Changing the course of history.

One of the most dramatic episodes in American history first began to unfold during a candlelit meeting at a modest, two-story frame house in Detroit. It was March 12, 1859, and by astonishing coincidence -- or perhaps pre-arranged design -- famed black orator Frederick Douglass and firebrand white abolitionist John Brown were both in town, Douglass to delivery an anti-slavery lecture and Brown to recruit volunteers for a bold plan to spark armed slave uprisings across the South.

At the home of William Webb, a local black leader with whom Douglass was staying, Brown laid out the first step in his campaign: a plot to seize the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry in Virginia (now West Virginia) and use the 100,000 weapons stored there to arm escaped slaves.

Though sympathetic to his cause, Douglass was skeptical of Brown's radical plan. He believed the arch-abolitionist was walking into a steel trap from which neither he nor his followers could possibly escape. Brown did, however, elicit promises of support from other black leaders gathered at the Webb home that evening.

From Detroit, Brown and his entourage -- including 14 escaping slaves from Missouri -- crossed the Detroit River into Canada to recruit a band of followers at Chatham, Ontario. History was about to be made.

Brown and his biracial army of 21 abolitionists attacked the arsenal on the night of Oct. 16, 1859. They captured the men on guard and took over the building, but their luck was about to run out.

Unbeknownst to Brown, militias in nearby towns had learned of the attack and were gathering their forces. Two days later, Brown and his ragtag army were quickly surrounded. During the siege, Brown and six men barricaded themselves in an engine-house and continued to fight until Brown was seriously wounded and two of his sons were killed.

Brown was tried and convicted of insurrection, treason and murder. On Dec. 2, 1859, he and six other men involved in the ill-fated attack were hanged. The Harper's Ferry raid widened the breech between North and South that culminated in the Civil War. During the bloody conflict, "John's Brown Body" was a popular marching song for Union soldiers.

Brown was widely condemned as a fanatic, even in the North, but Frederick Douglass took a kinder view. In an 1881 speech, he declared: "John Brown began the war that ended slavery and made this a free Republic. Until this blow was struck, the prospect for freedom was dim, shadowy and uncertain."