thumbnail of American Experience; John Brown's Holy War; Interview with historian Paul Finkelman, 4 of 5
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z's and it has to be evasive about how it's getting to that focus its this final focus that that the concerns and so so when he tells people don't ask me what my plans are you just have to trust me you know i would give money to that charity but people do because they're so overwhelmed by him pop minus y part part of who brown is is that he is this man with his long range focus he's going to strike a blow against slavery and he is able to convince people to support him even though he won't tell them what his plans are even though he will reveal very much about himself people back him because they are mesmerized by who he is i am what i am i'm the man who's going to attack slavery that's my focus is way off in the distance don't ask me about the particulars don't get involved with the details i have
this focus that's going to get me to attack slavery people backing people give you money people adore him people are thrilled to have them in their houses where he sits taciturn the cleaning his weapon while he talks to them about how he's going to strike a blog and slavery or he will have the media yeah well that's why when i'm younger i think we ought to talk about the aftermath of the raid and let's go with that cause you what made you want me to the true genius of brown comes about after he seized at harpers ferry and then we get an entirely different john browne it manipulates the media he manipulates the virginia courts he manipulates everybody in a way that is brilliant and the backup you know like the word manipulator and said i'm the
changing staffers for you now they're not using any of this except the ancient israelites actually makes you want to grab one of the guys i think brown's true genius appears in after he's captured at harpers ferry while he's in jail he begins to re create himself as a christ like martyr in a way that has the most profound effect possible on the nation especially the north in jail he writes in numerous letters to people in the north always putting his own actions in the best light quoting scripture attacking slavery and really creating a kind of self conscious martyrdom while he's in jail there
is talk of rescuing him brown wants none of it i am far better dead than alive he tells people he understands this fully he understands that that and if he's hanging he becomes a martyr and he really becomes the first official martyr to slavery or to anti slavery there had been other martyrs like alija lovejoy and by the way it's interesting that brown becomes active abolitionists day after the murder of love joy but for brown to be hanged to be officially executed by slavery makes him into a new kind of murder and he is brilliant at using this to further his goal and for him is to that is meaningless he's lived his life he's he's almost sixty he is an old man older than his years because of the hardships that he's gone through in kansas and he is ready to die he's been ready to die for a number of years for the cause this is in a sense what he's been living his life or at least since he went to kansas if
not earlier in your view that's fine that's right that's as fine to discuss tommy where everyone in jail graham has a kind of serenity he has now lived his life used to feel this purpose and the gallows or simply going to be his cross it's the last step in the evolution of john brown to where he wants to be furthermore the end and that's the next line of this in the north his allies and his friends also use brown and prison to a wonderful purpose for their perspective brown becomes the center of the focus of anti slavery ideas so rowe writes poems about him emerson writes about and ministers preached about him from the pulpit he becomes
again a new christ the new crom well and reverse instead of charles being executed by cromwell it's cromwell being executed by the south and he is the great puritan martyr for christ like mr and they begin to compare to crisis very interesting the the evolution in northern sentiment in at fifty seven fifty eight he's compared to crumb well making fifty nine is compared to christ he becomes the martyr abolition the abolitionists in the north seized on brown in a variety of ways they sell pictures of him they commissioned his official biography the gingerbread beth writes there are poems written and published about him there are paintings there are stories legends round becomes an instant myth the legend of john brown the myth of john brown begins to appear even before he's executed and he's helping to write them and i mean there are very few people in the world who get to write their own
legends and myths while they're sitting in jail waiting to become art he makes the most of it yeah i think there are probably very few people who have ever gone to their execution more satisfied more prepared more ready to die and john brown this is the culmination of his life that is far better than the guys to diana gallows to die after writing all these letters to die without the benefit of a southern minister he says to a number of people on the way to the gallows and i would rather be blessed by a slave woman holding her child to her breast then a southern minister wow what a wonderful thing to say for northerners and of course this leads to the story that the last thing he does this case a slave it means the
