I should have forfeited my own self-respect, and perhaps the good opinion of my countrymen, if I had failed to resent such an injury by calling the offender in question to a personal account.

Brooks was a fervent advocate of slavery. Brooks was tried in a District of Columbia court for the attack. Family
First marriage: Caroline Harper Means(1820–1843).

Sumner was seriously injured and unable to serve in the Senate for three years though eventually he largely recovered. This was in retaliation for an anti-slavery speech by Sumner in which Sumner attacked Brooks' uncle Senator Andrew Butler (Democrat-South Carolina). Brooks was a fervent advocate of slavery.