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There appeared an anonymous communication, written from Washington under the signature of Truth, so grossly calumnious of General Joseph Holt, Judge Advocate General in the trial of the assassins of President Lincoln, that he demanded the name of the author, who proved to be John T. Ford, of Fords Theater, where the fearful tragedy was enacted, and who, at the time, was committed to the Carroll Prison, where he was kept on suspicion, it is presumed over a month, when he was liberated without being brought to trial. Naturally enough, perhaps, he harbored a strong prejudice against General Holt, and sought to defame his character under cover through the press. Among other things he accused General Holt with having kept Mrs. Surratt heavily manacled during her trial, and also of virtually depriving her of reputable counsel refer- ring to the Hon. Reverdy Johnson, who, as clearly appears by his argument, which was upon the question of jurisdiction, voluntarily withdrew, leaving the case in the hands of his associate counsel, Messrs. Clampitt and Aiken. General Holt met the other charge by a letter, addressed to him, under date of September 4, 1873, from General J. F. Hartranft, who, referring to Fords article in the Tribune, said: I think it proper, in justice to you, to declare publicly that its statements, so far as they relate to occurrences within my own observation, are absolute falsehoods. As marshal of the court before whom the conspirators were tried, I had charge of Mrs. Surratt before, during, and after the time of her trial, in all a period of about two months, dnring which she never had a manacle or manacles on either hands or feet; and the thought of manacling her 1 Professor Hadley attributes a recent increase in railway accidents to this employment of new men, citing in evidence the fact that in the majority of detailed railroad reports we find some allusion to increased wages as an important element in expense. He attributes it, however, to the special demand was not, to my knowledge, ever entertained by any one in authority. One would suppose that proof so conclusive ought to set forever at rest the manacle charge; and as regards the reference to Reverdy Johnson, it is plain beyond doubt that had he desired to continue in the case, assuredly there was no power that could have prevented him from doing so. Yet, notwithstanding this and the overwhelming testimony on the other more serious and wanton charge against General Holt of withholding from President Johnson the recommendation of five members of the court that the sentence of Mrs. Surratt be commuted to imprisonment in the penitentiary, John. T. Ford appears again in the North American Review for April, 1889, in an article reiterating the falsehoods of his anonymous communication, and trying to show that General Holt was guilty of withholding from President Johnson the aforesaid recommendatiots of Mrs. Surratt to mercy. Now, in as brief a manner as possible, I will recite some of the stronger evidence, clearly proving the falsity of this last charge, made first before President Johnsons term expired, and afterwards by Johnson himself, when he was seeking to curry favor with the South in the hope of being elected to the presi- dency. He did not dare to make the charge while he was at the head of the Government, because he knew if he did that General Holt would instantly demand, as he did ask for, in 1866, a court of inquiry, which the President declined to order, and that all the facts and circumstances of the case would come out. General Holt, I think, took little, if any, public notice of this slander until he found it had received the indorsement for railroad labor, due to the larger proportionate amount of local traffic under the operation of the Inter-State Commerce Act, or, more commonly, to unhealthy competition and abnor- mally low freight rates. ( Quarterly Journal of Economics, January, 1889, pp. 174, 175.)Stanton when Judge Holt came in. He said, I have just come from a conference with the President over the proceedings of the military commission.~ Well, asked Mr. Stanton, what has he done? He has approved the findings and sentence of the court, replied Judge Holt. What did he say about the recom- mendation to mercy of Mrs. Surratt? He said that she must be punished with the rest; that no reasons were given for his interposition by those asking for clemency in her case, except age and sex. Now, is there a fair-minded person living who would require more or better proof that the recommendation for the commutation of the sentence of Mrs. Surratt to imprisonment for life was in President Johnsons office, and that the question was fully considered by him in conference with several, if not with all, of the members of his Cabinet before the day of execution? True, no one states that he actually saw it in the Presidents hands, though Judge Bingham says both Secretaries Stanton and Seward told him it was presented to him and duly considered before the death sentence was approved. But Attorney-General Speed, a direct eyewitness, could, had he chosen to speak, have made this fact certain beyond doubt or cavil. Mr. Ford professes amazement at General Holts anxiety for more de- tailed testimony from Mr. Speed, as indicated by their correspondence on the subject in the North American Review for July, 1888. I am myself free to confess that I do not think any additional proof whatever is at all necessary for General Holts complete vindication; but Mr. Speed had been a lifelong friend of his, and knowing that he saw the aforesaid recommendation in the Presidents own hands, is it strange he should in- sist that he should tell him so? He may be, and is, I think, over-sensitive. In his preface to Pittmans book of the trial, Major Ben: Perley Poore, who unwittingly repeats the false newspaper manacle story, observes, General Holt is an inflexibly upright administrator of justice, yet humanities have a large place in his heart; and General Mussey, speaking of the call made by General Holt at the White House on the morn- ing of the execution, when Miss Surratt was there and the President had refused to see her or any one in her mothers behalf, overruling, also, at the same time, Judge Wylies writ of habeas corpus, says, I shall never lose the impression made upon me of your [General Holts] deep pity for her [Miss Surratt] and of the pain which her distress caused you. But will Mr. .Ford or any other of General Holts persistent calumniators be so kind as to state why General Holt should have been so anxious for Mr. Speed to tell the whole truth, had he not known, beyond the remotest question, that it would have been conclusive testimony in his favor? Would he have asked Mr. Speed to say more than he did say, if he had had the least doubt on that point? Surely not. It is not the purpose of this article to go into the evidence regarding either Mrs. Surratts guilt or inno- cence; but I cannot refrain from brief comment on the following quotation from Mr. Fords article, wherein, referring to Mrs. Surratt, he says The very man of God who shrived her soul for eternity was said to be constrained to promise that she should not communicate with the world. As the poor martyr walked in her shroud tothe scaffold, it is also said that she begged the priest by her side to let her tell the people she was innocent. She was told that the Church was permitted only to prepare her soul for eternity; that already she was dead to all else. This looks strangely, to say the least; and I am re- minded by it that it was just this which the late John9 M. Brodhead, Second Comptroller of the Treasury, once told me was, in his view, conclusive proof of Mrs. Surratts guilt~ He believed that had not the priest known from her confession that she was guilty, he would never have prohibited her from declaring her innocence, but would himself have insisted on it to the last moment. One thing is certain, there was no man living who more firmly believed in her guilty participation in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln than President Johnson, who, in commenting on the appeals made to him for clemency, said at the time to Rev. J. George Butler of St. Pauls Church, Washington, that he could not be moved; for, in his own significant language, Mrs. Surratt kept the nest that hatched tile egg.  I have observed that General Holt at one time asked for a court of inquiry. It was in September, s866. In his answer, November 54, s866, Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War, wrote to Brevet Major General Holt, Judge Advocate General, as follows: Your letter of the iith of September applying for a court of inquiry upon certain imputations therein mentioned as made against you, of official misconduct in relation to the prosecution of Mrs. Surratt and others charged with the assassination of the late President, Abraham Lincoln, and in the preparation of testimony against Jefferson Davis and others, charged with complicity in said crime, has been submitted to the President (Johnson), who deems it unnecessary for your vindication to order a court of inquiry. In communicating the Presidents decision, it is proper for me to express my own conviction that all charges and imputations against your official conduct are, in my judgment, groundless. So far as I have any knowledge or information, your official duties as judge advocate general, in the cases referred to, and in all others, have been performed fairly, justly, and with distinguished ability, integrity, and patriotism, and in strict conformity with the requirements of your high office and the obligations of an officer and a gentleman.

