John Brown's Raid

Who Was John Brown?

John Brown (1800-1859) was an American Abolishment, which meant he did not like slavery and he wanted to get rid of it. He did not believe in it what so ever, He believed that Christians should treat people the same no matter what color their skin was. Also John believed that it was acceptable to use violence to end slavery. Brown was a man of many children; he had around 20 children which all believed in the same thing he believed in. John grew up in Spring Field Massachusetts, before moving into the Kansas Territory. 

The Raid

In 1859, John Brown and his 5 sons were so fed up with the slavery that John decided that he was going to pull an attack on Harpers Ferry in Virginia. Harpers Ferry had a large Federal Arsenal of weapons, because he was going to get the weapons to the slaves so they could attack and kill their masters so they could be free at last. John thought his plan would work perfectly, he thought him, his sons, and a few other black men would ambush the arsenal, killing the guards/soldiers, taking the weapons and giving them to the slaves. But the thing John did not know, was that most of all the slaves he invited would not show up, causing them to be over powered by the Confederates. Brown was captured when all of his sons were shot and killed, and he was hung on December 2, 1859.

Why was this important the Civil War?

There are many people who believed that this is actually what started the Civil War, because people believed that he had such a strike on the states. There was never such a violent abolishment attack before this raid, which is what shocked the Confederates. This is why this was a very large cause for the start of the civil war.