Beecher's Bibles

For decades, there had been conflict between pro-slavery and anti-slavery activists in America, particularly when a territory was admitted into the Union as a new state. Would it be a free state, or a slave state? When in 1820 Missouri was admitted into the Union the controversy was settled with the Missouri Compromise, which said all future states south of Missouri could be admitted as slave states. During the 1854 formation of two new states, Kansas and Nebraska, Congress repealed the Missouri Compromise and initiated the Kansas–Nebraska Act, saying rather the citizens within each territory could decide by popular vote. Settlers streamed into Kansas to stack the vote, many pro-slavers coming from neighboring Missouri. Violence was rife in Kansas between the two sides. It was during this conflict that Minister Henry Ward Beecher raised funds to buy rifles for the anti-slavery "free-staters".^[2] Beecher believed that such weapons were "a greater moral urgency among border ruffians than the scriptures".^[3]

The name "Beecher's Bibles" is in reference to Sharps rifles and carbines, associated with the New England minister and abolitionist Henry Ward Beecher,^[5] of the New England Emigrant Aid Society. Beecher was an outspoken abolitionist and he raised funds from his congregation to buy Sharps Carbines for Kansas' free state (anti-slavery) settlers. The Federal and state authorities had forbidden sending arms to the territory, but that did not stop abolitionists from donating funds for firearm purchases to aid free state fighters. There were approximately 900 Sharps Carbines sent to the Kansas conflict.^[6]

The Sharps Carbine Model 1853 was not a cheap or common rifle, it had a modern "high tech" design incorporating a breech loading mechanism that made it particularly advantageous against the weapons of pro-slavers.^[3][7] W. H. Isley wrote of the rifle in 1907, saying,

"The very name 'Sharps rifle' was to become a term to sober the border ruffian and give him serious pause. This breech-loading rifle was a new invention and extremely effective in comparison, the Missourian was poorly armed, carrying either a squirrel-knife, a heavy buffalo-gun, or a clumsy army musket. This difference in armament probably explains why the free-state bands, though usually outnumbered, were invariably victorious in all open fighting.”^[8]

There are a number of origin stories for the name "Beecher's Bibles". As traditionally told, it involves concealment. The carbines were shipped at the bottom of wooden crates covered in bibles.^[3] The crates were marked with "Books and Bibles", to not raise suspicion with pro-slavers.^[6][7] Similar stories of guns in an unlabeled box with bibles in a separate box. However, according to the journal Kansas History, there is nothing in the literature to support the concealment narrative.^[9] Rather, Beecher and his New York congregation sent a check for $625 to the Sharpes rifle company along with 25-bibles and a letter. Beecher requested the rifles be sent to Kansas, and to publicize the letter. Sharpes sent the rifles, and published the letter; in this way "Beecher", "Guns" and "Bibles" became associated in the public's mind. Newspaper headlines proclaimed "Bibles and Rifles for Kansas" and "Beecher Bible and Rifle Colony."^[10][8] Some newspapers began calling Beecher's church the "Bible and Rifle Company".^[11]

According to a letter written years later by Beecher himself:

The letter that accompanied the check and the Bibles [sent to the president of Sharpes Rifle company] was widely reprinted in newspapers across the country under the headline, BIBLES AND RIFLES FOR KANSAS and BIBLES AND RIFLES IN KANZAS. It was from these events that the company began to be referred to as the “Beecher Bible and Rifle Colony” and the Sharps rifle took on the nickname “Beecher’s Bible.^[10]