John Brown's body
- Northwest Ordinance (1787)
- Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions (1798–99)
- End of Atlantic slave trade
- Missouri Compromise (1820)
- Tariff of 1828
- Nat Turner's Rebellion (1831)
- Nullification crisis (1832–33)
- Abolition of slavery in the British Empire (1834)
- Texas Revolution (1835–36)
- United States v. Crandall (1836)
- Gag rule (1836–44)
- Commonwealth v. Aves (1836)
- Murder of Elijah Lovejoy (1837)
- Burning of Pennsylvania Hall (1838)
- American Slavery As It Is (1839)
- United States v. The Amistad (1841)
- Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842)
- Texas annexation (1845)
- Mexican–American War (1846–48)
- Wilmot Proviso (1846)
- Nashville Convention (1850)
- Compromise of 1850
- Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852)
- Recapture of Anthony Burns (1854)
- Kansas–Nebraska Act (1854)
- Ostend Manifesto (1854)
- Bleeding Kansas (1854–61)
- Caning of Charles Sumner (1856)
- Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)
- The Impending Crisis of the South (1857)
- Panic of 1857
- Lincoln–Douglas debates (1858)
- Oberlin–Wellington Rescue (1858)
- John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry (1859)
- Virginia v. John Brown (1859)
- 1860 presidential election
- Crittenden Compromise (1860)
- Secession of Southern states (1860–61)
- Peace Conference of 1861
- Corwin Amendment (1861)
- Battle of Fort Sumter (1861)
The abolitionist John Brown was executed on Friday, December 2, 1859, for murder, treason against the Commonwealth of Virginia, and for having led an unsuccessful and bloody attempt to start a slave insurrection. He was tried and hanged in Charles Town, Virginia (since 1863, West Virginia). He was the first person executed for treason in the history of the country.
His body was taken by his widow Mary Brown home to his farm in North Elba, New York, and buried there on December 8, 1859.