John Brown’s Raid: Harpers Ferry and the Coming of the Civil War, October 16-18, 1859

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By Jon-Erik M. Gilot & Kevin R. Pawlak

The first shot of the American Civil War was not fired on April 12, 1861, in Charleston, South Carolina, but instead came on October 16, 1859, in Harpers Ferry, Virginia—or so claimed former slave turned abolitionist Frederick Douglass. Brown led a band of nineteen men on the nighttime raid that targeted the Federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry. There, they planned to begin a war to end slavery in the United States. But after 36 tumultuous hours, John Brown’s Raid failed, and his subsequent trial further divided north and south on the issue of slavery. Herman Melville and Walt Whitman extolled Brown as a “meteor” of the war. Richly filled with maps and images, it includes a driving and walking tour of sites related to Brown’s Raid so visitors today can follow the path of America’s meteor.

Paperback: 192 pages
Publisher: Savas Beatie (March 2023)