Update #2

Well, this week and a half have been very busy, I must say. This past week I have been to Washington DC (where we saw all but two Smithsonians), I was certified by the NPS to work with antique firearms, and then certified to operate NPS artillery. This week I have visited three different battlefields (Bolivar Heights, Loudon Heights, and Antietam), I have learned a lot and also gone through some interesting experiences.

Mostly this week has been training, with exhibits, dealing with the public, and also learning alot. I think by the end of this internship, I will have overdosed on John Brown, and will be sick of hearing about him. :P Although, I must say that it has been an interesting study, as before I came here, I only knew pretty much what Hollywood was telling me in movies like "Santa Fe Trail", with Erroyl Flynn and Ronald Regan. But now I know a whole lot more, and am finally making my own feelings and opinions about John Brown and his raid, not that I am allowed to share that with the public, mind you. As a government worker and agent, I am required to share only the facts, and allow my visitors to make up their own minds, which I honestly appreciate.

So, you're probably wondering what my own feelings on Mr Brown are, so here they are:
First and foremost, I agree with the main nucleus of his politics, while certainly not his execution of them. I consider myself an abolitionist even today, as there is certainly slavery throughout this world in the form of sexual slavery (something we have in Portland), as well as payment in the form of free labor for being sneaked across the border (Mexico is an easy example). Slavery, quite frankly, is alive and well, so I still consider myself an abolitionist.

That being said, I do agree with Brown's politcs, that there is absolutely no excuse or reason for slavery to exist in the world, I feel it to be a moral evil, much as Brown did, and that any and every decent person should want to lend a hand to end it once and for all.

However, that is as far as Brown and I go together. Brown was willing to advocate violence, even against ones own nation to end a political institution. While I do advocate and am willing to co-operate with a violent action AS LONG AS THE MEANS JUSTIFY THE ENDS. This is why I support the Union army even in my current politics, which is also why I hardly ever wear a Confederate uniform. But like I said, I only support violent force if the means justify the ends, such as the case of the Civil War or World War Two.

Brown seperates from my political view when he proceeds into "bloody Kansas". He takes first blood in what is called the "Pottawatomie massacre", and takes part in the militant campaigns against the slave state advocates in Kansas.

In late 1856, he returns to the east coast to confer with "the secret six", six majorly influential abolitionist voices in the American political landscape, by the names of:  Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Samuel Gridley Howe, Theodore Parker, Franklin Benjamin Sanborn, Gerrit Smith, and George Luther Stearns. These men secretly were funding and supplying Brown's clandestine actions against pro-slavery forces, and had immense political and social power.

After speaking to the secret six, Brown traveled throughout New England and southern Canada gathering support from early 1857-mid 1859. In mid July of 1859, John Brown travels to a very small town of Harpers Ferry, Virginia, whose only claim to fame was the Harpers Ferry armory and arsenal, as well as the Hall's rifle works, built by John Hall, the inventor of the first breech loading firearm in America.

His objective in this town is to take as many firearms as possible from the arsenal to give to slaves that he is expecting to rise up in a massive slave rebellion in Virginia, which he will conduct from the sanctuary of the Appalachian mountains.

On the night of October 16th, 1859, Brown leads 18 followers, both black and white, in an attack on the United States arsenal, an action that immediately makes him both an anarchist and a rebel to the United States government, as well as against the state of Virginia. Initially the raid goes very well, and Brown takes over the armory, arsenal, and B&O railroad bridge with very little resistance. In this process, where he captures the two firewardens on duty in the arsenal, as well as taking dozens of hostages from the people of the town and the surrounding area, including Colonel Lewis Washington, the great-grand-nephew of General George Washington.

This is as far as Brown gets without a hitch however, as the people of the town are severely ticked off, instead of cowed in fear by Brown's raiders who have come in the middle of the night with torches and firearms. The next morning, the towns people begin to drive Brown's men from their positions throughout the arsenal, armory, and the town. By afternoon and evening of the 17th,  Brown and his men are pinned down in the armory firehouse at the south eastern corner of the armory, and the day ends with a draw between Brown's men and the angry towns people who have been reinforced by Virginia state militia.

By the morning of the 18th, the position is hopeless for Brown, especially as the angry mob and Virginia militia have now been reinforced  by 90 United States Marines from the Washington D.C. Navy yard, under the command of Colonel Robert E. Lee, who is accompanied by J.E.B. Stewart, of the United States Cavalry.

Arriving on the scene, Colonel Lee demands the surrender of the firehouse, which is refused by John Brown. Within minutes, a storming party is formed of Marines, and the final attack is made on the engine house. Liutenant Israel Greene is the first through the door of the engine house, followed by Privates Russel, Quinn, and Ruppert. Greene and Russel make it through the door and into the back of the engine house safely, but Quinn is killed in the door and Ruppert  is shot through the jaw just outside the door. These to USMC casualties are what makes the Harpers Ferry engine house an official USMC battlefield, on the same level of importance as Iwo Jima.

The final battle is over in three minutes, and the raid is finished without one slave freed or one firearm stolen. I have to chuckle at the fact that the entire raid lasted 36 hours, but the marines fought the final battle and ended it in 3 minutes.

That  is the story of John Brown, in a shortened version. This is only one of the stories I will be telling while I am here. I hope that I will learn to tell it well, and to do honor to the memories of those who died for the freedom of an entire race of men. It is a tremendous responsibility, as well as a huge honor. I only hope that I am up to the task.