John Brown After The Fact Analysis

In Chapter 7 of After The Fact, Davidson and Lytle attempt to prove if John Brown was a sane or insane person. After Brown’s attack on Harpers Ferry, Brown was put on trial for treason. In that battle, Brown led a group of 21 men, 5 of whom were black slaves, to the port town of Harpers Ferry in an effort to unite against the controversial issue of slavery. His attack began when he took a few captives, including Lewis Washington, the first president’s grandson. Although it began well, he underestimated the people he was fighting and he was eventually beaten after President Buchanan sent reinforcements down to help end the battle. The reinforcement troops killed 10 of the people in his “army” and left the rest of them “scattered or captured” (149). The public consensus on Brown was divided as some people believed Brown was right in
Through his actions at Harpers Ferry along with the evidence from the DSM-IV, I believe that John Brown was a crazy man. Also, the evidence from his letter to one of his investor’s thirteen-year-old son that shows his early recognition of slavery and how bad it was shows me that he had been thinking about some type of attack against it for a long period of time. This proves that his attack had to have been planned out before; therefore, his premeditated attack and killing of the people at Harpers Ferry proves his lack of sanity. Also, Brown’s actions from jail to try to convince people that he wasn’t trying to kill anybody in contrast to the testimonies of other co-conspirators shows that he had some type of mental issue that fuel his attack on Harpers Ferry. This evidence suggests that his undiagnosed bipolar disorder in addition to his fiery opinion against slavery shows that John Brown was an insane man who deserved to be put on trial, convicted, and killed for acts of treason against the United States of