Central Village,
Plainfield, Conn., Nov. 27.
Dear Friend: . . .
The moral effect of your bearing since your capture seems to me worth more than
any immediate physical good which would follow your victory. I think Slavery at
the South and every where is weaker than it could have been made by the exodus
of a thousand slaves under your lead. I need not explain the particulars of
this view; but there does seem to me a special providence in your being spared
beyond the hour of your capture, to be tried as you have been, and to appear
loftier and braver than your conquerors, as you have. It is God that has called
and disciplined you for this, and He sustains you, and will sustain you to the
end. . . . I shall probably be at Hartford on Friday of this week, the day
appointed for the execution of your sentence. That will be far easier than the
execution of yourself; for we believe your life and heroism are not lost in any
death. The Lord be with you in your last earthly hours.
SOURCE: James
Redpath, Editor, Echoes of Harper’s Ferry, p. 402
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