It was the original intention to steal four lots of horses and murder seven men. The persons murdered in pursuance of their plans were John Doyle and two of his sons, Hon. Allen Wilkinson, and William Sherman. Those who escaped death were Henry Sherman, a brother of William, and another person whose name has been withheld from publication.[114] The _silent_ weapons used in these murders were some of the short swords, ground to a keen edge, that Brown had brought with him when he came to the Territory. The unfortunate victims, in holding up their arms in vain attempts to shield their heads from impending blows, were struck upon their forearms and hands; these in some instances were almost severed from their bodies. The heads of the murdered men, except in the case of Doyle, were split open and their bodies otherwise mutilated. In the case of Doyle, he was shot in the head; and in addition thereto, a sword was run through his breast. He was the first victim of the tragedies. The shot which struck him was the only shot that was fired in these murders, and the firing of it stands charged to John Brown himself. Of this Mr. Villard says:[115] "Salmon Brown will not positively state that his father fired it but admits that no one else pulled a trigger." An account in detail of these murders is found in the testimony of the widows of Doyle and Wilkinson, and of James Harris, and others, taken before Hon. M. N. Oliver, of Missouri, minority member of a congressional committee of which Hon. W. A. Howard was chairman. The committee was appointed in 1855 to investigate and report to Congress upon the troubles in Kansas. The character of the evidence brought out in this investigation incriminated the Browns; but for more than twenty years thereafter the surviving members of the family stoutly denied having any participation in the crime. Even at Harper's Ferry, when standing within the shadow of the gallows, John Brown denied having had anything to do with it. To Judge Russell "the prisoner reiterated his assertion often made in those prison days that he was not personally concerned in the Pottawatomie murders."[116] But after the confession of James Townsley, his biographers and friends were forced to acknowledge Brown's directing hand in the crime. Since that time, they have continuously sought, by various pretexts--defensive, patriotic and altruistic--to justify him in the killing of these men; and to distract attention away from the real motive that prompted it; with the result that they have thus far succeeded in so agitating discussion upon the merits of the _murders_, as to concentrate public attention upon that feature of the crime--the murders--and to eliminate or silence any allusion whatever to the fundamental feature of it--_robbery_. As a consequence of their propaganda, writers of history have not made any reference to the robberies to which the murders were subordinate and incidental.