STEVEN LUBET. The “Colored Hero” of Harper’s Ferry: John Anthony Copeland and the War against Slavery. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015. Pp. xi, 272. $27.99. “Despite the best efforts of historians,” Isaac Marion writes in his novel Warm Bodies, “there are some things we’ll just never know.” While the past does not provide easy access to its forgotten corners, this often bleak aspect of the historian’s struggle is, happily, sometimes upended. In his new monograph, The “Colored Hero” of Harper’s Ferry: John Anthony Copeland and the War against Slavery, Steven Lubet valiantly explores one of history’s un- knowns, John Anthony Copeland, a black freedom fighter who joined John Brown’s infamous invasion of Harper’s Ferry. While Lubet does not fully rescue the black Oberlinite from the deep shadow of this event or its central protagonist, the author’s efforts to illuminate one of Brown’s virtually unknown compatriots are heartening and thought-provoking. Lubet sets himself a particularly difficult task because of Copeland’s association with Brown. Scholarly and pop- ular writing about Brown, dedicated to chronicling his ex- ploits, explaining his influence, and arguing about his mo- tivations, dwarfs the work dedicated to most American presidents, for example. The 150th anniversary of his exe- cution saw a slew of studies seemingly designed to close the case on this abolitionist and his fight against slavery, but the decade that has followed has seen no shortage of further work. Brown simply offers endless opportunities, in the words of Albion Tourge ´e, to create anew this “Monster and Martyr, Conspirator and Saint; Murderer and Liberator; Cause and Consequence!” Thus, Lubet’s volume may be met with a groan on the mistaken assumption that previous scholarship has ap- propriately characterized Brown’s followers as “loyal spear carriers” (9). Lubet must work doubly hard to show that Copeland was more than a deservedly unknown “foot soldier” (9) and that this particular raider’s story is worthy of its own monograph. Lubet is not the first to try and make more of the ragtag group of twenty-one men that joined Brown on his ill- fated invasion. Some in that group, like Owen Brown, es- caped anonymity; Brown’s third son enjoys a celebrated afterlife in Russell Banks’s fiction. Others, like Osborne Anderson, published important accounts of the raid from exile in Canada. But most of the men who followed the enigmatic and charismatic Brown to their deaths are less known to us. Lubet shows, in his treatment of Brown, his investiga- tion of Copeland, and the structure of the book itself, how Brown’s men deeply influenced “Brown’s own plan- ning for, and execution of, the historic raid” (8). That is to say, Copeland and others were not simply foot soldiers but shapers of Brown’s thoughts and actions. This dy- namic comes into wonderful relief when Lubet focuses on Copeland’s life at Oberlin College. Lubet’s account of the profoundly radical atmosphere of Oberlin’s racial egalitarianism and its influence (through men like Cope- land) on Brown and his mission is intriguing. In this re- gard, his insights harmonize with Brent Morris’s excellent monograph on the college, Oberlin: Hotbed of Abolition- ism (2014). What both authors recognize is the impor- tance of showing modern readers the urgency and pas- sion that these abolitionists felt toward the intractable evil of slavery. In Copeland’s case, that urgency and passion were translated into joining the most radical act of abolitionism in our nation’s history. And while Lubet may not con- vince us to entirely recast that radical act, his exploration of Copeland forces us to consider whether Brown should consume so much of the stage, even during the produc- tion that was the culmination of his entire life. Quoting Langston Hughes’s “October the Sixteenth,” Lubet’s book reminds us that while Brown “took his gun” and “took twenty-one companions,” these “White and Black” men set out to “shoot your way to freedom” (212). Hughes’s choice of the word “companion” captures so much of what made the radical reform movement of abo- litionism so special. Considering Copeland and his twenty white and black companions alongside Brown, rather than simply behind Brown, is a most worthy intervention. R. BLAKESLEE GILPIN Tulane University LOUISE L. STEVENSON. Lincoln in the Atlantic World. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015. Pp. xi, 277. $29.99. Historians of the U.S. have at last fully embraced the global turn, so it was only a matter of time before Lincoln scholarship caught up. Recently Richard Carwardine and Jay Sexton edited The Global Lincoln (2011), a series of essays chiefly exploring the image of the fifteenth presi- dent amongst foreign nations. Louise L. Stevenson’s Lin- coln in the Atlantic World takes a different tack. It focuses on foreign influences upon Abraham Lincoln, which Ste- venson insists were varied and significant. Mainly these influences came from the European world, a point Ste- venson amplifies via an interesting digression into the roots of the word “tycoon,” as Lincoln’s secretaries some- times referred to him. Its use did not signify a deep appre- ciation for Japanese culture, from which it was derived; rather the opposite. Lincoln, like other Americans, was chiefly embedded in Western civilization, with fewer and mostly superficial forays into other cultures. Stevenson goes about this task in a workmanlike fash- ion, with uneven results. Some of them are quite interest- ing. The discussion of Lincoln’s reading of the captivity narrative of James Riley, an American sailor enslaved in North Africa in 1815–1816, stands out. Stevenson argues that the inclusion of this book in an 1860 campaign biog- raphy signifies its place as one of the seven most influen- tial works for the Republican candidate. The book, ac- cording to Stevenson, had a strategic and concrete im- pact. Strategic, because it identified Lincoln as opposed both to slavery and to its immediate abolition. That com- bination situated him as a moderate, enhancing his elec- toral chances. Concrete, because the account taught Lin- coln that masters would only relinquish control over their Canada and the United States 1659 AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW DECEMBER 2016