The author of Five for Freedom comes to Frederick, MD, on Tues., Aug. 14th, at 7PM.
Join us at the National Museum of Civil War Medicine’s Delaplaine-Randall Conference Room to hear author Eugene Meyer discuss his latest book, Five for Freedom: The African American Soldiers in John Brown's Army.
Free event; no registration required. Books will be available for purchase and signing at the event. Presented in partnership with the National Museum of Civil War Medicine.
About Five for Freedom: On October 16, 1859, John Brown and his band of 18 raiders descended on Harpers Ferry. In an ill-fated attempt to incite a slave insurrection, they seized the federal arsenal, took hostages, and retreated to a fire engine house where they barricaded themselves until a contingent of US Marines battered their way in on October 18.
The raiders were routed, and several were captured. Soon after, they were tried, convicted, and hanged. Among Brown’s fighters were five African American men – John Copeland, Shields Green, Dangerfield Newby, Lewis Leary, and Osborne Perry Anderson – whose lives and deaths have long been overshadowed by their martyred leader and who, even today, are little remembered. Only Anderson survived, later publishing the lone insider account of the event that, most historians agree, was a catalyst to the catastrophic American Civil War that followed.
Five for Freedom is the story of these five brave men, the circumstances in which they were born and raised, how they came together at this fateful time and place, and the legacies they left behind. It is an American story that continues to resonate.
About the author: Eugene L. Meyer is an award-winning journalist and author and a former longtime reporter and editor at The Washington Post whose work has also appeared in The New York Times, U.S. News & World Report, and many other national and regional publications. Meyer has been the editor of the quarterly B’nai B’rith Magazine since 2009 and serves on the board of Washington Independent Review of Books, to which he also contributes reviews and essays. Much of Meyer’s writing is closely tied to his love of history. Following Chesapeake Country and Maryland: Lost and Found…Again, Meyer’s latest book Five for Freedom will be published on June 1, 2018, by Chicago Review Press.
At the National Museum of Civil War Medicine, 48 E. Patrick St., Frederick, MD. Click here for info.
