Brown and my father had accurate knowledge of many facts which might contribute to the success of a slave uprising in Virginia. They knew how many plantations there were and how many negroes were owned in each county—also the number of whites. Brown knew the names of the owners of the plantations and the means of reaching the plantations by unfrequented ways. He had talked this over with my father for years. William Lloyd Garrison told him it was a very foolish enterprise that he contemplated, and was opposed to it, although he was Brown’s intimate friend.
It is a significant and a not generally known fact that John Brown actually believed his insurrection would succeed; but whether it would or not, he was determined sooner or later to make the attempt. He said, “If I die that way, I will do more good than by living on; and, anyhow, I will do it whether it succeeds or not.”
The last time I saw John Brown was when he drove out to our house before leaving Springfield to go to Harper’s Ferry. My father drove him down to the station—to Huntingdon railroad station; they called it Chester Village then, but the name has since been changed. The last letter that he wrote from the prison at Charleston was to my father. It was written the day before his execution.
John Brown’s character was perfectly suited to the part he elected to play, and that this had a potent influence upon people’s minds and through them upon events leading up to the war cannot be denied. A less austere man or a man less firm in his own convictions would never have carried through such a mad exploit. But it is not a desecration of John Brown’s memory to state the simple fact that he lacked the quality of human understanding which Lincoln possessed so richly and which showed itself in the smile of sympathy and the word of good cheer.
Before I left Washington to go back to my regiment I learned that the friend for whose life I had gone to plead had been pardoned by the President. The hearty greeting which hailed the return of that young soldier to his comrades was full of spontaneous joy, but in the background of the picture was the great form of Old Abe, the greatest saint in the calendar of all the soldiers.
He was indeed, as has been often said before, the best friend of the whole country—the South as well as the North. Through all of that bitter struggle he never forgot that he had been elected President of all the United States.
When I had a second long talk with Lincoln, just shortly before he was murdered, not one word did he say against the South or against the generals of the South. He spoke of General Lee always in respectful terms. He respected the Southern army and the Southern people, and he estimated them for just about what they were worth. He did not underestimate their power nor their patriotism; not a word in that two hours’ interview did he say against the Southern army or the Southern people vindictively; it was that of a calm statesman who estimated them for what they were worth; and whenever he mentioned the name of General Lee he emphasized the fact that Lee was fighting that war on a high principle, not one of vindictiveness or any small ambition.
He realized that the Southern people were fighting for what they believed was right, and he knew General Lee would not be in it unless he was convinced it was right. He did not say that in words, but that is the impression I received. To hear the stories of Southern barbarities which would naturally be circulated about the enemy and then to find the President of the United States treating the matter with such dignity and calmness was a surprise and an enlightenment to me.
On that black day when the body of Abraham Lincoln lay in state in the East Room of the White House it was my great privilege to be detailed for duty there. I happened to be in Washington, recovering from a wound sustained in the battle of Kenesaw Mountain a short time before, and I was called upon, together with all unattached officers in the Capitol, to help out. About twenty officers were continually on duty in the room in which the casket stood. Two of us actually stood guard at a time—one at the head and one at the foot. The casket was heaped high with flowers and the people passed through the room in an unending stream.