Abolitionist John Brown's "Black" Springfield Years Radicalized Him

When John Brown left Springfield after closing his wool business, he bid farewell to his fellow parishioners at the Sanford Street Church (today’s St. Johns Congregational Church), his many friends in the growing African-American community, and his respected cohorts involved in the local Anti-slavery movement.

He left with full confidence that the leaders in the local black community had become quite effective in helping individuals seeking to escape slavery in the south. Brown felt the need to move on to other communities to continue his work knowing that Springfield was in good hands with the likes of strong-minded, brave, and dedicated African Americans like Thomas Thomas, William Montague, and Eli Baptist.

Since the end of the 18th Century, Springfield had become one of the safe havens for blacks escaping slavery from parts of the Northeast including neighboring New York where slavery was still legal until 1828 as well as the southern states.

During John Brown’s residency in Springfield from 1846 to 1849, he witnessed first hand how effective that safe haven status had become. In fact, his years in Springfield helped to confirm his thoughts about the evils of Slavery, the pervasive influence the “Slave Power” had on American national Government, but most of all his sojourn in this community opened his eyes and mind to the possibility of effective resistance.

In Springfield, he found a community whose white leadership from the community’s most prominent churches, to its most wealthy businessmen, to its most popular politicians, to its local jurists, and even to the publisher of the Republican, one of the nation’s most influential newspapers were deeply involved and emotionally invested in the anti-slavery movement.

But just as important, and perhaps more so, John Brown lived within the black community. He attended their church, hired fellow parishioners for his wool business, and notably developed a close friendship with Thomas Thomas even gifting his rocking chair to Thomas’ mother as a measure of respect when he left Springfield in 1849.

In this and many other ways, John Brown displayed a special affection for his African-American friends in Springfield.

His close association with the community more importantly provided John Brown with a living example of what a free black community could be. In church and at meetings, and in his philosophical and political conversations with black friends such as Thomas Thomas, John Brown personally experienced the impressive intellectual capabilities, and leadership qualities within the community. Through the passion of their rhetoric, sincerity of their prayer, and logic of their reasoning, he was inspired to re-double his efforts against the pernicious institution of slavery.

When the famous abolitionist Frederick Douglass came to Springfield, he met John Brown and was impressed by this remarkable man.

Douglass remarked, “Though a white gentleman, he is in sympathy with the black man and as deeply interested in our cause, as though his own soul had been pierced with the iron of slavery.”

While in Springfield, Douglass spent an entire evening with John Brown. An evening which arguably transformed Douglass’ perspective and views on the future direction of the national debate on slavery.

He wrote of his conversations with Brown, “From this night spent with John Brown in Springfield, Mass. 1847 while I continued to write and speak against slavery, I became all the same less hopeful for its peaceful abolition. My utterances became more and more tinged by the color of this man’s strong impressions.”

In 1849, Brown moved his family to North Elba, New York to live within its local black community. He was sensing progress in the fight against slavery although he also saw a long hard road ahead until abolition. But he was truly encouraged by the growth and development of these African-American enclaves where free blacks could live their lives away the shadows of slavery.

Imagine how distraught Brown must have felt when the Fugitive Slave Act was passed in 1850. For all the opinions offered on the national stage about the eventual demise of slavery through gradual means, here was proof positive that the Slave Power was not going away. In fact, with the Fugitive Slave Act, it had actually tightened its grip allowing slaveowners to have the force of federal law behind them.

The real and imminent threat of “slave-catchers” reaching out into the former “safe havens” like Springfield in order to drag African-Americans back into slavery became a catalyst for action.

In his first significant action after the Act was passed, John Brown returned to Springfield and immediately sought out his friends from Sanford Street Church, and in particular Thomas Thomas. They met to determined what to do to ensure that communities like Springfield remained “safe havens” and to establish a extra-legal counterforce to the actions of slavecatchers.

Author Joseph Carvalho III at Museum of Springfield History exhibit on John Brown he co-curated. The exhibit is on display at the museum at Chestnut and Edwards streets.

From the pulpit of the Sanford Street Church, Rev. John Mars enjoined his congregation that the time had come to “beat plowshares into swords” to defend their families and their freedom.

It was at this moment that John Brown drafted the founding document of the League of Gileadites with the help and influence of his Springfield friends in the black community.  Significantly, the League of Gileadites was established as an anti-slavery militia with its goal of self-defense against slavecatchers. In the eyes of the federal government and federal law as constituted with the enactment of the Fugitive Slave Act, this organization clearly promoted illegal civil, and most remarkably, armed resistance.

After establishing the League of Gileadites, John Brown left Springfield, but he left it in good hands. Not one person was ever taken back into slavery from Springfield from that point on.

In fact, William Wells Brown the famous black orator who traveled throughout the north recounting his own harrowing experience escaping from slavery commented how Springfield was remarkable for its open defiance of the Fugitive Slave laws.  He noted that on his visit to Springfield, that it was a common sight to see and meet local African Americans at the train station armed and ready to resist any slave catcher who attempted to conduct their “business” in their community.

For John Brown, “Bleeding Kansas” and the famous raid on Harper’s Ferry were to follow, two flash points that lead to the Civil War, and Emancipation. It is important to reflect upon Springfield’s place in his life and how the relationships formed during his stay here influenced the dramatic actions he took in the 1850s.

Source:  Joseph Carvalho III, "Abolitionist John Brown's years in Springfield Ma. transform his anti-slavery thoughts and actions," The Springfield Republican - Mass. Live.com (Apr. 6, 2010)