John Brown, Soldier of Fortune: A CritiqueWilson, Hill Peebles
History
John Brown, Soldier of Fortune: A Critique
Wilson, Hill Peebles
Brown, John, 1800-1859
have felt the oppression we ask you to check. Ask this gray
haired man, gentleman--if you have the heart to do
it--where lies the body of his murdered son--where are the
homes of his four other sons, who a year ago were quiet
farmers in Kansas. I am ashamed, in presence of this modest
veteran, to express the admiration which his heroism
excites in me. Yet he, so venerable for his years, his
integrity, and his courage--a man whom all Massachusetts
rises up to honor--is today an outlaw in Kansas. To these
witnesses, whose unsworn testimony deserves and will
receive from you all, the authority which an oath confers,
I will now yield place.
Mr. Redpath states that Brown then came forward and read his speech, "in
a clear ringing tone," as follows:[228]
"I saw, while in Missouri, in the fall of 1855, large
numbers of men going to Kansas to vote, and also returning
after they had so done; as they said.
"Later in the year, I, with four of my sons, was called out
and traveled, mostly on foot and during the night, to help
defend Lawrence, a distance of thirty-five miles; where we
were detained, with some five hundred others, or
thereabouts, from five to ten days--say an average of ten
days--at a cost of not less than a dollar and a half per
day, as wages, to say nothing of the actual loss and
suffering occasioned to many of them, leaving their
families sick, their crops not secured, their houses
unprepared for winter, and many without houses at all. This
was the case with myself and sons who could not get houses
built after returning. Wages alone would amount to seven
thousand five hundred dollars; loss and suffering cannot be
estimated.
"I saw, at that time, the body of the murdered Barber, and
was present to witness his wife and other friends brought
in to see him with his clothes on, just as he was when
killed.
"I, with six sons and a son-in-law, was called out, and
travelled, most of the way on foot, to try and save
Lawrence, May 20 and 21, and much of the way in the night.
From that date, neither I nor my sons, nor my son-in-law,
could do any work about our homes, but lost our whole time
until we left, in October; except one of my sons, who had a
few weeks to devote to the care of his own and his
brother's family, who were then without a home.
"From about the 20th of May, hundreds of men, like
ourselves, lost their whole time, and entirely failed of
securing any kind of a crop whatever. I believe it safe to
say, that five hundred free state men lost each one hundred
and twenty days, which, at one dollar and a half per day,
would be--to say nothing of attendant losses--ninety
thousand dollars.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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