Looking Back: An AutobiographyRichardson, Merrick Abner
History
Looking Back: An Autobiography
Richardson, Merrick Abner
Richardson, Merrick Abner, 1841-
"Not only is this God's law, but it coincides with experience.
Disappointment mingled with failure seems to be the earthly lot of man,
and yet it is not failure. When the morn of eternity dawns, and you and
I shall stand to be judged according to our past records, what will be
more glorious than that we meet failure in trying to accomplish good? I
know that slavery is a sin, and, if needs be, I will die for the cause."
Of course, I saw Brown occasionally during the next nine years, but I
have no time this evening to relate his wildcat crusades in Kansas and
Missouri, so we will pass over to the closing days of his life.
Oliver, Brown's youngest son, grew up on the North Elba farm, and
through him I was kept informed concerning Brown's border free-booters
until Brown came and took him to the Kennedy Farm near Harper's Ferry.
NEAR HARPER'S FERRY.
Anna, Brown's oldest daughter by his second wife, returned from
Maryland about the last of October, 1859, when at her father's request
she sent for me and gave me all the particulars concerning their
rendezvous at the Kennedy Farm and their contemplated raid on Hall's
Rifle Works at Harper's Ferry.
The next day, after promising my pets, my wife and Vida, that I
would not join the mutineers, as Vida liked to call them, I left for
Washington, and was soon in consultation with John Brown in the attic
of the little house on the Kennedy Farm, where Anna had, as Brown said,
acted as his watchdog, entertaining and detaining all strangers until
he or his men could disperse or prepare.
I soon discovered that his attitude toward universal freedom had not
abated, and that all his men, including three sons, had become much
like him, as, at the prayer meeting in the little church nearby and
the family altar, they often chimed in "Amen." As I think of them now
I can truthfully say I never saw a band of men more Christianized in
their expressions than those, for John had instilled into their minds
his theory that the world was to be benefited by the struggle they were
about to begin.
One day Oliver, his father and I walked down to Harper's Ferry, and
while returning in the evening, Oliver and I pressed him for an
explanation of the course he would pursue when he had taken possession
of the arms at the Rifle Works, as the slaves would be useless at
first, but he had none--he seemed to rely implicitly upon God and the
Northern abolitionists to see him through.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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