This weekend marks the 150th anniversary of the Harper’s Ferry raid led by abolitionist John Brown. The attack began on October 16, 1859, when Brown and a band of about twenty charged the Harper’s Ferry Armory in Virginia, aiming to obtain arms from the arsenal that could be distributed to slaves for an uprising. Though initially successful in capturing the armory, two more days of battle with militia occurred, during which Brown’s plans failed. Brown’s men were defeated by troops commanded by Colonel Robert E. Lee and Lieutenant J.E.B. Stuart. Both would become better known as participants for the Confederacy in the Civil War. Many of Brown’s abolitionists, including two of his sons, were killed in the fighting, while the rest were taken prisoner for trial and execution. Brown, who had previously led a bloody massacre and was considered a “madman” by Lee, was tried for treason and hanged on December 2.Readers are invited to visit the current issue (Fall/Winter 2009-2010: Volume XI, Number 1) of Valparaiso Poetry Review, released earlier this week, which includes a poem (“John Brown and His Men, with Some Account of the Roads Traveled to Reach Harper’s Ferry” by Jared Carter) concerning these events.
3 comments:
Carter's poem has such a clear flow, of words slipping into sentences, seamlessly, as of a single breath a story unfolds where only the sound of the campfire and the speaker's voice is heard. Thanks for sharing. A delight to read.
I wrote this poem awhile ago, and was reminded of it while reading here. Sorry if sharing is verboten but 150 years doesn't come around that often!
"Just North of South"
The Allegheny Mountains
grow small enough to climb
past a battered railroad bridge
linking north to south
at Harper's Ferry.
Weathered wood runs crazily
east, into a torn sun
where John Brown waited
on wooden slates, rocking
with indignation only
a white man could afford.
Virginia was not yet west,
just one, carved south near
Maryland, her second cousin
saluting past river waters
most called Potomac.
Owned and owner alike
broke crusty bread apart
under a genteel moon,
rising and setting on
three-fifths of each back
tilling in bare soil.
And when the dying was done
Brown's neck
grabbed a learned rope
hanging from pine scaffolding.
Too soon he knew
more living would begin.
KHW
According to accounts I've read, although Brown and most of the other raiders were either killed during the raid or captured and hanged later, a few (five, as I recall -- including another of Brown's sons) escaped and were never caught.
Liked the poem by Jared Carter.
Thanks for posting this.
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