whole hotel because of our sheltered one of the legends of brown which i think is actually one of the legends of brown which i think has some basis in truth is the story of him kissing the slave baby on the way to the gallows before he was executed he tells people that he doesn't want a southern slaveholding minister to an attitude before he's executed he rejects speaking to a southern minister and tells a number of people that he would simply like to be blessed by a slave woman holding a child her breast shortly after he dies there are stories how he kissed a slave baby on the way to the gallows there is that a painting of him leaning over to kiss a slave may be surrounded by the virginia troops that are guarding him no this is impossible this could not occurred but what probably get occurrences and as he leaves the jail he kisses the slave
child only by his jailer avis mr thomas amos's slave the church thomas so let me just say brown had been in the jail for more than a month he become very friendly with the jailer like him was sorry to see him executed and the jailers slaves i think it's quite likely that the listing rounded before you leave that left i think it's quite likely i think it's quite likely that the last thing a brown did before he left the jail was to kiss the child of the slave woman owned by the jailer and so the myth has some reality to it it's not a dramatic kissing a slave with hundreds of virginia troops watching him it's rather saying goodbye to the slaves on his way to the gallows the abolitionist simply make this into a slightly more dramatic event
but it's an event i think it's grounded in reality and of course you're you show the pictures right from the moment that the rate is over browne transforms himself into a kind of instant celebrity and its remarkable he's lying on a pallet wounded giving interviews to reporters he understands as almost no american doesn't the time the value of the newspapers the value of propaganda the value of getting his ideas across through the reporters and throughout his period in jail throughout the trial throughout waiting for his execution he constantly does this he is a master at using the media is a very very moderate man in this respect that we need for all his life he's been censored man of his times suddenly he he transports himself into thomas our own age in the way he uses the media to help with that
you question yeah couple days ago the abolitionists of course that always masters of propaganda and gestures are using the new printing presses and new techniques to get their ideas across but brown takes a two level starting by working with a bright red cap and kansas brown takes brain takes this to a new level by starting part of the anti slavery movement always been brilliant at using the media and media for them were new printing press techniques that flooded the nation with pamphlets and newspapers they were also extremely good at exploiting things like lovejoy's martyrdom but brown takes it to a new level in the party begins in kansas with a red pen red pen is his publicist in a
sense he's his press agent and when he it's wounded after harpers ferry he's lying on a pilot bleeding he's giving interviews to reporters because he's used to giving interviews with reporters he understands intuitively how important this now is and what's curious is he's gone the reverse of the anti slavery movement the anti slavery movement had always been about words and talking and communicating ideas and propaganda john brown transforms anti slavery by becoming a man of action and then in the last two months of his life he can do no action so he goes back to the altar the confusing words and using communication to once again transformed a nation by defending what he did and by making what he did seem glorious at a remarkable advance and it's remarkable transformation of brown himself woods was mostly
okay fine no no that's fine but this true gift to how he really unclear you're getting something fresh and i don't think anybody else is ever focused on it says i just do this one more time yeah he's a little more and he goes to like this notion that he switches from activists say okay fb pics right after his capture john brown begins in a sense the final transformation of anti slavery in america any aching fifties he had been the man of action and movement to behead in the fifties earlier in the decade he had been a man of action and a movement that up until that time had mostly been about words
now suddenly line a pallet bleeding talking to reporters he could no longer be a man of action so just as he is slavery action he moves back to words and begins to use words as a way of attacking slavery and explaining why he did what he did is not so much a defense of what he did as it is an explanation and it's directed at northern years in northern iceland northern readers and in the process of course the anti slavery movement which had always been good propaganda becomes better and turning brown and john brown into a martyr and so in a sense what we see in the last month of his life and in the three or four months after his death that the anti slaving so what we see in the last month of his life and the three or four months after his death the ad sleeve remove essentially manufactures martyrdom for john brown and he
becomes the single most important martyr to american slavery makes you want to eat the techniques of the manufacturing of brown's martyrdom are many and very modern in some sense pictures of brown or sold pictures of his wife mary are sold paintings of brown are exhibited there is one medium brown kissing the slave child which has exhibited to raise money and official biography of brown has written there had been official biographies of presidential campaigns campaign biographies they were right there had been official biographies of presidential candidates known as campaign biographies but this is the first time that there's an official biography of an anti slavery person read the earth writes the biography lydia marie child a very sentimental author of children's novels as well as an
