If Jason Brown, "whose hatred of blood-letting had deprived him of his fathers confidence," when violent deeds were under way,[151] "had devoted" himself to sharpening the cutlasses in John's camp May 23d, as stated by Mr. Villard,[152] he would have known that "blood-letting" was to ensue; and the news that blood had been shed, would not have come to him as a shock--"'the worst shock' that ever came to him in his life."[153] Nor would he have "tremblingly" _demanded_ of his father on the night of the 25th: "Did you have anything to do with the killing of those men on the Pottawatomie?" For he would not only have known that there were to be killings, and who were to be killed, but he would have been a party to them, and to the robbery. He would have known all about what was to happen. But to his eternal credit let it be said that his father and brothers had not taken him into their confidence in this matter. Townsley, in his confession, said nothing about the calling for volunteers, and the grinding of sabres, although it is probable that his connection with Brown's scheme began on May 23d, as he stated. There were suspicious circumstances which tended to incriminate the Brown party; but the facts that the horses which were stolen had been run out of the country, while the Browns remained in the neighborhood, and did not have the murdered men's horses in their possession, were potent in allaying these suspicions, and gave them an opportunity to deny their guilt. But if the sensational scenes of calling for volunteers for a hostile purpose, and the sharpening of their sabres had actually occurred, they would have had no possible defense. This evidence would have connected them directly with the crime, and it would have been published immediately upon the return of the resentful Pottawatomie Rifles to their homes at Osawatomie and on the Pottawatomie. Whereas the resolutions adopted at the mass-meeting of citizens at Osawatomie May 27th, refer to "midnight assassins unknown;" and on May 31st, Mr. James H. Carruth wrote to the Watertown (New York) _Reformer_: ... It was murder nevertheless and the Free-State men here co-operate with the pro-slavery men in endeavoring to arrest the murderers.