Page:John Brown (1899).pdf/70

 Kansas or Nebraska with a view to help defeat Satan and his legions in that direction, I have not a word to say; but I feel committed to operate in another part of the field." Just what he meant by this last reference can only be guessed. Sanborn believes that he was already thinking of Virginia; and Sanborn knew the man well at that time, and has gone more deeply into his life than any other writer. The sons "located" not far from a place called Osawatomie, and lived first in tents, then in rude huts. Fever and hunger overtook them. They were near the border of Missouri, and at the very seat of the struggle between the Pro-slavery and Free State influences.

The issue there was simply this. Kansas had lately been opened to settlement. Although slavery within the territory had, as was supposed, been forever prohibited by the Missouri Compromise of 1820, the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854