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(Originally published in the “Surratt Courier”. Oct. 2008)

Being a herpetologist by profession and a Lincoln assassination “buff” by hobby, I often wondered what reptiles and other animals John Wilkes Booth and David Herold might have encountered on the nights they stayed near the Zekiah Swamp.The Zekiah Swamp runs the length of Charles County in Southern Maryland and is part of the Wicomico River, which is one of Maryland’s designated “scenic” rivers (1). The word “Zekiah” is a derivative of “Sacaya,” which translates to “dense thicket.” The origin is from the Algonquin tribe.History has Booth and Herold leaving Dr. Mudd’s house in the early evening of April 15th, headed south towards the swamp. The evidence indicates that they stayed to the south/southeast of the swamp. It is possible that they were intending to go to the home of William Burtles, who was known to give shelter to Confederate agents and who could possibly guide them across the swamp (2). Lost and confused, they reached the home of Oswell [a.k.a. Oswald] Swann around 9 pm. Swann, a black tobacco farmer, owned fifty acres of land about two miles from Burtles’s place. The fugitives asked Swann to take them to Burtles, but on the way changed their minds and requested to be taken to the home of Samuel Cox, another underground character. Crossing a small section of Zekiah Swamp near the tiny community of Newtown, they arrived at Cox’s home, Rich Hill, very early in the morning on the 16th. Cox instructed his overseer, Franklin Robey, to hide Booth and Herold in a pine thicket on the west side of the swamp. There they would spend four days, with the nights being chilly and damp.I considered what animals they could have encountered while camping out. Could the creatures be potentially dangerous? Reptiles (such as snakes) are ectotherms, relying on warm, ambient temperatures for activity such as movement and seeking out prey to feed upon. When temperatures are as low as the mid-50s, snakes can’t digest food; thus they remain sluggish and seek warmth by taking cover in field debris such as fallen leaves, rotted and hollowed-out logs, etc. that litter the forest floor.The average temperature for Charles County in mid-April, 1865, was 57-degrees in the day and a chilly 44 at night (3). Most likely, they would not have encountered any snakes on such cold nights. However, the daytime temperatures were just about right for these snakes to be active!Maryland is home to twenty-seven species of snakes; however, only two of these are venomous. The Northern Copperhead and the Timber Rattlesnake are the bad guys. Zekiah Swamp is home to one potentially lethal snake, the Northern Copperhead. The Timber Rattlesnake inhabits northern Maryland. The Zekiah inherits “the good, the bad, and the ugly” as far as snakes are concerned (4).The snakes that are residents of the Zekiah, besides the venomous copperhead, are northern Water, King, Rat, Hognose, Green, and Milk snakes. All of these are harmless. However, they might appear menacing because a few of these species get rather large and mimic venomous snakes by flattening their heads and rattling their tails in dry leaves to simulate a rattlesnake’s behavior. I doubt that Booth and Herold knew the difference between a venomous and non-venomous snake. And, an attitude back in that day was, “That’s a snake! Kill it!” Booth and Herold were more likely camping right next to these well-camouflaged snakes and didn’t know it. Secretive and non-aggressive unless molested, the Northern Copperhead has a potentially fatal bite if envenomed. Remedies for snake bite back in the 1800s included excising the bite with a knife, carefully marking X marks at the fang penetration and squeezing the venom out. Another popular remedy was drinking whiskey – being careful not to pour too much on the wound to sanitize it, but saving most of it for “down the hatch.” I am reminded of a quote from comedian W.C. Fields, “I like to keep a bottle of stimulant handy in case I see a snake, which I also keep handy (5).”Booth and Herold would also have encountered mammals who do tolerate cooler climes, such as the Virginia Opossum, Striped Skunk, bats and beavers. Black Bears historically ranged in Charles County, Maryland, but were extirpated in the early 1800s, presumably for the fur trade (6).Some of these animals potentially carry rabies. A vaccine for rabies wasn’t available in the 1860s. In 1884, bacteriologist Louis Pasteur developed a vaccine for the disease. Prior to a vaccine, treatment consisted of washing the bite with soapy water and cauterizing it with a hot iron. However, most people died as a result of this virus, if not from an infection (7).I am reasonably certain that, while Booth and Herold were camping out, they heard things that go bump in the night and probably didn’t sleep very well with those noises going on. They also had to be alert for the sounds of hooves, as Union troops were searching for them.Imagine the scenarios if Booth or Herold were bitten by a copperhead or a rabid animal. One of them might never have made it out of the area, or one might have abandoned the other. If one did receive an injury, they probably would have changed their course and sought medical attention yet again. With his injured leg, Booth was already compromised health-wise. This would change history as we know it. The Garretts, Conger, Corbett, Baker, Doherty, etc. would possibly have never been heard of.Earlier this year, while on a Surratt Society’s John Wilkes Booth Escape Route Tour, I asked narrator Michael Kauffman if we could stop at the swamp and take a look around for a minute. Knowing what I wanted to do, he replied, “Not a chance!”

Sources:(1)Maryland Atlas of Greenways, Water Trails and Green Infrastructure. Maryland Greenways Commission. 2000 Edition.(2)Michael Kauffman, “Booth’s Escape Route, Lincoln’s Assassin on the Run,” Blue & Gray Magazine, Vol. VII, Issue 5, June 1990.(3)National Climatic Data Center, (Historical Temperatures)(4)Maryland Department of Natural Resources, Wildlife and Heritage Service(5)In Cory Fords, Time of Laughter, published by Marion Pitman’s Book, London, 1970.(6)Maryland Department of Natural Resources, Wildlife and Heritage Service(7)Rabies in Texas, A Historical Perspective, (pamphlet) Zoonosis Control Division of the Texas Department of Health, 100 West 49th street, Austin, Texas 78756.I would like to thank Laurie Verge, Director of Surratt House Museum, and eminent Lincoln assassination historian, Michael Kauffman, for their suggestions and encouragement

The post Booth And Herold’s Four Nights in the Pine Thicket by Randal Berry appeared first on Lincoln-Assassination.

No sensible historian today would think that the assassination of
Abraham Lincoln was anything less than one of the more catastrophic events
in American history. If Abraham Lincoln is the one president that every
schoolchild can readily recognize in an era when many are not sure who
Franklin Roosevelt or Harry Truman were, John Wilkes Booth ranks a close
second in universal recognition. Booth’s fame, if fame is the right word, is
only because he murdered America’s greatest icon. And yet, Lincoln¹’s
assassination seems to have slipped in the narrow crack between the end of
the Civil War and the Reconstruction period that followed it. Most writers
have simply described Lincoln¹s murder rather than explain it.
Of the 125-plus books that have been written on Lincoln’s assassination,
only eight are written by professional historians. This raises two
questions. First, why have professional historians shunned Lincoln’s murder?
And second, does it matter? The answer to the first question is not clear.
Over 16,000 books and articles have been written about Lincoln ranging from
the ridiculous (Lincoln’s Doctor’s Dog) to the sublime (How Lincoln Prayed).
Historians have probed every aspect of Lincoln’s life from his personal
finances to his sexual preferences. Their absence from writing on his
assassination remains unclear, especially in light of their seeming
insatiable appetite for every other aspect of his life. As to the second
question, a careful read through the ten dozen books written by amateur or
non-professional historians suggests the story has suffered considerably in
the hands of the amateur.

In her most recent book, “Dangerous Games: The Uses and Abuses of History,”
Canadian historian, Margaret Macmillan (“Paris 1919″ and “Nixon in China”)
laments what she perceives as a failure on the part of professionally
trained historians to write for public consumption, “It is particularly
unfortunate that just as history is becoming more important in our public
discussions, professional historians have largely been abandoning the field
to amateurs.”

While this is certainly true in the case of Lincoln’s assassination it has
not precluded the publication of works of first-rate quality. It has,
unfortunately cluttered the field with books of poor quality and dubious
conspiracy theories that belong in the fiction section. It presents a
confusing aspect of history to the average reader who is not equipped to
separate fact from fiction.

Lincoln’s assassination has been described as the result of a mentally
deranged actor, on the orders of Pope Pius IX and his Jesuit lackeys, as a
result of a conspiracy by members of Lincoln’s own party including his own
secretary of war Edwin Stanton, and as a final desperate attempt by
Confederate leaders to win independence by killing Lincoln when victory on
the battlefield became impossible. Some authors have gone so far as to claim
that Booth was never killed but escaped making his way to Enid, Oklahoma or
Guwahati, India where he died years later.

In the latest effort, television celebrity Bill O’Reilly and his co-author
Martin Dugard have entered the fray boldly claiming to cut through the
tangle of conspiracy theories and give their readers the “unsanitized and
uncompromising” version of “a no spin American story.”  Sadly, they do not.
Killing Lincoln falls short of its promise in several ways. It falls
somewhere between an authoritative account and strange fiction. The book is
a pleasant read. It is well written and flows from beginning to end rather
nicely. But that is not enough for an event so important to American
history. The authors have chosen to write a story based what others have
written rather reconstruct the events by using the primary documents and
records of the period as any historian would do. In the authors own words
they draw their information from a few dozen secondary books. These books
range from excellent to positively dreadful. There seems to be no vetting of
the secondary works they rely on treating all of them as equal. They are
not.

The book contains no endnotes even though the authors end their work with a
section titled “Notes.” These notes are simply a listing of previously
published books the reader is encouraged to read or browse for more
information on a particular subject mentioned in the text – two of my own
books are listed. Conspicuously absent from the short list of books are
several volumes that contain the primary documents that directly pertain to
the assassination, the individuals charged with carrying it out, and the
trial and its aftermath. That these books were  not consulted by the authors
is a serious failing, and quite frankly, inexcusable.