abolitionist and wanted to write a biography the child is probably the wrong person to write and browns we do another one the child was probably the wrong person to write the biography and browns widow an intimate way and hard time here but child was probably the wrong person to write the autobot sorry because of the war show ready every child a very sentimental abolitionists who had authored a number of children's books had wanted to write brown's biography but she was probably the wrong person to do this because in a sense her sentimentality prevented her from understanding that at heart brown had been bringing the violence in death to the anti slavery movement and so red death writes the biography red beard has designated to do so by brown's well another item number
red beard is designated to do the biography by brown's widow and a number of other abolitionists agree that he is the guy and he of course is able to elevate the issue of ottawa to me he seemed able to talk about the violence without getting into the details and that helped set the stage for northerners be prepared for violence it it's only to be two years later the northerners are going to send their sons to die and civil war and in a sense brown and red pants laying the groundwork for that i think brown knows this when he's lying on the palate brown is a sense of manipulating public opinion he is creating a sense of martyrdom a sense of violence necessary to confront slavery and the abolitionists go along with it one of the techniques the abolitionists use is selling photographs selling bossa brown
selling pictures of brown one abolitionist was to send his body around from city to city packed in ice so people can see his wounds although this does not happen is indicative of the way in which they see brown as an opportunity to elevate the consciousness of america to change north european union and to get ready for what's coming as soon as he's writing sober john brown makes life very difficult for many northerners republicans who are after all politicians trying to get elected are scared to death they run is far from brown as they can lincoln seward david davis lincoln's political ally and supporter in illinois all exchanged letters about how happy they are no republicans have been implicated in the brown raid but within a few months the number of republicans are beginning to cautiously embraced brown john
andrews soon to be governor of massachusetts says that what john brown did was wrong but that john brown himself is right and so politicians begin to see that there is a lot of support for brown initially there's a lot of opposition to brown their ad brown rallies and demonstrations in northern cities but there are also bigger program rallies and demonstrations by the time he is hanged he's seen as a martyr showbiz beat by the time of the hanging that's been taking on when we're going to the girls' and housing oh toddlers insanity capture are like
out in the context of of no no no no no no no just one sailor talk about it but actually top of insanity nepotism i bring the question of john brown's sanity of course comes up when he's in jail a number of supporters tried to show the browns family has insanity and therefore brown's crazy let him out you can't execute an insane man brown of course resists if he's insane that his life has been meaningless and so he resists any defense of insanity because he wants to be considered singing because that is the only way to justify what he did for more of course the governor of virginia wants him to be saying because he can't hang a crazy man and the governor of virginia desperately wants to hang john brown ironically the virginians would be much smarter if they said yes friends in st helena
put him in a lunatic asylum john brown running away and a lunatic asylum would have been meaningless it would have destroyed harpers ferry he would have been simply a crazy man had done something crazy but in fact for the political needs of this governor of virginia hanging john brown is important even though it makes a martyr in the north and david that's right that's right in the end the virginians undermine their own position by hanging john brown that would be much smarter to declare an insane when he said he wasn't insane that would be simply prove that he was insane and put him away let him rot or nobody would see him and he would simply be a crazy man the virginia authorities make another huge mistake they let john brown right anybody he wants they let visitors come see him he is a
celebrity they haven't figured out the notion of the celebrity criminal you may be the first celebrity criminal america and thinks he's not funny that date back off on that virginians don't understand the notion of the political the virginians don't understand the notion of a political celebrity criminal so they give john brown complete access to the media they let him talk to any reporter who comes by their living right anyone he wants and he becomes his own public relations firm inside the jail in virginia and virginians are complicit this in this case they aren't smart enough or they are sophisticated enough to realize how damaging this is to their own position now we wanted me to get back on the diseases for you know
given them okay while is craziness you know which is a kind of a gym or something which and jim and i both agree with but it's i think it's worth saying it for me as well as ginnie mae when he uses both from the moment to the harpers ferry raid people say that brown is crazy that is insane but what's important to see is that is only insane if you believe that willing but what's important to see is that he's only insane if you think that is from the moment of his capture harpers ferry people alleged the charlie brown is insane and out of course resist this for the modern perspective it's worth noting that brown has only insane
