Show The Capture of John Brown From an account in the June Century John Brown at Harpers Ferry written by one of his prisoners who was in the enginehouse during the insurrection and afterward held the rank of captain in the Confederate army we quote the following When Lieutenant Stllrt came in the morning for the final reply to the demand to surrender I got up and went to Browns side to hear his answer Stuart asked Are you ready to surrender sur-render and trust to the mercy of the Government Brown answered promptly No I prefer to die here His manner did not betray the least fear Stuart stepped aside and made the signal for the attack which was instantly begun with sledgehammers to breakdown break-down the door I Finding it would not yield the soldiers I sol-diers seized a long ladder for a battering ram and commenced beating the door with that the party within firing incessantly inces-santly I had assisted in the barricading fixing the fastening so that I could remove re-move them upon the first effort to get in I But I was not at the door when the battering bat-tering began and could not get to the fastenings until the ladder was used I I then quickly removed the fastenings and I I after two or three strokes of the ladder the engine rolled partially back making i which Lieu I 11 a small aperture through tenant Green of the marines forced himself jumped on top of the engine and stood a second in the midst of a shower of balls looking for John Brown When he saw Brown he sprang about twelve feet at I him and gave an underthrust with his I sword striking him about midway in the i body and raising him completely from I the ground Brown fell forward with his head between his knees and Green i struck him several times over the head and as I then supposed split his skull at every 1 was stroke not two feet from Brown at that time Of course I got out of the building as soon as possible and did not know until un-til some time later that Brown was not that in making the killed It seems I thrust Greens sword struck Browns belt The the body and did not penetrate that sword was bent double The reason killed when struck on the Brown was not head was that Green was holding his sword in the middle striking with the hilt and making only scalp wounds |