Within a few a few days of Lincoln’s murder Secretary of War Edwin Stanton
selected Judge Advocate General of the Army Joseph Holt to head the
prosecution of those accused of Lincoln¹s murder. Stanton and Holt then
selected Colonel Henry L. Burnett to gather the evidence Holt and his
assistant, John A. Bingham, would use in the trial of the conspirators.
Burnett and his staff diligently collected 5,004 documents, which they
carefully sifted through and organized into an evidence file (National
Archives Record Administration, Record Group 153, Microcopy-599, reels 1-7).
The University of Illinois Press has published this evidence file along with
modern annotation as a single volume (William Edwards and Edward Steers,
Jr., eds., “The Lincoln Assassination. The Evidence” (Urbana, IL: University
of Illinois Press, 2009). In like manner, the military trial of the
conspirators was recorded verbatim by the competent Benn Pitman and his
staff of court recorders. The final trial transcript has been published
together with the informative commentary of nine expert historians (Edward
Steers, Jr. ed., “The Trial” (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky,
2003). Stanton also selected Major General John F. Hartranft to oversee the
daily physical and medical care of the accused conspirators before, during,
and after their trial and sentencing. Hartranft kept a letterbook in which
he made a daily record of the prisoners oversight including their meals,
medical examinations, personal hygiene, and visitations. This letterbook,
along with modern annotation by the editors, was published as a single
volume (Edward Steers, Jr. and Harold Holzer, eds., “The Lincoln
Assassination Conspirators. Their Confinement and Execution, as Recorded in
the Letterbook of John Frederick Hartranft,” Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana
State University Press, 2009). And last, the Congress established a special
committee to adjudicate the distribution of the $105,000 reward money
offered for the capture of certain conspirators. The committee received
hundreds of affidavits and supporting documentation from dozens of
individuals seeking a share of the money. This file is located in the
National Archives as part of Record Group 94, Records of the Adjutant
General¹s Office, Microcopy-619, reels 455-458. As with the other files
described above, this invaluable collection has been published as a CD-ROM
by William Edwards (William C. Edwards, M-619 “The Lincoln Assassination
Reward Files,” 2008) and is easily obtainable for a modest price (Surratt
House Museum).

This material represents virtually all of the primary documentary record of
the assassination, and is readily available for anyone wishing to research
every aspect of the assassination all for less than $200. It is inexcusable
not to avail oneself of this essential record in researching and writing
about this important event in our nation¹s history. By their own words, the
authors relied on the writing of previous authors, and in doing so
perpetuated some of the gross errors and myths found in those writings.

“Killing Lincoln” contains numerous errors of people, places, and events.
For example: they refer to James J. Clifford, John Ford’s chief carpenter.
The man’s name is Gifford, and he was Ford’s architect who redesigned and
oversaw the reconstruction of Ford’s theatre following the 1862 fire that
gutted the theater.  He later served as Ford¹s chief carpenter.

At another point, the authors have George Atzerodt, the man assigned to kill
vice president Andrew Johnson, drinking with (Washington) Naylor shortly
before the assigned hour of Atzerodt¹s attack. Washington Naylor owned the
stables where Atzerodt and David Herold rented their horses. Atzerodt did
not meet with or drink with Naylor before the assigned hour. He drank with
John Fletcher, the stable manager, and it was John Fletcher who later told
the Metropolitan police and 22nd Army Corps detectives that Herold (and
presumably Atzerodt) had fled over the Navy Yard Bridge into southern
Maryland.

During the morning cabinet meeting on April 14, the authors state that
secretary of war Edwin Stanton was absent from the meeting. According to
Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, he was not only present, but made a
major presentation to the cabinet and General Grant reading his plan for
reconstruction.

In describing the sensational murder of Philip Barton Key, son of Francis
Scott Key, by Congressman Dan Sickles (later Major General Dan Sickles of
Gettysburg notoriety) the authors state, “the congressman shot his
mistresses husband.” The congressman (Dan Sickles) shot his wife’s (Teresa
Bagioli Sickles) lover (Philip Barton Key), not his mistress’s husband. The
subsequent trial became a national sensation where Sickles attorney, Edwin
Stanton, used the temporary insanity for the first time in American
jurisprudence.

Lewis Powell, the man assigned to kill secretary of state William Seward,
did not speak with “an Alabama drawl.” He was from Florida and no one today
knows what he sounded like.

The authors write that George Atzerodt took a stage into Maryland at the
time of his escape. He took a stage to the picket post at Military Road
(within the District of Columbia) where he changed over to the market wagon
of William Gaither, and road into Maryland just north of Rockville.
Dr. Samuel Mudd’s farm consisted of 217 acres, not 500 acres, and his
father, Henry Lowe Mudd, owned farm.

Booth and Herold spent five days in hiding in the pine thicket not six as
the authors claim. This is another example of not examining the primary
documents. Booth carried with him a small memorandum book, which he used as
a diary or journal. In it he drew a small calendar making annotations in the
blocks for certain days. For Thursday, April 20, he wrote “POTO,” and in the
block for Saturday, April 22, he again wrote “POTO,” indicating he and
Herold first attempted to cross the Potomac River on Thursday, and tried
again on Saturday. They spent Friday hiding at the farm of John J. Hughes
owned by Peregrine Davis. A simple review of Booth’s diary would have led
the authors to this conclusion.

Perhaps most egregious error or misrepresentation is the authors description
of Mary Surratt. The authors write that she was forced to wear a padded hood
when not on trial, and that she was imprisoned in a cell aboard the monitor,
“Montauk,” which was “barely habitable.” She suffered from “claustrophobia
and disfigurement caused by the hood,” and was “barely tended to by her
captors.” “Sick and trapped in this filthy cell, Mary Surratt took on a
haunted, bloated appearance.” None of this was true. Mary Surratt was never
shackled or hooded at any time from her arrest to her hanging. She was never
imprisoned aboard the “Montauk,” but taken to the Carroll Annex of the Old
Capitol Prison before being transferred to the women¹s section of the
Federal Penitentiary at the Washington Arsenal. Here she was eventually
moved to a small, private room adjoining the trial room, and her daughter
Anna was allowed to stay with her and care for her. Mary was provided with a
bed, rocking chair, reading material, and a priest. Mary did suffer from
what some believe was endometriosis, a rare disease in women resulting in
pelvic pain.  She was examined twice daily by an army surgeon and treated
and every effort was made to see to her comfort throughout her
incarceration. She was permitted visitors including her attorneys, John
Brophy (her neighbor), and Father Francis Boyle, her priest in Washington
who administered to her spiritual needs. General Hartranft describes all of
this in detail in his letterbook.  This mischaracterization of Mary Surratt
is unfortunate, and only helps to perpetuate the myth of her innocence and
her brutal treatment at the hands of the Federal government. All a myth.

Mary’s son, John Surratt, did not flee to Montreal where “he followed the
news of his mother’s trial and execution.” He fled from Elmira, New York
first to Coburg in Canada and eventually wound up in St. Liboire, Canada
where he stayed at father Charles Boucher¹s rectory throughout the trial and
execution of his mother. He did visit Montreal on a few occasions briefly
but always returned to St. Liboire.

During the early hours of their escape from Washington the authors write
that,”It was the actor’s leg that made them detour to Mudd’s house.
Otherwise they would have reached the Potomac River by sunrise.” The
distance from Ford’s Theatre to the Potomac River was just over fifty miles.
Traveling at a good pace without stopping, it would have taken Booth and
Herold at least ten hours to reach the river. This would place them at the
Potomac sometime between 8:30 and 9:00 am. Sunrise on Saturday, April 15,
was at 5:31 am. The two fugitives would have spent at least three to three
and a half hours traveling in daylight through territory teeming with Union
troops. That is why Booth had previously made arrangements to stop over at
Mudd¹s house. According to George Atzerodt, Booth had sent provisions to
Mudd¹s two weeks before to be picked up during the escape to Richmond. When
Booth was stopped at the Navy Yard Bridge and asked where he was headed, he
replied, “Beantown.” Beantown was the neighborhood where Mudd lived. These
facts only add to the weight against Mudd and show that he and Booth were
conspirators from early on in Booth’s plot. All of this is described in
detail (with endnotes) in four of the books I wrote – one specically devoted
to Mudd (“His Name Is Still Mudd”). A simple reading of the literature along
with a look at the Naval Observatory tables would have made this obvious to
the authors.

In their Afterword, the authors bring up the strange conspiracy theory put
forward by authors Leonard Guttridge and Ray Neff and detailed in the book
“Dark Union.”  This is the old tired theory that Stanton along with other
prominent politicians and financiers in the North secretly engineered
Lincoln¹s assassination. As part of the theory, Booth escaped capture at the
Garrett farm and eventually made his way to Guwahati, India where he died 1n
1883. Included as a part of this conspiracy theory eighteen pages are
mysteriously missing from Booth’s diary; eighteen pages that explain the
conspiracy and name names including Stanton and head of the National
Detective Police, Lafayette Baker. Again, this absurd theory has been
exposed as nonsense in several reputable books including one of mine that
the authors recommend in their “Notes.”

