Meriam was frantic by now, confused by the war between his mortal fear, which made him want to flee, and his long-held desire to become the man whose sacrificial death would save the others, and he careened amongst the trees like a blind man, while Coppoc stared coldly from the cliff to the town. “You should have kept them from going in,” he said finally. “You should have told us the truth.”
“That wouldn’t have kept Father out. Nothing would. He’d have gone alone, if necessary. You know that. And there’d always have been some of the men to follow him. Maybe not Kagi, maybe not Cook or you. But your brother would. And mine, Watson and Oliver, and the Thompsons, some of the others. Those boys would follow the Old Man straight through the gates of hell. You know it as well as I. No, it’s better they all went in together, not just five or six of them. Even me, if Father had not posted me on this side of the river, I’d have gone in, too. Twenty men have a better chance of getting out than five or six.”
“Maybe. But only if they leave that place now!’ Coppoc replied, and then he declared that he was going over. He would tell them the truth of the matter himself. “To let them know their real situation,” he said. He called Meriarn to him, calmed him somewhat, and asked him to go down into the town with him. Coppoc explained that they could get across the bridge all right, as it was still evidently under Father’s control, and if they hurried and got across before full daylight, they could sneak unseen into the armory yard and help the Old Man and the boys fight their way out.
Meriam agreed at once. Coppoc had resolved his dilemma. “It’s how I knew it would happen,” he said. “I foresaw it, and now it’s the Lord’s will running things, not mine. It’s how it has to be. So I must go with you, Barclay.”
“What about you, Owen?”
“Father said to wait here for the Negroes. You two ought to do the same. He ordered us to arm the slaves when they came here and to meet up with him and the others later in Cumberland.”
“Well, now, that’s done with, isn’t it? Countermand the Old Man’s order, for heaven’s sake! You got the right. You’re in command up here.”
“My father does not want me to save him,” I said.
“Seems to me that’s the only order you’re following. Back at the house there, when we loaded the wagon, I never smelled chimney smoke. You didn’t burn those papers like he said to, did you, Owen?”
“I needed more time. There was more material than I thought, books and so on. I’ll go back and destroy them later. Or carry them away,” I added.
“So, Owen Brown, it’s over. And you’ve single-handedly done the whole thing in. Amazing.” Coppoc shook his head in weary resignation. “Well, what about it, are you coming with me and Frank?”
“No.”
“You don’t intend to try stopping us, do you?” he said, and he leveled his rifle at me.
“My orders are to stand fast, unless he sends for us. And if you go down there with what I’ve told you, Barclay, all you’ll do is sow disunity amongst the men,” I said. “Father was right about that much. One by one, they’ll sneak off and run, and not a one will come out of that place alive unless every one of them believes he’s fighting for more than just to save his own life. Those are brave men, Barclay, and they still have a chance, but this news will make cowards of them all.”
“You sound like the Old Man. All theory. You ready, Frank?” Meriam nodded solemnly, and they slowly backed away from me, with Coppoc still keeping me under his gun, although I had no intentions of trying to force them to stay. It was too late. They were already doing exactly what I feared the others would do, cutting away from Father and running for their lives. I knew that Coppoc and Meriam would never make it into town, that before they reached the bridge they would realize the extremity of their situation and would disappear into the Virginia woods, and that eventually they would be hunted down out there and shot dead or else hog-tied and brought in to be hung.
The dawn wind blew through the leaves overhead. Then I heard the train locomotive hissing and blowing steam below and turned my gaze back to the town. Slowly, the train pulled out of the station and entered the bridge. A minute later, it reappeared on the other, the near, bank of the river, where it bore away to the east, curling along the broadening valley of the Potomac, carrying to the nation the fearful and exciting intelligence of the Negro insurrection raised this October night by Old John Brown and his men at Harpers Ferry.
It was nearly full daylight, and the tall oaks stood around me like sentries. For a long while, as if I could not, I did not move. I was alone, as alone as I had ever been in my life. But strangely — all unexpectedly — free. As if, after a lifetime bound to my father’s fierce will and companionship by heavy steel manacles and chains, I had watched them come suddenly unlocked, and I had simply, almost casually, pitched them aside.
But were my actions from then on those of a free man? I cannot say. To be sure, I followed no impulses but my own. It sounds ridiculous now as I write it, but when Coppoc and Meriam had been gone awhile, I climbed the branches of the tallest oak tree up there on the cliff, climbed to the topmost branch that would safely support my weight, and, with my Sharps rifle in my lap, made for myself a sort of crow’s nest from which I could see clearly the streets and buildings of Harpers Ferry — from the rifle factory at the further, southern end of town, where Kagi, Leary, and Copeland were pinned down by local riflemen, to the Maryland side of the B & O bridge, where Oliver, Will Thompson, and Dangerfield Newby were posted. I could also see along the remaining length of the high ridge of Bolivar Heights, down to where the road from the Kennedy farmhouse emerged from the woods and crossed the canal to the tow path. And I could look directly into the armory yard itself, where Father and most of his raiders had positioned themselves behind the high, iron-rail walls and cut-stone pylons and inside the firehouse with the hostages.
All was still and silent down there, until, from my watchtower, I saw Father walk out of the firehouse with a man I did not recognize and appear to send him from the armory across the open square to the hotel. After a time, the man returned, carrying a large, open carton of what must have been food — breakfast for the hostages and the raiders both, I assumed. Again, all was calm for a while, until around midmorning, when movement and the sound of men and horses below me and to my right drew my attention away from the town. A large party of armed white civilians under the flag of the notorious Jefferson Guards was riding in from the west along the tow path.
At a point very close to the Maryland end of the B & O bridge, they spotted Oliver and Will Thompson and Dangerfield Newby, dismounted, and at once began firing at them. The three raiders took shelter behind the toll house and returned fire, but the fusillade from the militiamen drove them steadily backwards towards the bridge, where I saw Newby at the entrance suddenly fall down dead, slain by what appeared to be a long spike or a bolt shot from a smooth-bore musket that tore through him ear-to-ear at the throat. Dangerfield Newby — the mulatto slave-son of a Scotchman from Fairfax County, Virginia — was forty-four and the oldest, after Father, of the raiders. He had joined us early on, with the main intention of freeing his wife and children, who were slaves of a man in Warrenton, Virginia. A tall man of light color, well over six feet, and a splendid physical specimen, he was a melancholy man, a good man, and my friend. And now he lay dead — the first of the raiders to go down — while Oliver and Will Thompson fled to safety in the firehouse.
Soon after this, another detachment of armed civilians led by a man in uniform, a second militia force, I supposed, came riding into town from the southwest along Shendandoah Street, where they swiftly secured the Shenandoah bridge and took up positions behind the arsenal, thus commanding the town square and the front of the armory yard. Their position, combined with that of the Jefferson Guards at the B & O bridge, effectively shut off the only escape routes left to Father and his men. They also made it impossible for Barclay Coppoc and Frank Meriam or anyone else to slip in from the Maryland side and help rescue them. Except for Kagi and his men out at the rifle works, Father and his Provisional Army were now trapped with their hostages in the armory yard and firehouse.