ABSTRACT
On May 22, 1856, John Brown decided to “strike terror in the hearts of the Pro-Slavery people” of Kansas.2 Enlisting the aid of seven hand-picked men, four of whom were related to him by blood, Brown proceeded to Pottawatomie Creek to see a bit of “radical retaliatory” justice done.3 In the killing spree that followed, Brown and his men brutally hacked fi ve men to death with their razor sharp broadswords. At the time of the murders, Brown had been in Kansas for only seven months, having made the arduous journey from his home in North Elba, New York during October of the previous year. He came to Kansas to join fi ve of his sons who had been lured there by “glowing accounts of extraordinary fertility, healthfulness and beauty of the territory.”4 The promotional literature of Ohio’s emigrant aid societies suggested that the territory would be a paradise for Eastern settlers if “honest, free-soil men could keep it from the grasp of the South.”5 Intrigued by the opportunity to both aid his sons in their claims of good land and advance the Free-Soil cause, Brown arrived in Kansas mentally prepared for armed confl ict.6
