>>EXCERPT ONE— “I John Brown am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away, but with Blood. I had as I now think vainly flattered myself that without very much bloodshed, it might be done.” >>EXCERPT TWO— Crossing the Potomac River On Horseback At Night to Escape Slavery:“In this trying hour, the severed and bleeding heart of the husband resolved to escape at all hazards, taking with him a daguerreotype likeness of his wife which he happened to have on hand, and a lock of hair from her head, and from each of the children as mementoes of his unbounded (though sundered) affection for them.” >>EXCERPT THREE— The Confederate Mata Hari: Best known as Belle Boyd (and dubbed the Cleopatra of the Secession or Siren of the Shenandoah, and later the Confederate Mata Hari) was a Confederate spy in the American Civil War. Often she was helped by Eliza Corsey, a Boyd family slave whom Belle had taught to read and write.