At one point the authors dredge up another myth involving the head of the
“Secret Police,” Lafayette Baker, presumably linking him directly with
Booth. According to the authors, both Baker and Booth received large sums of
money from a “Canadian outfit known as the J.J. Chaffey Company” (Baker
allegedly received $150,000 and Booth $15,000).  This presumably explains
the money Booth mysteriously had when he left Canada in October 1864. The
authors write, “To this day, no one has discovered why the J.J. Chaffey
Company paid Lafayette Baker and John Wilkes Booth for anything.” The reason
no one has discovered why is because it never happened. An examination of
the original ledger book of James and John Chaffey now housed in the Indiana
State Library in Terre Haute shows entries only for the years 1831-1838. It
did not exist in 1865. There are no documents for this company during the
time of Civil War. This tired myth has been effectively demolished by any
number of historians and is as dead as Booth himself.

In their Afterword, the authors also dredge up the “Stanton did it” myth
once again writing, “Did he have any part in the assassination of Abraham
Lincoln? To this day there are those who believe he did. But nothing has
ever been proved.” That Stanton had nothing to do with Lincoln’s murder has
been proven time and again, and by competent historians through competent
research. Volumes have been written on the subject putting it to rest. It is
an enormous disservice to Stanton who was a patriot of the highest quality
and a man who loved Lincoln, and was loved by Lincoln. That one hundred and
forty-six years after Lincoln¹s death anyone should continue to suggest that
Stanton was anything other than a patriot who worked tirelessly with Lincoln
to save the Union is a travesty to a great American.

To their credit the authors point out that the great body of historians have
dismissed Neff’s theories as well as the alleged missing eighteen pages from
Booth’s diary.  Why then bring it up? Why leave the impression with so many
readers that there might be something to the theories? Mr. O’Reilly assures
us in his introduction that his book is “a no spin American story.” To drag
out the Stanton conspiracy nonsense only damages his effort. Had the authors
done a normal literature search they would have discovered several treatises
refuting all of these claims. The authors would have done better to leave
this part of the story buried where it belongs.

If all of the above sounds like nit-picking, consider this. If the authors
made mistakes in names and places, and events, what else did they get wrong?
How can the reader rely on anything that appears in “Killing Lincoln?” This
is unfortunate because of the wonderful opportunity O’Reilly and Dugard had
to bring the story of Lincoln¹s killing up to date. There are over 16,000
books and articles written under the bibliographic heading of Lincoln. Of
these 125-plus are written on Lincoln’s assassination. The justification for
yet another book on Lincoln¹s murder should include new information or a
reevaluation from another perspective. In any event, any new work should at
the very least cause the reader to think anew this tragic event.
Unfortunately, Killing Lincoln offers nothing new and fails to explain what
we already know.

Bill O’Reilly has an audience available to him that none of the rest of have
in telling this dramatic and historically important story. This is a good
thing. The authors had an opportunity to tell why Lincoln was murdered, not
just how, and they failed. Most people know how Lincoln was killed. Very few
know why. The involvement of the Confederate Secret Service stationed in
Canada, the close involvement of the Confederate mail line running through
southern Maryland exploited by Booth, the roll of Dr. Mudd and Mary Surratt,
and perhaps most important, why Booth decided to include Johnson, Seward,
and Grant in his murderous plot?

Killing Lincoln is not a bad read. No doubt it will land on the “New York
Times” Best Seller list despite its shortcomings. Had the authors done their
homework more thoroughly and made use of the available sources of primary
documents, they would have written a book much closer to the actual facts
and enlightened a public eager to learn more about this tragic event.
Sadly, they missed a golden opportunity.

Ed Steers

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DEATH OF AN ASSASSIN: Homicide, Suicide or Something Else?

by Steven G. Miller

One of the longest-running controversies surrounding the death of Abraham Lincoln’s assassin, John Wilkes Booth, concerns the question of whether Booth was shot by Sergt. Boston Corbett on April 26, 1865, or if he shot himself. This matter of suicide versus homicide — whether justified or not — has been around since the news first broke that Booth was dead, and the issue is still debated today. I have long been of the opinion that Booth was shot by Sergt. Corbett. I think the forensic evidence, expressed by Dr. J. Janvier Woodward in the 1865 autopsy and seconded by Dr. John K. Lattimer in his 1980 book and follow up article, shows that the fatal bullet was fired from a cavalry revolver from a distance of a few yards, rather than by a revolver or rifle from a few inches — as would be the case if Booth shot himself with one of the weapons he carried. The strongest piece of evidence about the shooting is the 1865 letter from one of the members of the patrol that captured Booth, Private Emory Parady. On April 28, 1865, Parady wrote that, at the time he was shot, Booth “was in the act of raising his caribine when crack went a pistol”.

