The Trial and Execution of Louis XVI: The Indictment of Louis XVI (December 11, 1792) Louis, the French people accuses you of having committed a multitude of crimes in order to establish your tyranny by destroying its liberty.

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John Brown was a leading anti-slavery activist in pre-Civil War America. John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry galvanized the era's abolitionist movement. John Brown was a criminal trial held in Charles Town, Virginia, in October of 1859. The abolitionist John Brown was quickly prosecuted for treason against the Commonwealth of Virginia, murder, and inciting a negro insurrection, all part of his raid on the United States federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (since 1863, West Virginia). So Famous Trials 2.0 (thanks to my great support team) debuted in 2017 with a cleaner look, additional video and audio clips, and new features that should improve navigation around the site. You will not find every trial deserving of being called “famous” on this site. If the famous trial you were hoping to find is not included, click on. John Brown's raid and subsequent trial inflamed the dispute between the country's abolitionist and pro-slavery factions hardening the lines that separated the North and the South. 'I determined to summon the insurgents to surrender.

'Now, if it is deemed necessary that I should forfeit my life for the furtherance of the ends of justice, and mingle my blood further with the blood of millions in this slave country whose rights are disregarded by wicked, cruel, and unjust enactments, I say, let it be done.'
--John Brown, statement at his sentencing on Nov. 2, 1859

'[John Brown is] that new saint, than whom none purer or more brave was ever led by love of men into conflict and death,--the new saint awaiting his martyrdom, and who, if he shall suffer, will make the gallows glorious like the cross.'
--Ralph Waldo Emerson, from his lecture 'Courage,' delivered in Boston on Nov. 8, 1859

The arrest, trial, and execution of John Brown in the fall of 1859 came at a critical moment in United State history. According to historian David S. Reynolds in his recent biography, John Brown, Abolitionist: The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights (2005), Brown's actions and statements following his failed attempt to begin a slave insurrection near Harper's Ferry, Virginia so polarized northern and southern opinion on the slavery issue as to ensure Abraham Lincoln's election and cause the Civil War to occur perhaps two decades earlier than it might have otherwise. Reynolds is quick to point out that not only was Brown 'right' on slavery and other racial issues of his day, but that his conduct--in causing the Civil War to begin in 1861 rather than, say, 1881--potentially saved hundreds of thousands of lives that could have been lost in a war fought in a time of much greater population and more deadly weaponry and, at the same time, might well have spared an entire generation of African-Americans the humiliating experience of human bondage....'

John Brown's Last Speech

On October, 16, 1859, John Brown and nearly two dozen comrades seized the armory at Harper's Ferry in West Virginia, hoping to use its massive arsenal in the struggle to forcibly end slavery. Captured and brought to trial at nearby Charles Town, Brown was found guilty of treason. One month before his execution, John Brown addressed a courtroom in Charlestown, West Virginia, defending his role in the action at Harper's Ferry. Henry David Thoreau, although himself did not favor violence, praised John Brown, and when the fiery preacher was sentenced to death, Ralph Waldo Emerson said: 'He will make the gallows holy as the cross.'

I have, may it please the Court, a few words to say.

In the first place, I deny everything but what I have all along admitted, the design on my part to free the slaves. I intended certainly to have made aclean thing of that matter, as I did last winter, when I went into Missouri andthere took slaves without the snapping of a gun on either side, moved themthrough the country, and finally left them in Canada. I designed to have done thesame thing again, on a larger scale. That was all I intended. I never did intendmurder, or treason, or the destruction of property, or to excite or incite slavesto rebellion, or to make insurrection.

I have another objection; and that is, it is unjust that I should suffer sucha penalty. Had I interfered in the manner which I admit, and which I admit hasbeen fairly proved (for I admire the truthfulness and candor of the greaterportion of the witnesses who have testified in this case), had I so interfered inbehalf of the rich, the powerful, the intelligent, the so-called great, or inbehalf of any of their friends, either father, mother, brother, sister, wife, orchildren, or any of that class, and suffered and sacrificed what I have in thisinterference, it would have been all right; and every man in this court wouldhave deemed it an act worthy of reward rather than punishment.

This court acknowledges, as I suppose, the validity of the law of God. I see abook kissed here which I suppose to be the Bible, or at least the New Testament.That teaches me that all things whatsoever I would that men should do to me, Ishould do even so to them. It teaches me, further, to 'remember them that are inbonds, as bound with them.' I endeavored to act up to that instruction. I say, Iam yet too young to understand that God is any respecter of persons. I believethat to have interfered as I have done as I have always freely admitted I havedone in behalf of His despised poor, was not wrong, but right. Now, if it isdeemed necessary that I should forfeit my life for the furtherance of the ends ofjustice, and mingle my blood further with the blood of my children and with theblood of millions in this slave country whose rights are disregarded by wicked,cruel, and unjust enactments, I submit; so let it be done!

Let me say one word further.

I feel entirely satisfied with the treatment I have received on my trial.Considering all the circumstances. it has been more generous than I expected. ButI feel no consciousness of guilt. I have stated from the first what was myintention and what was not. I never had any design against the life of anyperson, nor any disposition to commit treason, or excite slaves to rebel, or makeany general insurrection. I never encouraged any man to do so, but alwaysdiscouraged any idea of that kind.

Let me say, also, a word in regard to the statements made by some of thoseconnected with me. I hear it has been stated by some of them that I have inducedthem to join me. But the contrary is true. I do not say this to injure them, butas regretting their weakness. There is not one of them but joined me of his ownaccord, and the greater part of them at their own expense. A number of them Inever saw, and never had a word of conversation with, till the day they came tome; and that was for the purpose I have stated.

Now I have done.

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'I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land can never be purged away but with blood.'

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