H. S. DE FOREST.
MORE ABOUT THE JOHN BROWN SONG.
When at my house, and talking over Mr. Jerome’s account of the origin of the John Brown song (printed since in your July number of the American Missionary), you intimated that it might be of interest to your readers to know of my own relation to it. Since that conversation I have received letters on the same subject, and have had an interview with a reporter for the Chicago Tribune, who called to make inquiries. After the latter had left, I instituted a search among my papers, and found some additional memoranda on the matter, made at the time, which enables me to give the account a little more minutely and with a slight correction on one point.
On the 23d of October, 1861, I started on a visit to our army, in behalf of the Chicago Sanitary Commission, of which I was a member. Taking the train at Chicago for Cairo, Ill., I meditated, during the long hours, on the bearing of the war upon the emancipation of the slaves, and was saddened by the indisposition of the Government, the army, and the leading politicians to connect that object with the preservation of the Federal Union. I had been preaching and writing on that point with great earnestness, and was inwardly inquiring what else I could do in behalf of the slave. Just then the John Brown song, which had recently become somewhat popular, and the tune of which—apparently taken from the revival melody, “Say, brothers, will you meet us?”—pleased me much as admirably effective for use among the people, occurred to my mind. It was sung to a ridiculous string of words about “We’ll hang Jeff Davis on a sour apple tree,” etc., but had a good chorus: “Glory, hallelujah! His soul is marching on.” Why not have some better stanzas, with a proper rhythmical swing and a good anti-slavery moral, yet based on John Brown’s history? The more I meditated on it, the stronger grew the impulse to do something of the kind, till, to while away the tedium of the journey, I pulled out the back of a letter or something similar, and wrote a set of rhymes. When I saw the Chicago Tribune reporter, I thought that this occurred on my return journey, and so stated to him. But my original memorandum showed that it was on the day of starting, as given above. I went to Paducah, Ky., to inspect certain camps, and found there an Illinois regiment, under command of Col. McArthur. The chaplain was my old friend, Rev. Joel Grant, to whom I read my rhymes. He was so struck with their adaptedness to convey anti-slavery sentiment, that he insisted on my giving him a copy, that he might set the soldiers to singing them, which I did. On my return home to Chicago, I concluded to insert them in the Chicago Tribune, as Mr. Medill’s family attended my church, and I knew his sympathy with the anti-slavery cause. But as I did not claim to be a poet, and felt shy of seeming to appear as one, I used the signature of “Plebs” for that and for two other pieces of rhyme, called “The Old Fogy’s Lament,” and “The Warning,” both also on the slavery question. I gave the title as “The New John Brown Song,” retaining the first line and the chorus of the early version. There were six stanzas, which were as follows, adding a single omitted word:
I.
Old John Brown’s body lies a-moldering in the grave,
While weep the sons of bondage, whom he ventured all to save;
But though he lost his life in struggling for the slave,
His soul is marching on! O Glory! Hallelujah!
II.
John Brown he was a hero, undaunted, true and brave,
And Kansas knew his valor, where he fought, her rights to save,
And now, though the grass grows green above his grave,
His soul is marching on! O Glory! Hallelujah!
III.