However, after reading as many eyewitness accounts as possible during the preparation of a manuscript concerning the death of the assassin, I’m not sure that this conclusion contains the whole story. In fact, I think that there may be a middle ground between these two positions. I’ve concluded that Booth’s death may be the most famous, heretofore undiagnosed example of what law-enforcement officers now generally call “suicide by cop.”
In other words, Booth was killed by Sergt. Corbett, but that the assassin set it up so that the soldier virtually had no choice in the matter.
There are several terms by which this controversial phenomena is known: “police assisted suicide” (PAS), “homicide by law enforcement,” “in the line of duty shootings,” “victim precipitated homicide” (VPH). The last term preferred is by Canadian Criminologist Richard B. Parent who has done a major study of the phenomena. The most commonly used phrase by law enforcement and the media, however, is “suicide by cop,” also known by the abbreviation SBC.
A rough definition of SBC is: “A form of suicide in which a person intentionally provokes law enforcement agents or police officers into using deadly or lethal force against them.”
It is generally agreed that people with a death wish who resort to this method do it for a variety of reasons, some known and some unknown. These may include depression, cowardice or the inability to kill themselves, religious beliefs that prevent the taking of one’s own life, a sort of macho idea of “taking someone with me”, or a notion of dying for a cause (martyrdom). There are also incidents in which police officers, fearing for their own safety, have had to use deadly force on a suspect who is seemingly out of control on alcohol or drugs, or is so mentally disturbed that they can’t be reasoned with or restrained. Do these instances constitute “suicide by cop”? No.
There are four criteria that law enforcement officers use to classify incidents of SBC:
1. The subject must indicate the intent to die.
2. The subject must have a clear understanding of the finality of the act.
3. The subject must confront a law enforcement official to the degree that it compels that officer to act with deadly force.
4. The subject dies as a result of the confrontation.
Booth’s decision, I believe, was prompted by a series of events that convinced him that escape was impossible and that he faced imprisonment, trial and execution at the end of a rope. The first of these so-called “trigger events” occurred immediately after the shooting of the president. Booth sustained a broken left leg, either in the dramatic leap from the President’s box at Ford’s Theatre after the assassination or in a horseback accident shortly thereafter. Once he broke his leg, his ability to escape was seriously hampered. Following that, he received a luke-warm reception in Maryland — his home state — but at least he was helped by members of the Confederate underground. He probably expected that Virginians would be much more accepting of his deed and be of more assistance. Once across the river into Virginia he met three confederate soldiers, Bainbridge, Ruggles and Jett. They promised to help him and this buoyed his spirits, but after a while didn’t seem to be of much value. At first they helped hide him and promised to try to get him further south, but they spent their time drinking and frittering away the hours instead of coming up with any concrete plans.’
This allowed the manhunters to catch up to Booth and he was stuck without a plan of escape. Booth was finally left with a typical middle-class Virginia family, the Garrett’s. He was introduced to them under an assumed name and the family had no idea who he really was. The two older Garrett sons were recently returned Confederate soldiers and farmer Garrett was an educated and semi-prominent man. They would be a good barometer of the reaction of locals. Booth was at dinner with them when the news of the assassination was brought in by one of the sons. The family members, far from praising the deed, expressed their opinion that it was a terrible blow to an already defeated south. The father, Richard Henry Garrett, condemned it in “the strongest terms.”
Booth still had a chance to escape, however, but did not have a horse to ride. He and his companion David Herold, rowed across the Potomac to Maryland and were, thus, unable to bring mounts with them. They were brought to the Garrett farm by the three rebel soldier on horseback, but only by riding double. The Garrett’s refused to sell Booth a horse and made only token attempts to arrange for a wagon to take them on to another location. On the late afternoon of April 24th the situation grew decidedly more desperate. Two of the soldiers, Ruggles and Bainbridge, came up to the gate at the Garrett house and warned Booth and Herold that Yankee troops were entering the town of Port Royal, three miles north. The rebels did not offer to help the assassins escape. Instead they wished the wanted pair good luck, told them to hide themselves and quickly departed. The northerners rode by on the southbound road and stopped to water their horses across from the Garrett house. One of the sons went over to ask a neighbor what they soldiers were doing. He was told that they were looking for two men, one with a broken leg. The Garrett’s hospitality then grew ice cold and Booth and Herold were denied permission to even sleep in the family house. They were told them must move on. The pair did not have the ability to travel, but tried to make plans to leave on the next morning in a hired wagon. The Garrett’s begrudgingly allowed them to sleep in the tobacco house/barn/storage building, but locked them in and sent two sons out to ensure that they did not steal the family horses. By this time Booth must have seen all his options gone and made up his mind that he had to do something to forestall capture and a humiliating death. I believe he chose suicide by cop.
Does the shooting of Booth fit the SBC profile? Consider the following: 1. On April 24, 1865, Booth told one of the Confederate soldiers he met, Lt. A.B. Ruggles, that he would never be taken alive. When surrounded by Union troops in Garrett’s tobacco house the soldiers demanded that Booth give himself up. He called out: “Surrender? The word was never in my vocabulary! I have never learned the meaning of it.”
Though the pursuers did not know it until later, he had written in his notebook—
“the so called “diary” that he had ” too great a soul to die like a criminal. Oh, may He (God), may He spare me that, and let me die bravely.”
In 1865, the usual method for executing criminals was by hanging. That was a fate that Booth surely knew he faced if captured. During his days as a fugitive he had been supplied with newspapers reporting on his crime. He knew that there was a huge reward offered for his capture, that there were a large number of searchers hot on his trail, and that, because of the broken leg he suffered right after the assassination his odds of escape were minuscule.
When asked to surrender his weapons he said, “These guns are mine and I may have to use them on you.”
He also prevented Jack Garrett and Corp. Herman Newgarten from piling wood against the side of barn by telling them he would shoot if they persisted. When told that if he did not surrender they would set fire to the barn, his response was: “Well, prepare a stretcher for me.”
He dramatically yelled from inside the barn: “Another stain on the glorious old banner.”
After he was shot he mumbled, “Tell mother I died for my Country.”
He died on Garrett’s porch as a result of the gunshot wound. While lying wounded after being carried from the barn he begged the soldiers to kill him. Some historians have concluded that he wanted them to do that to ease his pain, but perhaps he was worried that the troops t killed him after all, and that he might survive the injury. One of the detectives said they did not want him to die, but rather to get better. Given all the evidence that is presented above, Booth seems to meet all the four criteria of a SBC:
1. He told several people (Lt. Ruggles, for instance) beforehand that he would never be taken alive. He also wrote that in his diary. This shows intent.
2. He threatened the troops who were trying to arrest him and he stated that he was a cripple and that he would fight then singly if they would move back and allow him to come out of the barn. He didn’t seriously believe that he could have outfought them all and somehow escape. When told he would face a fiery death in a burning barn, he said that they had better prepare a stretcher for him. He clearly knew that he was facing death one way or another. This indicates knowledge that his action would result in his death.
3. When confronted with the option of surrendering or burning to death, he chose to raise and point his rifle toward the front door where Herold was being taken out by Lieut. Doherty. This action prompted Sergt. Corbett to shoot at him. Corbett’s shot hit Booth through the neck, rather than the arm as intended. The sergeant testified that he could have shot Booth beforehand, but that he held his fire until such time as Booth seriously posed a threat to someone else. What Booth did caused the shooting.
4. Booth died as a result of the wound. (He even begged them to finish him off, in case the wound was not fatal.)
After long study I concluded that the death of John Wilkes Booth clearly met all four criteria for classification as Suicide by Cop.
John Wilkes Booth’s escape plans for an escape after the assassination of the President apparently centered on out distancing his pursuers and getting out of America to a save haven, possibly Mexico. Unfortunately for his plans, he broke his leg after the shooting of the president. This injury essentially reduced his changes of a successful escape to next to zero. Dr. Samuel Mudd confirmed his worst fears, that the leg was seriously injured. Once he made contact with Thomas A. Jones and went to ground, he learned that the massive manhunt was very close to him. Before he was able to cross the Potomac he must have concluded that his escape was unlikely and that he must take drastic steps if he was to avoid the hangman’s noose. His choice was almost certainly SBC.
Sources:
1. Ingraham, Prentiss, (Editor), “Pursuit and Death of John Wilkes Booth,” THE CENTURY MAGAZINE, 1889. Lt. Ruggles stated: “(Booth) said that he would never be taken alive. If he had not broken his leg he could readily have distanced all pursuit. . . .there was no braggadocio about him; simply a determination to submit to the inevitable, parleying when it should become necessary to do so. The few extracts he read me from his diary showed this.”
2. Lattimer, John K., KENNEDY AND LINCOLN, MEDICAL AND BALLISTIC COMPARISONS OF THEIR ASSASSINATIONS. New York; Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980
3. ———- “Who Shot J.W.B.?”, NAVY ARMS 1982 MUZZLELOADERS ANNUAL MAGAZINE.
4. Parent, Richard B., “Suicide by Cop,” POLICE MAGAZINE, September 1999. (Parent examined the phenomenon of victim precipitated homicide, also known as suicide by cop, in his thesis, entitled “Aspects of Police Use of Deadly Force in British Columbia: The Phenomenon of Victim Precipitated Homicide”. He is a Canadian police officer who was a Ph.D. candidate at Simon Fraser University when he did the study.
5. Emory Parady letter’s 4/28/1865 is from the Millington-Parady Papers, author’s collection.

