Had he made an effort to rescue you, your wife and daughters, your mother and sisters from slavery and from the vengeance, the wrath, the rape and rapine of your slaves, would you have hung him? No. But he sought to rescue slaves from the wrath, rape and rapine of yourself and your fellow slave-breeders and slave-traders, and you killed him. Had he done for you and them the very deeds for which you have hung him, you and they would have pronounced him innocent, and crowned him with glory.
Your slaves have as good a right to enslave you, as you have to enslave them. They have as good a right to scourge your naked back, to drive you to unpaid toil, to sell you as a beast, to shoot you and tear you to pieces with bloodhounds, if you run away, as you have to do these things to them. They have as good a right to subject your wife and daughters, and your mother and sisters, to their passions, as you have to subject theirs to yours. They have as good a right to perpetrate robbery, murder, rape and rapine upon you and your confederates in slave-breeding and slave-trading, and upon your wives and children, as you have to perpetrate like outrages upon them. They have as good a right to defend themselves and families against you and your associates in plunder and rapine, as you have to defend yourselves against them. You and your co-workers in crime call on the North to come down and defend you and your families against your slaves. They come and defend you, and you thank them. The slaves call on John Brown to come down and deliver them and their families from your lusts and your cruelties, and defend their property, their liberties and lives against you. You say it is the duty of the North to defend you against the slaves. John Brown and his God told him it was his duty to defend the slaves against you. He came to Virginia to do so, and for doing his duty, you have hung him. Are you not a murderer?
What says Virginia of your deed? The slaves and all the world look on the seal with which, as Governor of the State, you stamp your letters and all public documents. What do they see? Virginia, standing with one foot on the neck of a prostrate slaveholder, whose head she has just cut off, and holding in her right hand the sword with which she did the deed, all reeking with his blood. Proud and