if we think that it is insane or crazy to give your life for a higher good such as freeing black slaves i and african american communities no one thinks he's crazy frederick douglass doesn't think he's crazy frederick douglass thinks he's a martyr and so do many abolitionists they see nothing crazy about what he's done nothing and saying he's a good tactician exhibit strategist is a bad plan or he's not a very good general but he's not crazy right now ah the creation of them are working to create unity of the aisle yet you do want to give it to the dog was quote no okay you can pull it out he's a good military strategists but he's a brilliant political strategist he understands exactly what he's doing especially after harpers ferry ray bans and he transforms the whole debate into one about slavery
and his own martyrdom and so in a sense he creates himself as an iconic even before he's dead in the aftermath of the hanging brown becomes an icon for much of the north he is the first casualty perhaps in the civil war he is the main who is predicted that all the violence can end slavery that slavery must be confronted with violence and by eighteen sixty one an eighteen sixty two and beyond ramadan becomes even more obviously correct and i sensed brown does what lincoln does which is to transform the civil war from a war about constitutional issues to one about slavery it was always of course or about slave rick everybody knew it at the time even though at the beginning of the war lincoln has to say it's not for political reasons for
constitutional reasons for strategic reasons lincoln is the better strategist and browns but when it comes to what the cause of the war is the cause of the war slavery and brannan increasingly becomes the icon of northern resistance to the aggression of slavery in a sense what brown was able to do is to make himself appear to be the victim of slavery rather than the attacker of slavery at the same time that he makes it clear that a tax on slavery are necessary to end this profoundly evil horrible institution now brown here for the abolitionists and if brown especially are right about the monstrous people of slavery and if they are right that there's no way politically to end
slavery in the south because it can only be done by state law britain's actions become plausible rationale it's true that he risks his life and gives his life for the cause but in other circumstances we pin medals on people for doing that we give them awards we given ticker tape parades the only difference for brown is that he does something which seemed suicidal but again in wartime we give medals for people who do things to recycle and in that sense there's nothing crazy all about it's very rational it's very clear he is fighting a war against slavery only work and end slavery and brown is setting up the circumstances to help create a larger war against slavery and in this unusual
Series
American Experience
Episode
John Brown's Holy War
Raw Footage
Interview with historian Paul Finkelman, 4 of 5
Contributing Organization
WGBH (Boston, Massachusetts)
AAPB ID
cpb-aacip/15-hq3rv0f012
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Description
Description
Martyr, madman, murderer, hero: John Brown remains one of history's most controversial and misunderstood figures. In the 1850s, he and his ragtag guerrilla group embarked on a righteous crusade against slavery that was based on religious faith -- yet carried out with shocking violence. His execution at Harpers Ferry sparked a chain of events that led to the Civil War. Finkelman talks about Boston - gets support w/out revealing much, Boston - give money, strike a blow against slavery, Jail - Christ - like martyr, Jail - no rescue, if hanged then martyr, Jail - martyr, ready to die, Jail - fulfilled purpose, last step in his evolution, Jail - instant myth, he makes the most of it, Jail - kissed child of jailer's slave woman, Jail - understands value of the media, Jail - media, goes back to old way, using words (long), Jail - media, goes back to old way, using words (short, Insanity - Virginia's mistake (alt), Insanity - Virginia's mistake (better), Jail - Virginians give access to media, own PR firm, Insanity - insane to give life for higher good?, Insanity - bad tactician, planner, etc. but not crazy, Icon - for North, only violence can end slavery, Icon - like Lincoln, makes Civil War about slavery, Icon - makes himself victim of slavery (There is no transcript for barcode173904_Finkelman_04)
Topics
Biography
History
Race and Ethnicity
Subjects
American history, African Americans, civil rights, slavery, abolition
Rights
(c) 2000-2017 WGBH Educational Foundation
Media type
Moving Image
Duration
00:28:32
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Release Agent: WGBH Educational Foundation
AAPB Contributor Holdings
WGBH
Identifier: barcode173904_Finkelman_04_SALES_ASP_h264 Amex.mp4 (unknown)
Duration: 0:28:27
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Citations
Chicago: “American Experience; John Brown's Holy War; Interview with historian Paul Finkelman, 4 of 5,” WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed March 29, 2024, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-hq3rv0f012.
MLA: “American Experience; John Brown's Holy War; Interview with historian Paul Finkelman, 4 of 5.” WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. March 29, 2024. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-hq3rv0f012>.
APA: American Experience; John Brown's Holy War; Interview with historian Paul Finkelman, 4 of 5. Boston, MA: WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-hq3rv0f012