He said he was simply trying to free slaves, as he had done the previous year in Missouri. He insisted that fighting against slavery was the right thing to do. His statement was published in papers all over the country. A gaunt but defiant John Brown walked to the gallows at age 59.
John Brown was an American abolitionist leader. He was viewed as a hero because the slaves at the time tought he was born to end slaverly. The soutnrhens hate him as they love there slaves and would die without them.