The Reading Warehouse

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A Plea for Captain John Brown is an essay by Henry David Thoreau. It is based on a speech Thoreau first delivered to an audience at Concord, Massachusetts on October 30, 1859, two weeks after John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry.

John Brown, a radical abolitionist, and twenty-one other men seized the federal armory at Harper's Ferry, the holding place for approximately 100,000 rifles and muskets, hoping to arm slaves and create a violent rebellion against the south. However, after thirty-six hours the revolt was suppressed by federal forces led by Robert E. Lee and Brown was jailed. The raid resulted in thirteen deaths, twelve rebels and one U.S. Marine. After being found guilty of murder, treason, and inciting a slave insurrection, Brown was hanged on December 2, 1859. Although largely called a failure at the time, the raid and Brown's subsequent execution impelled the American Civil War.