Whereupon Captain Brown replied: “That will be just what I want first to do; then I would follow them up. If we could drive them out of one county it would be a great gain; it would weaken the system throughout the state.”
“But,” said Douglass, “they would employ blood-hounds to hunt you out of the mountains.”
“That they might attempt,” was the answer, “but the chances are that we should whip them, and when we should have whipped one squad, they would be careful how they pursued us.”
Thus would Brown confidently meet all possible obstacles to his plan of invasion. If any other man had urged such views about freeing the slaves with a force of less than one hundred men in the Virginia mountains, he would have been regarded as ridiculous; but John Brown was an advocate of such intensity of faith and readiness to put himself in front of every danger, that it required no little courage to oppose him.
Mr. Douglass was evidently much affected by this interview. He had never before seen courage and self-confidence so imperious, or a determination to do something large and terrible so absolutely regardless of consequences. After this conference he admits that his own “utterances became more and more tinged by the color of this man’s strong impressions,” and his conviction grew “that slavery could only end in blood.”
Brown’s influence was easily traceable in Mr. Douglass’s subsequent utterances, both in the North Star and in his public addresses. During the fight for free soil and free men in Kansas, after the Kansas-Nebraska bill became a law, Mr. Douglass probably did more than any one to supply the militant captain with money and munitions. The full size of Brown as a man was revealed in Kansas when the struggle between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces became actual war. His daring deeds in going into the state of Missouri, bringing out dozens of slaves and conducting them safely to the North; and his fight to keep Kansas free, could not have succeeded, but for the support of such men as Frederick Douglass. Captain Brown’s experiences and adventures here strengthened his conviction that his plans for the invasion of Virginia were right. He had studied the mountain ranges and was satisfied in his own mind that the “Almighty had raised those mountains for the very purpose of aiding him to strike a death blow to slavery.” The correspondence between the two men continued and the black leader was well informed of every movement. Brown never ceased to urge the ex-slave to join him, both in drawing up a constitution for future use and in the actual fighting. Indeed he had so exalted an opinion of Douglass’s influence that it was believed the slaves in Virginia and other parts of the South would rise en masse if they knew that he was a part of this rescuing army.
About three weeks before the assault at Harper’s Ferry, while John Brown was at Chambersburg, making final arrangements for his attack, he sent an urgent letter to Douglass, begging a conference. The latter knew that this was a perilous step and would certainly implicate him in the conspiracy when the crash of failure came; yet he ignored the danger and responded. He speaks of this last visit to the old warrior, in part, as follows:
“I approached the old quarry with a good deal of caution, for John Brown was generally armed and regarded strangers with suspicion. He was there under ban of the government and heavy rewards were offered for his arrest for several offenses which he is said to have committed in Kansas. He was then passing under the name of John Smith. As I came near him, he regarded me rather suspiciously, but soon recognized me and received me cordially. He had in his hand, when I met him, fishing tackle, with which he had been fishing in a stream hard by, but I saw no fish.... The fishing was simply a disguise and was certainly a good one. He looked in every way like a man of the neighborhood and as much at home as any of the farmers around there. His hat was old and storm-beaten and his clothing was about the color of the quarry itself, his present dwelling-place. His face wore an anxious expression and he was much worn by exposure. I felt that I was on a dangerous mission and was as little desirous of discovery as himself.”
Captains Brown, Kage, Shields Green and Mr. Douglass sat down to hold a council of war. The whole scheme of the proposed attack on Harper’s Ferry and its capture was gone over without the slightest hint of possible failure. Douglass opposed the plan as wholly impracticable and fatal to all who might engage in it, but his arguments were promptly set aside by Brown. “He was not to be shaken by anything I could say, but treated my views respectfully. The debate continued during Saturday and Sunday. Brown was for striking a blow that would arouse the country, and I, for the policy of gradually and secretly drawing off the slaves to the mountains, as at first suggested by Brown himself.” In the most fervent manner he urged Mr. Douglass to remain and take part in the fight. Just before the latter’s departure, Brown threw his arm around the black man’s neck and said: “Come with me, Douglass! I will defend you with my life. I want you for a special purpose. When I strike, the bees will begin to swarm, and I shall want you to help hive them.”
The colored leader did not yield to the entreaty. Brown was incapable of seeing the death-trap that he had set for himself and his followers, and even if he could have seen it, he would not have been moved from his determination. A thousand men might have followed him and all have perished, but there could have been but one martyr, and that was himself. Mr. Douglass’s death would have been a wanton sacrifice, because it would have meant nothing to the cause for which he had contributed so much of his life during the previous twenty-five years. He had a right to feel, as his subsequent career so abundantly proved, that his work was not finished. Of all the Abolitionists he was the only one who followed Brown to the last with advice, money, and other assistance. Because of what he had already done, and especially in this final conference at Chambersburg, he became amenable, as afterward appeared, to the charge of treason.