Read Online Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War Hardcover – Bargain Price by Tony Horwitz - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Tony Horwitz
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night. “My husband and two boys, my sons, did not come back,” Mahala later testified.
She and her son John didn’t know the identity of the men who came to their door, but they’d glimpsed their faces in the candlelight. “An oldman commanded the party,” John Doyle testified; “his face was slim.” He added: “These men talked exactly like eastern men and northern men talk.”
Before leaving, the strangers asked the Doyles about a neighbor, Allen Wilkinson, who lived about half a mile away with his wife, Louisa Jane, and two children. Like the Doyles, they had come from Tennessee and owned no slaves. Unlike them, Wilkinson could read and write. He was a member of Kansas’s proslavery legislature, and his cabin served as the local post office.
After midnight, Louisa Jane, who was sick with measles, heard a barking dog and woke her husband. He said it was nothing and went back to sleep. Then the dog began barking furiously and Louisa Jane heard footsteps and a knock. She woke her husband again; he called out, asking who was there.
“I want you to tell me the way to Dutch Henry’s,” a voice replied.
When Wilkinson began to give directions, the man said, “Come out and show us.” His wife wouldn’t let him. The stranger then asked if Wilkinson was an opponent of the free-state cause. “I am,” he said.
“You are our prisoner,” came the reply. Four armed men poured into the cabin, took Wilkinson’s gun, and told him to get dressed. Louisa Jane begged the men to let her husband stay: she was sick and helpless, with two small children.
“You have neighbors?” asked an older man who appeared to be in command. He wore soiled clothes and a straw hat pulled down over his narrow face. Louisa Jane told him she had neighbors, but couldn’t go for them. “It matters not,” he said. Unshod, her husband was led outside. Louisa Jane thought she heard her husband’s voice a moment later “in complaint,” but then all was still.
DUTCH HENRY’S CROSSING WAS named for Henry Sherman, a German immigrant who had settled the ford on the Pottawatomie. He traded cattle to westward pioneers and ran a tavern and store that served as a gathering place for proslavery men. He and his brother, William, were feared by free-state families for their drunken and threatening behavior.
On the night of the Northern army’s visit to the Pottawatomie, DutchHenry was out on the prairie looking for stray cattle. But one of his employees who lived at the crossing, James Harris, was asleep with his wife and child when men burst in carrying swords and revolvers. They demanded the surrender of Harris and three other men who were spending the night in his one-room cabin. Two were travelers who had come to buy a cow; the third was Dutch Henry’s brother, William.
Harris and the two travelers were questioned individually outside the cabin, and then returned inside, having been found innocent of aiding the proslavery cause. Then William Sherman was escorted from the cabin. About fifteen minutes later, Harris heard a pistol shot; the men who had been guarding the cabin left, having taken a horse, a saddle, and weapons.
It was now Sunday morning, about two or three A.M. The terrified settlers along the Pottawatomie waited until dawn to venture outside. At the Doyles’, the first house visited in the night, sixteen-year-old John found his father, James, and his oldest brother, twenty-two-year-old William, lying dead in the road about two hundred yards from their cabin. Both men had multiple wounds; William’s head was cut open and his jaw and side slashed. John found his other brother, twenty-year-old Drury, lying dead nearby.
“His fingers were cut off; and his arms were cut off,” John said in an affidavit. “His head was cut open; there was a hole in his breast.” Mahala Doyle, having glanced at the bodies of her husband and older son, could not look at Drury. “I was so much overcome that I went to the house,”
She and her son John didn’t know the identity of the men who came to their door, but they’d glimpsed their faces in the candlelight. “An oldman commanded the party,” John Doyle testified; “his face was slim.” He added: “These men talked exactly like eastern men and northern men talk.”
Before leaving, the strangers asked the Doyles about a neighbor, Allen Wilkinson, who lived about half a mile away with his wife, Louisa Jane, and two children. Like the Doyles, they had come from Tennessee and owned no slaves. Unlike them, Wilkinson could read and write. He was a member of Kansas’s proslavery legislature, and his cabin served as the local post office.
After midnight, Louisa Jane, who was sick with measles, heard a barking dog and woke her husband. He said it was nothing and went back to sleep. Then the dog began barking furiously and Louisa Jane heard footsteps and a knock. She woke her husband again; he called out, asking who was there.
“I want you to tell me the way to Dutch Henry’s,” a voice replied.
When Wilkinson began to give directions, the man said, “Come out and show us.” His wife wouldn’t let him. The stranger then asked if Wilkinson was an opponent of the free-state cause. “I am,” he said.
“You are our prisoner,” came the reply. Four armed men poured into the cabin, took Wilkinson’s gun, and told him to get dressed. Louisa Jane begged the men to let her husband stay: she was sick and helpless, with two small children.
“You have neighbors?” asked an older man who appeared to be in command. He wore soiled clothes and a straw hat pulled down over his narrow face. Louisa Jane told him she had neighbors, but couldn’t go for them. “It matters not,” he said. Unshod, her husband was led outside. Louisa Jane thought she heard her husband’s voice a moment later “in complaint,” but then all was still.
DUTCH HENRY’S CROSSING WAS named for Henry Sherman, a German immigrant who had settled the ford on the Pottawatomie. He traded cattle to westward pioneers and ran a tavern and store that served as a gathering place for proslavery men. He and his brother, William, were feared by free-state families for their drunken and threatening behavior.
On the night of the Northern army’s visit to the Pottawatomie, DutchHenry was out on the prairie looking for stray cattle. But one of his employees who lived at the crossing, James Harris, was asleep with his wife and child when men burst in carrying swords and revolvers. They demanded the surrender of Harris and three other men who were spending the night in his one-room cabin. Two were travelers who had come to buy a cow; the third was Dutch Henry’s brother, William.
Harris and the two travelers were questioned individually outside the cabin, and then returned inside, having been found innocent of aiding the proslavery cause. Then William Sherman was escorted from the cabin. About fifteen minutes later, Harris heard a pistol shot; the men who had been guarding the cabin left, having taken a horse, a saddle, and weapons.
It was now Sunday morning, about two or three A.M. The terrified settlers along the Pottawatomie waited until dawn to venture outside. At the Doyles’, the first house visited in the night, sixteen-year-old John found his father, James, and his oldest brother, twenty-two-year-old William, lying dead in the road about two hundred yards from their cabin. Both men had multiple wounds; William’s head was cut open and his jaw and side slashed. John found his other brother, twenty-year-old Drury, lying dead nearby.
“His fingers were cut off; and his arms were cut off,” John said in an affidavit. “His head was cut open; there was a hole in his breast.” Mahala Doyle, having glanced at the bodies of her husband and older son, could not look at Drury. “I was so much overcome that I went to the house,”
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