Brown's younger sons were infidels. They had "discovered the Bible to be all fiction."[44] To the Sabbath day and its sanctity, he was indifferent. In violation of the stricter conventions, which prevailed at that time, concerning the observance of it as "Holy unto the Lord," he committed the principal crimes incident to his career, wholly or in part, on the Sabbath. A part of the murders and thefts on the Pottawatomie were committed on Sunday morning, May 25, 1856. Returning to Kansas from Nebraska City (August 9th and 10th) half the journey was made on Sunday, August 10th. "On August 24," 1856 (Sunday), "the Brown and Cline companies set out for the South, marching eight miles and camping on Sugar Creek."[45] Sunday night, October 16, 1859, was the time fixed for the insurrection of the slaves to occur, and on that night, in pursuance of his plans, he occupied Harper's Ferry. Brown was averse to military operations, and military affairs. He refused to drill with the local militia, paying the fines instead, which were imposed by law for such delinquencies. In political matters he affiliated with the Abolitionists, or with those of the party who were "non-resistants."[46] The statements which have been put forth in support of the assumption that Brown's life was a devotion to the Anti-Slavery cause--a series of abnormal activities in opposition to slavery--are not confirmed, nor can they be justified by any contemporaneous evidence. For notwithstanding the persistent, if not offensive, insistence of his biographers to the contrary; and the pages without number which have been written in support of such insistence, the record of his life is practically barren in relation to the subject. There is not a scrap of concurrent evidence which, even remotely, suggests that prior to 1855 he might have taken more than a most ordinary interest in securing freedom for the slaves. Even in his letter of that year to Mr. John W. Cook (_note_ 40), informing him of his intention to go to Kansas, and of his motive for going thereto, he made no reference to the subject whatever. A statement of everything which Brown did, or that he attempted to do up to that year, in opposition to slavery, may be republished in this book without encumbering its pages. It will therefore be given.