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Everton J. Conger gazed thoughtfully into the blue Montana sky. It was April 26, 1910–the day after his 76th birthday–and the day was spent with a reporter anxious to mine Conger’s memories of the same day 45 years prior. On April 26, 1865 John Wilkes Booth was captured, and the murder of Abraham Lincoln avenged. Fate chose Conger as one of 27 men who had witnessed the expiation of Booth’s crime.“The aged man leaned forward upon his hand and was silent for several minutes,” the reporter noted. “Before his view in kaleidoscopic rapidity, spread the eventful occurrences of the morning of four and a half decades ago.” To Conger those events were as clear as if they had happened that morning. He again smelled the acrid smoke from the fire burning out of control in Richard Garrett’s tobacco barn. The sharp crack of Boston Corbett’s pistol echoed afresh in his mind. Booth gasped for air on Garrett’s front porch, begging to be killed.Conger hesitated with deliberateness, as if his memory gate suddenly snapped shut. The silence, however, wasn’t resistance. He never refused the myriad requests to reminisce, even filling local lecture halls with friends and neighbors. As would happen every time before he talked about the assassination, Conger had to brace himself. His granddaughter recalled Conger would sometimes tear up when telling the story. But this silence wasn’t an attempt to suppress his emotions. He knew he would shock those who saw Booth only as a coward.“If there was anything in the assassin’s career which prompted admiration, it was his courage,” Conger said. “I was twice wounded in the Civil War, was under fire at many of the most disastrous battles and led my command right through the teeth of almost certain annihilation, yet this exhibition of sublime courage, with death lurking in every corner, was a lesson to me.” Conger suggested Booth was either a maniac or the bravest man he ever saw. “I am inclined to think that the former was nearer the exact situation with him than the latter.” Conger’s opinion wasn’t meant to signal approval for Booth’s actions. But as a man who witnessed how scores of soldiers responded to their imminent demise, he knew that as reprehensible as Booth was, acceptance of his fate was anything but cowardly.April 14, 1865 was a day to visit the theater. Abraham Lincoln watched “Our American Cousin” performed by a professional troupe of actors at Ford’s Theater. Conger, a civilian after battle wounds forced his departure from the Union cavalry in early 1865, was watching a group of Connecticut soldiers perform a play in Richmond, where as a government detective he was taking depositions in a bounty fraud investigation. When Conger returned to his billet he found utter chaos. “[E]verything was going wild, and it was an hour before I could find an officer that knew what had happened to stop and tell of the report. It was reported that Mr. Lincoln, and Stanton and Seward and a lot of others were killed,” Conger later recalled.Whether Conger was ordered back to Washington or returned on his own, the next day he closed his office at City Point. “While I was there doing that Ward Lamon, who was Marshall of the District of Columbia, came down from Richmond on a boat of his own and stopped there. [He] was going on to Washington, and I went with him and got to Washington Sunday afternoon.”Conger’s superior, Lafayette Baker, was in New York City at the time of Lincoln’s murder. Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton ordered Baker to return at once to Washington to help in the investigation. Later, Baker would create a fanciful scene in which Stanton tearfully told him that his entire dependence was on Baker’s shoulders. Baker also claimed he was in charge of the entire investigation. Both stories are inventions.While at the War Department telegraph office, Baker stumbled onto intelligence that two men had crossed the Potomac River into Virginia. Investigators had earlier determined that Booth was riding with a druggist’s clerk named David Herold, who had conspired in Booth’s earlier plot to kidnap Lincoln. Shut out by other investigators, Baker decided to send his own men into the field. In the first official statement he gave after Booth’s capture, Conger recalled that at noon on April 24, Baker asked if he had a horse ready. “I want to send you away,” he said. Conger was sent to General Christopher C. Augur to request 25 soldiers for the expedition. Upon Conger’s return, Baker called for a map to show where he believed Booth and Herold had crossed.Lafayette’s cousin, Byron Baker soon entered the room. Byron had served as quartermaster of the First District of Columbia Cavalry, which Conger had de facto command of from 1863 to 1864, although Lafayette, who in 1865 still held the rank of colonel, was its figurehead leader. “I want you and Conger to go to this place [on the map], search the country through and get Booth,” he told the pair. Lafayette would stay behind in Washington. Later Lieutenant Edward P. Doherty of the 16th New York Cavalry reported in. Introductions were made, and further plans were discussed.As Conger and Byron were both civilians, Doherty assumed he would be in charge of the expedition, as he was in command of the 16th New York detachment. However, Lafayette, if his account of the meeting is to be believed, told Doherty he was to act under the orders of Conger and Byron. While this could be true, it’s questionable as neither Conger nor Byron mention it in their statements. A monumental clash of egos among the trio was quickly established, especially between Conger and Doherty. Even though several months elapsed since Conger was forced out of the service, he saw himself as the ranking officer. Conger was never one to suffer underlings gladly, and he saw no reason to make an exception for Doherty.While Conger and Byron saw themselves as a team, both agreed Conger would lead. Again rank played a role. Conger believed since he outranked Byron in the army, he outranked him in the chase. Byron never questioned this until after Booth’s death. Years later, Byron claimed Conger commanded only because he (Byron) gave in to Conger’s hurt feelings.Boarding the steamer John S. Ide, the posse made its way down the Potomac River to a landing near Belle Plain, Va., where they arrived later that evening. Disembarking, Conger and Byron, who were in civilian clothes, rode ahead of the detachment, pretending to look for two men they had become separated from. As they knew Booth had broken his leg, the pair visited several doctors in the region to see if they had met their supposed friend. The ruse produced no solid information so the two re-joined Doherty and the 16th New York and rode to the Rappahannock River.Pain from Conger’s war wounds surfaced. Stopping just after daybreak on April 25 at a local doctor’s home near Port Conway Va., the men ate and Conger rested. While Byron and Doherty headed to Port Conway, Conger slept. Sensitive to his condition, Conger rarely mentioned this. When the distribution of the reward money turned Byron and Conger first into rivals and later bitter enemies, Conger’s infirmities and their effect would become a club with which Byron figuratively beat Conger.The man leading the chase was born in 1834 in Huron County, Ohio. Conger was the eighth of ten children of Rev. Enoch and Esther Conger, Presbyterian missionaries on Ohio’s Western Reserve. Enoch Conger had served as a chaplain during the War of 1812, after which he entered the ministry. He led several churches in Ohio, so the family constantly moved. In 1836, Enoch moved his family to Fremont, where several years later Everton lived as a dentist until war erupted.When the Confederates fired on Fort Sumter, Conger enlisted with the 8th Ohio Infantry. Well known to his fellow soldiers as “Dr. Conger”, he was elected second lieutenant of Company F. The unit never left Ohio. After its term of service expired, Conger was discharged, at a loss as to his place in the emerging struggle. Combining a lifelong love of horses with advice from a future president, Conger soon found his role.“I have seen Conger. . .” fellow Fremont resident Rutherford B. Hayes wrote his uncle, Sardis Birchard. “He wishes a place. I ventured to suggest that he could perhaps raise a company in your region by getting an appointment from the governor. All here praise him both as a business man and as a soldier. He must, I think, get some place. His reputation is so good with those he is associated with.” On Sept. 15, 1861 Conger took Hayes’ advice and was enrolled as captain of Company A, 3rd West Virginia Cavalry. The only other enrollee at the time was his older brother, Seymour, who became First Lieutenant. Together, they embarked on the adventure of their lives, but only Everton lived to tell about it.Conger’s first serious taste of combat came during Stonewall Jackson’s 1862 summer foray into the Shenandoah Valley. Conger rode with Major General John C. Fremont as unattached cavalry. He became known to his commander through a chance encounter with Colonel Turner Ashby, a reckless cavalryman described by a colleague as “a strange man.” Ashby, it was said, “Regards nothing. Shot, shell, rain, hail, snow…all are apparently the same to him. He will quit a meal at anytime for a chance at a Yankee.”Making his retreat up the valley, on June 3 Jackson ordered Ashby to burn the Cedar Mill Creek Bridge near Mt. Jackson. Conger, whose troops had been in pursuit of Jackson that day, led his men toward the bridge, galloping at full speed in an attempt to stop Ashby’s work. Ashby hurried his men across and ordered combustibles piled on the bridge. The heavy rains had soaked the wooden structure, making it difficult to light.Conger and company reached the bridge and watched as the men detached by Ashby escaped, their work unfulfilled. Ashby, however, kept to his duty, trying to light the fire. Seeing it was impossible, he mounted his horse at the last minute, leading the pursuers for another two miles. At least one of those chasing Ashby was killed. One of the pursuing federals fired at Ashby. The bullet grazed his boot, but struck Ashby’s white horse. Despite the steed’s mortal wound, Ashby escaped capture.Conger’s first wound came in 1862. Operating under Major General Franz Sigel in the Loudon Valley in Virginia, Conger was en route to Bristoe Station on October 23 with 40 men when he was attacked by 125 rebel cavalry. Although outnumbered, Conger’s forces routed the Confederates, making prisoners of two and killing 12. In the thick of the fight, Conger was shot off his horse. The ball entered Conger’s right side between the hip and the ribs and lodged into bone near the spine, where it remained for the rest of his life. After falling from his mount, Conger received a saber wound from a rushing Confederate. Believed by his men to be dead, Conger spent the frigid October night on the field. When he was found to be alive Conger was taken to a local doctor’s home for treatment.With one of his best soldiers now a Confederate prisoner, Sigel determined to find Conger. On October 26, Captain Ulric Dahlgren, along with 100 men, headed toward Warrenton Junction, looking for whatever information they might