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222

John Brown

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:NA
John Brown

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Auction Date:2010 May 12 @ 10:00 (UTC-05:00 : EST/CDT)
Location:5 Rt 101A Suite 5, Amherst, New Hampshire, 03031, United States
ALS - Autograph Letter Signed
ANS - Autograph Note Signed
AQS - Autograph Quotation Signed
AMQS - Autograph Musical Quotation Signed
DS - Document Signed
FDC - First Day Cover
Inscribed - “Personalized”
ISP - Inscribed Signed Photograph
LS - Letter Signed
SP - Signed Photograph
TLS - Typed Letter Signed
A Connecticut-born farmer with Calvinist roots, Brown (1800–1859) was a lifelong opponent of slavery. In the 1850s, amid the heated debate over the admission of Kansas as a slave vs. a free state, the increasingly zealous Brown moved there and led a guerrilla band in the murder of five pro-slavery settlers that came to be known as the Pottawatomie Massacre. Later, Brown hatched a plan to capture the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry and distribute the weapons to slaves. The violent plot failed when he was captured by Robert E. Lee, tried, and hanged. Rare ALS, one page, 7.75 x 12.5, May 15, 1857. Brown writes from Peterboro, New York, to Gerrit Smith. In part: “When you have received for me the $1,000…from Boston, please deduct from the amount of what is then due you on Franklin P. and Saml. B. Thompson’s land contract; together with One Hundred and ten Dollars…for which you hold on my note; also $150…advanced by me to said Thom[p]sons; which $150…please retain for me; and at once advise said Thompsons at North Elba, Essex Co., N. Y., by letter, of the receipt of the money by you; and also remit to them the balance on receipt of their contract assigned to me.” The bottom margin bears several contemporary pencil calculations and notations in a different hand. Small repairs to partial separations along folds, and professional silking to both sides, otherwise fine, clean condition.

Smith was a social reformer and one of the “Secret Six,” a group of wealthy and influential men who secretly funded the famed abolitionist. Like Brown, Smith had grown impatient with the slow progress of abolitionism and spent $16,000 to purchase guns for the Pottawatomie Massacre a year earlier. Here, Brown repays his close friend and, unbeknownst to many, a co-conspirator who would later provide funds for the Harper's Ferry raid. In a way, the transaction identified here created a chain of events that would take Brown to Harper’s Ferry. He had originally acquired the property from Smith in 1854, with the intention of spending his days in the free black community created there by Smith. Instead, Brown—with financial support from Smith—joined the anti-slavery fighters in Kansas, giving his life new focus. One of the many building blocks in Brown’s life, sent to one of his co-conspirators. Pre-certified John Reznikoff/PSA/DNA and RRAuction COA.
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