1892 Reclus print HARPERS FERRY, WEST VIRGINIA (#30)

Description: Reclus16_30 1892 Reclus print HARPERS FERRY, WEST VIRGINIA (#30) Nice view titled Vue prise a Harper's ferry, from wood engraving with fine detail and clear impression, nice hand coloring, approx. page size is 28 x 19 cm, approx. image size is 19 x 13 cm. From La Nouvelle Géographie universelle, la terre et les hommes, 19 vol. (1875-94), great work of Elisee Reclus. Harpers Ferry, town, Jefferson county, West Virginia, U.S., at the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers, in the Blue Ridge Mountains where West Virginia, Virginia, and Maryland converge. It was the site of Harpers Ferry Raid, one of the major incidents precipitating the U.S. Civil War, and it was the site of several battles of the war. The town was settled in 1734 by Robert Harper, who established a ferry across the Potomac and a grist mill on the Shenandoah. The site was selected by Pres. George Washington for a federal armoury because of its waterpower potential and was purchased from Harper's heirs in 1796. The town developed as an important U.S. arsenal and centre for the manufacture of rifles. On Oct. 16-18, 1859, the arsenal of Harpers Ferry (then located in Virginia) was the target of an assault by an armed band of Abolitionists led by John Brown. The raid was intended to be the first stage in an elaborate plan to establish an independent stronghold of freed slaves in the mountains of Maryland and Virginia--an enterprise that had won moral and financial support from several prominent Bostonians. Choosing Harpers Ferry because of its arsenal and because of its location as a convenient gateway to the South, John Brown and his band of 16 whites and 5 blacks seized the armoury on the night of October 16. The entire countryside was quickly alerted, and combined state and federal troops overwhelmed the raiders in two days. Seventeen men died in the fighting, and Brown and six surviving followers were hanged before the end of the year. Although the raid on Harpers Ferry was denounced by a majority of Northerners, it outraged Southern slaveholders, who were already fearful of slave insurrections, and convinced them that Abolitionists would stop at nothing to eradicate their "peculiar institution." Once the war began, Harpers Ferry served as an important link in the defense of Washington, D.C., was repeatedly attacked by both Union and Confederate armies. Confederates under Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson captured the town (Sept. 13-15, 1862) and took more than 12,500 prisoners, the largest Union surrender in the war. Harpers Ferry is now a quiet residential village and is the headquarters for a resort area including the Harpers Ferry National Historic Park (1,909 ac [772 ha], authorized as a national monument in 1944; changed to a national historic park in 1963), with museums, monuments, and historic buildings. Inc. 1763. Pop. (1990) 308.

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Location: Zagreb

End Time: 2024-10-30T05:53:23.000Z

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