Plotted in secret, launched in the dark, John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry was a pivotal moment in U.S. history, But few Americans know the true story of the men and women who launched a desperate strike at the slaveholding South. Brown, the descendant of New England Puritans, saw slavery as a sin against America's founding principles. Unlike most abolitionists, he was willing to take up arms, and in 1859 he prepared for battle at a hideout in Maryland, joined by his teenage daughter, three of his sons, and a guerrilla band that included former slaves and a spy. On October 17, the raiders seized Harpers Ferry, stunning the nation and prompting a counterattack led by Robert E. Lee. After Brown's capture, his defiant eloquence galvanized the North and appalled the South, which considered Brown a terrorist. The raid also helped elect Abraham Lincoln, who later began to fulfill Brown's dream with the Emancipation Proclamation, a measure he called "a John Brown raid, on a gigantic scale." This book travels antebellum America to deliver both a historical drama and a telling portrait of a nation divided, a time that still resonates in ours.

October 16, 1859 -- The Road to Harpers Ferry. School of adversity ; I consecrate my life ; A warlike spirit ; First blood ; Secret service ; This spark of fire -- Into Africa. My invisibles ; Into the breach ; I am nearly disposed of now -- They Will Brown Us All. His despised poor ; A full fountain of bedlam ; So let it be done! ; Dissevering the ties that bind us ; Immortal raiders.