Third, and this was the path that led to Civil War and far beyond: The raid aroused and directed the conscience of the nation. Strange it was to watch its work. Some, impulsive, eager to justify themselves, rushed into print. To Garrison, the non-resistant, the sword of Gideon was abhorrent; Beecher thundered against John Brown and Seward bitterly traduced him. Then came an ominous silence in the land while his voice, in his own defense, was heard over the whole country. A great surging throb of sympathy arose and swept the world. That John Brown was legally a lawbreaker and a murderer all men knew. But wider and wider circles were beginning dimly and more clearly to recognize that his lawlessness was in obedience to the highest call of self-sacrifice for the welfare of his fellow men. They began to ask themselves, What is this cause that can inspire such devotion? The reiteration of the simple statement of “the brother in bonds” could not help but attract attention. The beauty of the conception despite its possible unearthliness and impracticability attracted poet and philosopher and common man.
To be sure, the nation had long been thinking over the problem of the black man, but never before had its attention been held by such deep dramatic and personal interest as in the forty days from mid-October to December, 1859. This arresting of national attention was due to Virginia and to John Brown:—to Virginia by reason of its exaggerated plaint; to John Brown whose strength, simplicity and acumen made his trial, incarceration and execution the most powerful Abolition argument yet offered. The very processes by which Virginia used John Brown to “fire the Southern heart” were used by John Brown to fire the Northern conscience. Andrew Hunter, the prosecuting state’s attorney, of right demanded that the trial should be short and the punishment swift and in this John Brown fully agreed. He had no desire to escape the consequences of his act or to clog the wheels of Virginia justice. After a certain moral bewilderment there in the old engine-house at his failure on the brink of success, the true significance of his mission of sacrifice slowly rose before him. In the face of proposals to rescue him he said at first thoughtfully: “I do not know that I ought to encourage any attempt to save my life. I am not sure that it would not be better for me to die at this time. I am not incapable of error, and I may be wrong; but I think that perhaps my object would be nearer fulfilment if I should die. I must give it some thought.”[[264]] And more and more this conviction seized and thrilled him, and he began to say decisively: “I think I cannot now better serve the cause I love so much than to die for it; and in my death I may do more than in my life.”[[265]]
And again: “I can trust God with both the time and the manner of my death, believing, as I now do, that for me at this time to seal my testimony for God and humanity with my blood will do vastly more toward advancing the cause I have earnestly endeavored to promote, than all I have done in my life before.” And then finally came that last great hymn of utter sacrifice: “I feel astonished that one so vile and unworthy as I am would even be suffered to have a place anyhow or anywhere amongst the very least of all who when they came to die (as all must) were permitted to pay the debt of nature in defense of the right and of God’s eternal and immutable truth.”[[266]]
The trial was a difficult experience. Virginia attempted to hold scales of even justice between mob violence and the world-wide sympathy of all good men. To defend its domestic institutions, it must try a man for murder when that very man, sitting as self-appointed judge of those very institutions, had convicted them before a jury of mankind. To defend the good name of the state, Virginia had to restrain the violent blood vengeance of men whose kin had been killed in the raid, and who had sworn that no prisoner should escape the extreme penalty. The trial was legally fair but pressed to a conclusion in unseemly haste, and in obedience to a threatening public opinion and a great hovering dread. Only against this unfair haste did John Brown protest, for he wanted the world to understand why he had done the deed. On the other hand, Hunter not only feared the local mob but the slowly arising sentiment for this white-haired crusader. He therefore pushed the proceedings legally, but with almost brutal pertinacity. The prisoner was arraigned while wounded and in bed; the lawyers, hurriedly chosen, were given scant time for consultation or preparation. John Brown was formally committed to jail at Charlestown, the county seat, on October 20th, had a preliminary examination October 25th, and was indicted by the grand jury October 26th, for “conspiracy with slaves for the purpose of insurrection; with treason against the commonwealth of Virginia; and with murder in the first degree.”
Thursday, October 27th, his trial was begun. A jury was impaneled without challenge and Brown’s lawyers, ignoring his outline of defense, brought in the plea of insanity. The old man arose from his couch and said: “I look upon it as a miserable artifice and pretext of those who ought to take a different course in regard to me, if they took any at all, and I view it with contempt more than otherwise.... I am perfectly unconscious of insanity, and I reject, so far as I am capable, any attempts to interfere in my behalf on that score.”[[267]]
On Friday a Massachusetts lawyer arrived to help in the trial and also privately to suggest methods of escape. John Brown quietly refused to contemplate any such attempt, but was glad to accept the aid of this lawyer and two others, who were sent by John A. Andrew and his friends. The judge curtly refused these men any time to prepare their case, but in spite of this it ran over until Monday when the jury retired. Late Monday afternoon they returned. Redpath says:
“At this moment the crowd filled all the space from the couch inside the bar, around the prisoner, beyond the railing in the body of the court, out through the wide hall, and beyond the doors. There stood the anxious but perfectly silent and attentive populace, stretching head and neck to witness the closing scene of old Brown’s trial.”
The clerk of the court read the indictment and asked: “Gentlemen of the jury, what say you? Is the prisoner at the bar, John Brown, guilty or not guilty?”
“Guilty,” answered the foreman.
“Guilty of treason, and conspiring and advising with slaves and others to rebel, and murder in the first degree?”