find. After being alerted by citizens as to Conger’s whereabouts, under a flag of truce Dahlgren visited Conger at the doctor’s home. Dahlgren succeeded in getting Conger, who was on a mattress on the floor, moved to a bed. After Conger briefed Dahlgren on what happened, the raider returned, reporting to Sigel that Conger was alive. Sigel wrote Conger, saying “your services are much appreciated by me. I am cheered to learn that you are recovering. Send for anything you might need and it will be forwarded to you.”Conger began a long road to recovery after receiving his parole on November 2. He returned to duty in August 1863, but his time with Company A was nearing an end. Conger applied for the major’s position in the 1st District of Columbia Cavalry. On September 11, he received word from Colonel Lafayette Baker of his application’s approval. He resigned his commission with the 3rd West Virginia ten days later. Seymour remained with the 3rd West Virginia, rising to the rank of major, until his death in 1864 while leading a charge in Moorefield, Va.Conger’s reasons for transferring remain a mystery. Possibly, his chances for promotion in the 3rd West Virginia were slim, given his long absence. Even after his close encounter with Ashby and the skirmish near Catlett’s Station, Conger remained a captain. Not only would he go into the 1st D.C. as a major with de facto command of the regiment, he would shortly be promoted to lieutenant colonel.Few people ever had anything good to say about Lafayette Baker. A Senator remarked after the war he thought it doubtful Baker ever told the truth, “even by accident.” In 1909, Clara Laughlin, author of one of the earliest histories of Lincoln’s murder, described Baker as “a pious old fraud who left a most malodorous reputation in Washington” and as “one of the worst leeches in the Government employ.” Baker’s poor reputation rested mainly on his role as chief of the National Detective Police (NDP). With strong support from Secretary of War Stanton, and more importantly, Lincoln, the NDP was the investigative arm of the War Department.Conger’s military career ended in the June 1864 raid led by Brigadier General James H. Wilson. The 1st D.C., attached to Major General Ben Butler’s Army of the James, was under the command of Brigadier General August V. Kautz. Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant ordered Kautz to support Wilson on the expedition, which would add pressure to Lee’s lines of supply and communication and was Grant’s final attempt to take Petersburg short of a siege. Wilson sniffed that Kautz’s troops were “nothing more than a small and poorly organized brigade of about two thousand men.” Many from the 1st D.C. had little experience on horseback, having trained unmounted. “Probably…no other regiment in the service took the field in a condition so unfavorable to success,” wrote regimental historian Edward P. Tobie.Most of the men of Kautz’s command, some 2,500 in all, were ordered to take the Staunton River Bridge, which was defended by about 1,000 men, many of whom were either civilians or soldiers recuperating from wounds. Six attempts were made to storm the bridge, and all six were repulsed. In addition to superior Confederate entrenchments, the Union soldiers had to contend with no effective covering. Also, the intense heat and sun caused several to fall from sunstroke. On one of the six charges, Conger was again wounded. Declared unfit for service by Union doctors in early 1865, Conger was assigned by Baker to detached service in the War Department. In February 1865, Conger was officially mustered out of the cavalry. In what was probably an attempt to keep his old friend from becoming destitute, Baker offered Conger a job in the NDP. Although he offered no prior experience as an investigator, Conger accepted. While providing a steady income, the job didn’t require much in the way of rigorous duty.Why Baker selected Conger for the search, given the aforementioned severity of his wounds, defies easy answer. Conger should never have been picked for this duty. Booth had been free for nearly two weeks, so every minute wasted was another minute that could see the assassin elude capture. But Baker, for all his faults, recognized that the success that the 1st D.C. was due to Conger’s leadership, and there is evidence Conger knew the territory where the posse would search.On April 24, Booth and Herold crossed the Rappahannock at Port Conway with three Confederate soldiers, Willie Jett, Mortimer Bainbridge Ruggles and Absolom Ruggles Bainbridge. Looking for a place to deposit Booth, the party made its way to the farm of Richard Garrett, who agreed to let the stranger into his home. Herold rode further south with the three Confederate soldiers.As Conger rested, Doherty and Byron got a clue from ferryman William Rollins that five men had crossed the Rappahannock the day before. Doherty sent for Conger. Rollins agreed to take the party to Bowling Green, Va., provided they arrest him. He didn’t want to be known as one who voluntarily cooperated with Yankees. Crossing the river, the trio’s first stop was the Trap, an establishment dedicated to pleasurable pursuits, to see if any special guests had recently visited. The owner, a Mrs. Carter, declined to talk, knowing it would be bad for business. With a brilliant ruse, Conger loosened her tongue after saying the men they were after had violated a young woman in a most brutal fashion.Mrs. Carter confirmed that four men had been “guests” there for a short time, but none were lame, which meant Booth was somewhere else. Herold and his three new-found friends headed out to Bowling Green, Carter said. She added that three of them returned the next day minus Jett, who had gone to the Star Hotel in Bowling Green where his girlfriend, Izora Gouldman, lived. To Bowling Green they headed.A short time later, Conger, Byron and Doherty were standing in Jett’s room, a gun pointed at the young Confederate soldier’s head. “Where are the two men who came with you across the river at Port Royal,” Conger demanded. Jett sized up the situation, saw Conger as the one in charge, and asked if he could speak to him alone. Byron and Doherty left the room. Jett reached out his hand to Conger and told him “I know who you want; and I will tell you where they can be found.” Jett, who had never been comfortable with Booth and Herold, now tried to save his own skin. However, there was a problem. Jett assumed Conger and his party had come from Richmond, not realizing they came from Port Royal. “If you have come from there, you have come past them,” Jett said. “I cannot tell you whether they are there now or not.” Conger told Jett it didn’t make any difference. They would return to Garrett’s farm.After arriving at the farm and stationing the men at various spots on the property, Conger went to the porch where he found Byron in conversation with Richard Garrett. Conger asked Garrett “Where are the two men who stopped here at your house?” Garrett, who stammered when excited, said they were in the nearby woods. Garrett protested that they had arrived at his doorstep without his consent, and that he had ordered them to leave. Conger cut him off. “I do not want any long story out of you,” he roared. “I just want to know where these men have gone.” With a gun to his head, Garrett again stammered and said he hadn’t wanted anything to do with his “guests.” Exasperated, Conger ordered a rope be brought to him, saying “I will put that man up to the top of one of those locust trees.” John Garrett, one of Richard’s two sons who served in the Confederate army, came to his father’s rescue.He explained Booth and Herold had been locked in the tobacco barn and were still there. Immediately, Conger, Byron, Doherty and John Garrett went to the barn. Conger and Doherty stationed the remaining soldiers around three sides of the structure with Byron locating himself at the front, where Conger and Doherty joined him.Byron told Booth they were going to send in one of the Garrett brothers to retrieve the weapons they believed the fugitive to have, and that they must surrender or the barn would be fired. The younger Garrett demurred, saying Booth would shoot him. “They know you, and you can go in,” Byron said. Once in, Booth snarled at the young man, “Damn you! You have betrayed me.” The younger Garrett beat a hasty retreat. Conger ordered him to gather some brush and place it against the barn. After Booth again threatened the young man, Conger let Garrett draw back. Herold decided he wanted out. After calling his travel companion a “damned coward” Booth told Byron there was a man inside willing to surrender. Fine, Byron replied, but Herold must bring out the weapons. Booth refused, saying the guns were his. This exchange lasted for some time until Conger told Byron to forget the weapons and get Herold out.With Herold in custody, Conger determined Booth wouldn’t leave voluntarily so he went to the back of the barn, tied together some loose hay into a rope, and set the rope ablaze. He threw it on more loose hay piled in a corner. Conger never gave any other reason why he decided it was time to end the stand-off, although the pain from his wounds likely precipitated the action. Even with his rest, Conger was in excruciating pain.After Conger lit the fire, Booth hobbled back to the corner. “He looked at the fire, and from the expression on his face, I am satisfied he looked to see if he could put it out, and was satisfied that he could not do it, it was burning so much,” Conger would later testify. “He dropped his arm, relaxed his muscles, and turned around, and started for the front of the barn.” Conger also headed for the front of the barn. Halfway there he heard the sharp crack of a pistol. Boston Corbett, a sergeant in the 16th New York Cavalry and a man generally described as a religious fanatic, had shot Booth in the neck. Corbett later testified that he felt either Booth was attempting to escape or was going to shoot Byron.Conger entered the barn and immediately told Byron “he has shot himself.” Byron, who had full view of Booth at all times, knew Booth hadn’t committed suicide. Again, Conger said “Yes sir, he shot himself.” Again, Byron said he hadn’t. Conger thought it strange that Byron would disagree with him, but there was little time to ponder it as the barn became engulfed by flames. They dragged Booth outside, and Conger returned to the barn in a vain attempt to put the fire out.Conger thought Booth was dead. But as he testified later, “when I got back to him, his eyes and mouth were moving.” Conger called for some water to splash in Booth’s face, which revived him. The detective noticed Booth was attempting to speak. He bent down, put his ear next to Booth’s mouth, and heard “tell mother I die for my country.” Conger repeated it, asking if that was Booth’s words, which Booth affirmed. Although Byron would testify that Booth was shot against orders, Conger contradicted him in his first statement aboard the monitor Montauk, saying “they [the soldiers] had no orders either to fire or not to fire.”Booth lived a few more hours. At various times he asked for water or to be turned, and he begged to be killed. Conger ordered a soldier to Belle Plain to get a doctor. A short time later that