D. O. Thompson Edwin Coppoc Barclay Coppoc W. H. Leeman Owen Brown Oliver Brown Watson Brown F. J. Merriam Stewart Taylor
The extent of the conspiracy among the slaves and the confidential arrangements and agreements which Brown made and entered into with them--his co-conspirators--during the months he spent in secret negotiations with them; and the pledges and promises that had been exchanged between them will, of course, never be known. But so far as the plans agreed upon related to the initial movements, the general outline of them was simple enough for the comprehension of every one, the untutored slaves included. Brown and his men were to occupy Harper's Ferry. They were to cut the telegraph wires and take possession of the public buildings located there--the armory, the arsenal, and the rifle works--and the military stores contained in them. The slaves, on their part, were to revolt against their masters; murder them and their families, and then report to Brown at Harper's Ferry, where they would be organized into companies, regiments, and brigades, and be armed and equipped from the stock of war material which he would have in his possession.