John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry successful? Hardly. Brown had two goals he wanted to achieve with the raid on Harper's Ferry, the first was to acquire weapons to arm a slave uprising. It was the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry he attempted to raid. Attempted is the key word because he found himself and his men surrounded by local militia and farmers, unable to escape before Colonel Robert E Lee (yes, the very same man who would become famous as a Confederate General) arrived with a Marine detachment to subdue the raiders. Of the twenty-one or twenty-two raiders led by Brown, only five managed to escape, all others were either killed or captured. They failed to obtain the vast number of weapons they sought to steal from the armory.
The second goal was to insite a slave rebellion. Brown was convinced slaves would rally to his cause, rising up against their masters. At most all he seems to have gotten was two slaves, not exactly the uprising he wanted. Undoubtedly there were slaves who were willing to fight against their masters, we can see that from Nat Turner's Rebellion of August 1831 and from the fact that slaves did join the Union army during the war. But there weren't enough of these slaves willing to flock to Brown's cause.