doctor pronounced the wound mortal. Conger went through Booth’s pockets and removed several items, including a date book that would later gain fame as Booth’s “diary.”After Booth died, Conger headed out ahead of the party to return to Washington, taking with him the items found in Booth’s pockets. He went to Belle Plain with Corbett, although the sergeant stayed, waiting for the posse to return with Booth’s body. In his book Manhunt, writer James Swanson claims Conger did this in order to promote his own role in the capture and puff up his claim to the reward. However, Conger said that he had been ordered by Stanton not to make any comments about the capture of Booth, even turning down an offer of money for his story. Conger’s return to Washington was the action of a leader.Back in Washington, Conger went to Lafayette’s office, and the two rode to Stanton’s office at the War Department. Stanton had already gone home, so they went there. Stanton was lying on a sofa when Lafayette rushed in and told him Booth had been captured. It took a while for the news to sink in, but eventually Stanton got up and looked at the items which Conger had brought back from Garrett’s farm. Afterward, Conger, exhausted, ate supper and rested.Conger’s attention turned to the $75,000 reward offered by the War Department. Because of the numerous claims submitted, the decision on how to distribute the money was left to a commission headed by Judge Advocate General Joseph Holt and his assistant, E.D. Townsend. Reflecting the military convention of its make-up, the tradition of distributing prize money by rank was favored as the fairest arrangement. “The analogies between the seizure by a naval force of a vessel in the service of the public enemy, and the capture of felons and traitors who have committed crimes in the same service and in the interest of the rebellion, are sufficiently obvious to suggest the advisability of restoring in the latter case to similar rules for the distribution of rewards…” the Holt-Townsend commissioners wrote. Using that logic, the reward scheme favored Doherty, who would be awarded $7,500 compared to Lafayette’s $3,750 and the $4,000 given to Conger and Byron.Concerned that the credit (not to mention a good chunk of the money) would go to Doherty, Lafayette had Conger and Byron submit a report which he in turn presented to Stanton on Dec. 27, 1865. The detailed report, which appears in Lafayette’s autobiography, had attached to it his own “observations.” In it, he said regardless of whether those involved were “citizen, soldier, or alien” whoever participated in the capture deserved a share commensurate with that person’s role. Since it was his plan, and he sent the men into the field, Lafayette felt entitled to the largest portion, followed by Conger and Byron. Doherty and his men were mere subordinates, “though necessary, instruments” to his own detectives.When the Holt-Townsend report was issued in April 1866, Doherty was relieved to find his claim had been upheld, and that Conger and the two Bakers, while getting some money, didn’t get the lion’s share, and with it the credit for capturing Booth and Herold. However, others weren’t as happy. On May 7, 1866, less than a month after the Holt-Townsend report was issued, Congressman William D. Kelley of Pennsylvania introduced a resolution asking the Committee of Claims to “inquire into the fairness and propriety of the distribution of the rewards offered for the arrest of Jefferson Davis and the conspirators to murder President Lincoln.”The Committee investigated, and on July 24, 1866 issued its report. Baker’s arguments fell on more favorable ears because the committee wrote it did not “regard the capture of Booth and Herold as purely military service.” As Congress wrangled with the rewards question, Conger wanted it over so he could return home. Unknown to outside observers at the time was a deal brokered at “the eleventh hour” which allowed the bill to pass. The compromise was struck by Congressman Rutherford B. Hayes, again playing a role in his fellow townsmen’s life. Hayes told Conger if he would be patient, he could get $15,000. Conger agreed. The House passed the bill, followed by the Senate.As his time in the spotlight ended, Conger settled into a voluntary obscurity. An attempt at farming in Ohio failed, so he and his family headed to southern Illinois, where his parents and a brother, Chauncey, lived. Conger studied law and dabbled in local politics, being elected as police magistrate (similar to justice of the peace) which he held until President Hayes once again helped his old friend by appointing him to the territorial supreme court of Montana in 1880.Conger found his time in Montana to be anything but quiet. In 1882 a political dispute forced Conger into a battle to restore his name. Conger, a Republican, supported Democratic commissioners against a power grab by some Republican territorial officials. The Republicans sought Conger’s dismissal from office using the one issue they could exploit—his addiction to alcohol (brought on by his war wounds) and love of gambling. In 1883 President Chester A. Arthur suspended Conger pending an investigation. Shown mercy, Conger was allowed back on the bench a few days before his term expired. Wanting to restore his reputation, Conger requested re-appointment. He was ignored, and in 1884 was out of a job.For the rest of his life, Conger practiced law, tried ranching, and reminisced about the capture of Booth. Both Byron Baker and Doherty were receiving national attention for their exploits. Both ensured the other was never mentioned, and neither man mentioned Conger. Whether he felt like he had nothing to prove, or he just didn’t want to mount a national tour, Conger stayed quiet. Occasionally, Conger’s name surfaced in newspapers, either at a reunion of the Grand Army of the Republic or near the anniversary of Lincoln’s death and Booth’s capture.Conger’s last few months were spent in Hawaii, where in 1917 his son-in-law, Joseph Poindexter, was sent to the territorial bench by President Woodrow Wilson. Conger followed current events with intense interest, especially those in Europe. Although he had already lost two sons, his daughter’s death in 1918 proved unbearable. Just a few short months after her demise, Conger suffered a massive stroke, which proved fatal. His body was returned to Dillon, Montana, where after he was buried, his name slipped further into obscurity.Butte Evening News, April 3, 1910Author interview with Helen P. Morgan, Aug. 14, 1995.Butte Evening News, April 3, 1910.Unpublished statement of Everton J. Conger in White County Historical Society, Carmi, Ill. [n.d.].Ibid.Statement of Everton J. Conger aboard the monitor Montauk, April 27, 1865, National Archives and Records Administration RG 94, M619 R455, frame 725 (hereafter referred to as Montauk Statement).Lafayette C. Baker, History of the United States Secret Service (Philadelphia, 1867), 531.Testimony of Luther Byron Baker in Impeachment Investigation: Testimony Taken Before the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives in the Investigation of the Charges Against Andrew Johnson, 40th Congress, 1st Session House Report No. 7, (Washington, 1867) 490 (Hereafter referred to as Impeachment Investigation).In Conger’s testimony during the trial of John Surratt in 1867, he admitted to being “a little lame” during the chase, but Byron Baker began to cast doubts during his testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on Conger’s fitness to be in the field. Several years later Baker claimed that Conger begged him to be allowed to come along but Baker was concerned about his ability to ride. For Conger’s testimony see “Trial of John Surratt” in The Reporter (Washington, D.C., 1867) 262; For Baker’s comments see Luther Byron Baker, “An Eyewitness Account of the Death and Burial of J. Wilkes Booth”, Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, 39 (Dec. 1946), 428.Charles Richard Williams, ed., Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Vol. II 1861-1865, (New York, 1971) 48Paul Christopher Anderson, Blood Image: Turner Ashby in the Civil War and the Southern Mind, (Baton Rouge, 2002) 2-3A.E. Richards, “General Turner Ashby” Southern Bivouac, Vol. 2, No.1, (June 1886) 63.OR, Series 1, Vol. 2, 16.OR, Series I, Vol. 19, Part 2, 100-101; Conger’s wounds are described in his pension papers, RG 94, NARA;I am deeply indebted to Eric Wittenberg for bringing to my attention the role played by Ulric Dahlgren in Conger’s story. Much of the information comes from the relevant chapter in his upcoming biography of Dahlgren. The letter from Franz Sigel is in Conger’s pension papers, RG 94, NARA.Lafayette Baker to Everton J. Conger, September 12, 1863 in Conger’s service record, RG 94, NARA; On Seymour’s death see Wheeling Intelligencer, August 14, 1864.Impeachment Investigation, 3; Clara Laughlin, The Death of Lincoln (New York, 1909) 144.James Harrison Wilson, Under the Old Flag, (New York, 1912) 456; Edward P. Tobie, History of the First Maine Cavalry, 1861-1865, 332-33.For accounts of the attempts to burn the bridge see the various reports in the OR by Wilson, Series 1, Vol. 40, Part 1, 620-33 and Kautz and various commanders, Series 1, Vol. 40, Part 1, 730-742 ; Tobie, History of the First Maine Cavalry, 335-36; For the Southern perspective see Southern Historical Society Papers, Volumes 19 and 37 and Captain Benjamin L. Farinholt’s report in OR, Series 1, Vol. 40, Part 1, 764-5.Testimony of Luther Byron Baker in Impeachment Investigation, 479.Edward J. Steers, Blood on the Moon (Lexington, Ky., 2001) 199.Testimony of Everton J. Conger in Ben: Perley Poore, Conspiracy Trial for the Murder of the President and the Attempt to Overthrow the Government by the Assassination of Its Principal Officers (Arno Press Reprint, New York, 1972) 313.Ibid, 313-314.Ibid, 314.Ibid, 315.Ibid, 316; Corbett testimony in Ibid, 324.Testimony of Everton J. Conger in The Reporter, 262.Montauk Statement, frame 725.James L. Swanson, Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer (New York, 2006), 349. Conger’s claim is found in “An Account of the Proceedings by Colonel Conger” an unpublished typescript in the possession of Conger relatives. I am thankful to Conger’s grandson, Everton Ellsworth Conger for supplying it to me.While the reward amount offered by the War Department was $100,000, that was for the capture of Booth, Herold and Surratt. As only Booth and Herold were captured, the amount paid out was $75,000.Awards for the Capture of Booth and Others, Letter from the Secretary of War in Answer To A Resolution for the capture of J.W. Booth and D.E. Herold, April 19, 1866, 39th Congress 1st Session, Ex. Doc. No. 90., (Washington, 1866) 7.Baker, History of the United States Secret Service, 539Reward for the Capture of Booth, 39th Congress, 1st Session, Report No. 99 (Washington, 1866) 1.“An Account of the Proceedings by Colonel Conger”, 3.The hearing file concerning Conger numbers 880 pages and is located in the National Archives. See also Clark C. Spence,Territorial Politics and Government in Montana, 1864-89 (Urbana, 1975) 227; and John D.W. Guice, The Rocky Mountain Bench (New Haven, 1972) 76-77.

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