In 1856, in Kansas, United States, the total prohibition of the slavery was voted upon. The state, located in the internal border of the country, was a regular target of armed raids of “Border Ruffians:” pro-slavery militias that attacked fugitive slave camps and the farms of free Blacks. In May of that same year, the town of Lawrence, with numbers of free Blacks, was threatened by a column of “Ruffians.” Anti-slavery leader John Brown, along with an old escaped slave and Brown’s four sons mustered together a people’s militia to defend the town. However, they failed and had to witness the sacking of Lawrence by the “Ruffians.” In retaliation, Brown comes out in persecution of those "Ruffians" and trapped them in May 24, 1856 in an ambush in Pottawatomie where he killed at eight of them. In response, the “Ruffians,” supported by the big landowners, carried out raids against the farms of the freed slaves and murdered two of John Brown’s sons. For three years, the anti-slavery guerrilla forces of Brown’s people’s army kept the pro-slavery militiamen in check. In 1859, in a raid on an arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia, Brown was captured, tortured and executed in public.