Charlestown, Jefferson County, Va., Nov. 25, 1859.
Rev. Heman Humphrey, D.D.
My Dear And Honored
Kinsman, — Your very sorrowful, kind, and faithful letter
of the 20th instant is now before me. I accept it with all kindness. I have
honestly endeavored to profit by the faithful advice it contains. Indeed, such
advice could never come amiss. You will allow me to say that I deeply
sympathize with you and all my sorrowing friends in their grief and terrible
mortification. I feel ten times more afflicted on their account than on account
of my own circumstances. But I must say that I am neither conscious of being “infatuated”
nor “mad.” You will doubtless agree with me in this, — that neither
imprisonment, irons, nor the gallows falling to one's lot are of themselves
evidence of either guilt, “infatuation, or madness.”
I discover that you labor under a mistaken impression as to
some important facts, which my peculiar circumstances will in all probability
prevent the possibility of my removing; and I do not propose to take up any
argument to prove that any motion or act of my life is right. But I will here
state that I know it to be wholly my own fault as a leader that caused our
disaster. Of this you have no proper means of judging, not being on the ground,
or a practical soldier. I will only add, that it was in yielding to my feelings
of humanity (if I ever exercised such a feeling), in leaving my proper place
and mingling with my prisoners to quiet their fears, that occasioned our being
caught. I firmly believe that God reigns, and that he overrules all things in
the best possible manner; and in that view of the subject I try to be in some
degree reconciled to my own weaknesses and follies even.
If you were here on the spot, and could be with me by day
and by night, and know the facts and how my time is spent here, I think you
would find much to reconcile your own mind to the ignominious death I am about
to suffer, and to mitigate your sorrow. I am, to say the least, quite cheerful.
“He shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.” This was
said of a poor erring servant many years ago; and for many years I have felt a
strong impression that God had given me powers and faculties, unworthy as I
was, that he intended to use for a similar purpose. This most unmerited honor
Ho has seen fit to bestow; and whether, like the same poor frail man to whom I
allude, my death may not be of vastly more value than my life is, I think quite
beyond all human foresight I really have strong hopes that notwithstanding all
my many sins, I too may yet die “in faith.”
If you do not believe I had a murderous intention (while I know
I had not), why grieve so terribly on my account? The scaffold has but few
terrors for me. God has often covered my head in the day of battle, and granted
me many times deliverances that were almost so miraculous that I can scarce
realize their truth; and now, when it seems quite certain that he intends to
use me in a different way, shall I not most cheerfully go? I may be deceived,
but I humbly trust that he will not forsake me “till I have showed his favor to
this generation and his strength to every one that is to come.” Your letter is
most faithfully and kindly written, and I mean to profit by it. I am certainly
quite grateful for it. I feel that a great responsibility rests upon me as
regards the lives of those who have fallen and may yet fall. I must in that
view cast myself on the care of Him “whose mercy endureth forever.” If the cause
in which I engaged in any possible degree approximated to be “infinitely better”
than the one which Saul of Tarsus undertook, I have no reason to be ashamed of
it; and indeed I cannot now, after more than a month for reflection, find in my
heart (before God in whose presence I expect to stand within another week) any
cause for shame.
I got a long and most kind letter from your pure-hearted
brother Luther, to which I replied at some length. The statement that seems to
be going around in the newspapers that I told Governor Wise that I came on here
to seek revenge for the wrongs of either myself or my family, is utterly false.
I never intended to convey such an idea, and I bless God that I am able even
now to say that I have never yet harbored such a feeling. See testimony of
witnesses who were with me while I had one son lying dead by my side, and
another mortally wounded and dying on my other side. I do not believe that
Governor Wise so understood, and I think he ought to correct that impression.
The impression that we intended a general insurrection is equally untrue.
Now, my much beloved and much respected kinsman, farewell.
May the God of our fathers save and abundantly bless you and yours!
John Brown.
SOURCES: Franklin B. Sanborn, The Life and Letters
of John Brown, p. 603-5
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