FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, LANCASTER, MA
BACK TO RESULTS
Acton is the neighboring town just west of Concord. Situated on the Fitchburg Railroad line, in Thoreau’s day there was a South Acton station (still active) and a West Acton station which no longer exists.
Thoreau went through Acton, usually via the railroad, numerous times in his life as he traveled to give lectures or on his excursions. His most hair raising association with the Acton station involved one of John Brown’s men.
Late in the evening of December 2, 1859 Thoreau was visited by Frank Sanborn, who told Thoreau that a “Mr. Lockwood” needed a ride to the South Acton train station at first light the next morning. Thoreau was to get a horse and wagon from Emerson, but Sanborn said little else about the man or the reason why this was all so secretive. And Thoreau didn’t ask.
The next morning, at dawn, Thoreau picked up “X” (as he referred to him in his Journal) and began the 7 mile journey to Acton. The man seemed unhinged; he babbled about John Brown and invading the South. He demanded to be taken to see Emerson, and then wondered aloud if Thoreau was Emerson. “I am not” is all Thoreau would say.
At times, the man ranted about “proceeding to business” and that “time was short.” He also repeatedly apologized to Thoreau, saying, “I know I am insane.”
“I knew it too”, Thoreau would report in his Journal.
At one point “Mr. Lockwood” jumped out of the wagon, determined to walk back to Concord to see Emerson. Thoreau tried to persuade him to get back in the wagon, but eventually used “judicious force” to get the man seated. “Lockwood” wouldn’t be quiet; “His insanity exhibited itself chiefly by his incessant, excited talk” Thoreau would later comment. They finally arrived in South Acton, where Thoreau got the man on a train that would eventually get him to Montreal.
Thoreau had just helped one of John Brown’s men escape to Canada. Francis Jackson Merriam had been in Maryland with Brown and his men just before the raid on Harpers Ferry. But, Merriam had stayed behind at the farmhouse they’d been using as a headquarters in order to guard the weapons they had stashed there. When it became evident that the Raid had failed, he headed north, first going to Canada. Already in an “excitable” state, he decided to go back to the United States, unrealistically hoping to continue Brown’s revolution. He eventually wound up in Boston, seeking the help of Sanborn. Ironically, he was in Concord on the day that Brown was hanged in Virginia, and Sanborn knew that he had to get Merriam out of the country ASAP.
Although Thoreau probably guessed the identity of Mr. X, it wasn’t until he was on his deathbed two years later that Sanborn told him it was Merriam. He was one of only five of Brown’s men to escape Harpers Ferry, and was one of the most wanted men in the country. In helping Merriam escape Thoreau’s actions were dangerous — and treasonous — to the extreme.
Today the South Acton Train Station is a stop on the Fitchburg Commuter Rail. A modern new station was built a few years ago, so there is no physical evidence to connect Thoreau’s numerous visits to the station.
