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Ilia Burial at North Elba Twenty-Tliree Years Alter ilia Death at Harper’s Ferry.| [From the Evening Post.JNottTH . Elba, N. Y.. October 13.—Of all the strauge and romantic incideuts in the career of John Brown and Uia family, one of the strangest was the banal yesterday, In this mountain fastness, of that son of John Brown whose body was tskcn by Virginia, in 1859, as a specimen in uuatomv, and has remained till now uubuned. Watson Brown with his older brother Owen, aud his youuirest brother Oliver, accompanied John Brown to the- Kenuedy furua in Maryland in the summer of 1859, and marched down with him toward Harper’sFeirjr on the 16ih ot October, when he invaded Virginia with seventeen men, and captured au important town, which he held in his possession for a day. Owen Brown remained on the Maryland shore to guard arms and supplies, while Watson atiu Oliver went across the Potomac iuto Virginia aud captured Harper’s Perry under Johti Browu’siead. Both these sons re-irca'etl wnh their father luio the engine-house, where he was besieged and taken captive by Geu-erui Lee, who afterward was himself besieged aud taken captive ny General Grant. Oliver was shot, aud died before John Brown surrendered; but Watson, though mortally wounded before his father’s face, lingered for a day, aud died line morning after the surrender. Perhaps it was for this reason that tae Virginians took his dead body to their medical college at Winchester, not far from Harper’s Ferry, and there prepaied it for anatomical use in the college— refusing to give It up for burial to his motuer, who asked fur it. Two or three years later, wheu Winchester was occupied by the Union army, in the civil war. the suigeou of au Indiana regiment heard the sroryor this barbarity from me Virginia surgeon who perpetrated it. and took the bouy away with him to Indiana, where it has remained uuuofieed for twenty years. Wheu the surgeon beard, last August, tuat the widow of John Brown was yet living, and was traveling from California to the Adirondack Mountains to visit her husband’s grave, he felt some compunctions of conscience, ana wrote to her olfcnug to give up the remains of her son for burial. The poor mother accepted the offer with lov, and after her sou, John Brown, Jr.. had entitdlrd bmiseif by a visit to Indiana that the oody ot his brother was really there, he carried IT to Mrs. Brown at his home in Ohio, and from thero it was brought to this town for burial yesieritay.The grove of John Brown himself, as all the world knows, is here, where his funeral was celebrated with great houor iu December, 1859. Watson Brown curne here with his father wheu he was u lad of fourteen, grew up amid These mountains, and married the daughter of a neighboring lartner, shortly before he went to die iu Virginia. Three yeurs earlier (in 185U). ho had left North ElOu for a wuilo to Joiu his father aud brothers in Kansas, but he returned here In T857, und was tilling the hard acres of his mother’s tarm wheu his father's summons called him tp Virginia, It was, therefore, with deep feeling that his former neighbors, the farmers aud burners of the Adirondack region, came to his strangely delayed funeral. They gathered at thehouse of his father near which, beside u great rock. John Brown is buried, and they lowered his cotHu iuto a grave near his father’s, after religious and commemorative services hud been performed on the green in front of theeottage. The clergyman iu uttendance was ihe Kev. Mr. Pope, of North Elba, who spoke in behalf of the people of North Elba with much feeling aud eloquence. Hymns were sung by tue Brown family aud their former neighbors. and then John ana Owen Brown addressedthe company. John Brown, jr., rend a letter from a fcotith Carolinian named Tayieure, who was with Watson wheu he died, and who, among other things, said:“Duty took me to Harper’s Ferry at the time of the raid in 1859 (I was then connected with the Baltimore press), and by chance I was brought into close pci son *1 contact with both your father und your brother Watson after the assault. 1 assisted your father to rise us he stumbled forward out of the historic engine-house, aud 1 was abte to administer to your brother, just before he died, some physical comforts, which won meins thanks. I gave him a cup of water to quench his thirst, and improvised a couch for him out of a bench, with a pair of overalls for a pillow. As I remember him, he looked singularly handsome. eteu through the grime of his all-day struggles and the intense suffering which he must have endured. He was very calm, and iu tone and look very gentle. The look with which he searched my heart I can never forget. One sentence of our conversation will give you the key note to the whole. I asked him: ‘What brought you hereT He replied, very patiently, ‘Duty, sir.’ After a pause I asked: ‘Is It, then, your idea of duty to shoot men down upon their own heartb-stoues fur defending their own rights!’ He answered: 'I am dying; f cannot discuss the question. I did my diny as T saw it. ”To this letter John Brown, jr.. made a brief reply, which was also read at the funeral.Mr. Brown accompanied the reading or these letters with some remarks concerning his brother Watson, after which Oweu Browu rose and spoke of the entire good faith in which Wat«on uad accepted the doctrine of the Golden Rule and of the Declaration of Indeuendenoe, which his father said uicaut the same thing.The members of the Brown family present at the funeral were Mrs. John Brown—a tall, vigorous-lookmg wotuau oi sixty-seven years—her stey-soDS John and Ow^n, with their sister Ruth, the wife of Henry Thompson, and the widow of Watson Brown, who has since married a cousin of her first husband, and lives near the Browns in Ohio. This Mrs. Brown in the sister of Henry Thompson, and two of her brothers, as welt as her husband and his 'brother, were killed at Harper’s Kerry. None of the family of John Brown now live at North El bn, the sons and daughter of theflrst marriage all residing in Onio, and the son and three daughters or the second marriage living with or near their mother in California. It is possible, however, that some of the family may return to North Elba, to which they feel a strong attachment, both for its own sake, and because thoir father’s sfave is there.
Newspaper Details
Cincinnati Commercial
Cincinnati, Ohio, US
Mon, Oct 23, 1882
Page 7
Full Page
Clipped by
Daniel E.
FL, USA 30 Oct 2020
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