In no other situation in life is the character of a man more fully and
truthfully brought into view than when he is placed upon the witness-
stand and subjected to an examination by counsel or others who aim to
support opposite opinions and to reach adverse results. The committees
that conducted the investigations were composed of men who entertained
opposite views in regard to the reconstruction of the government and in
regard to the impeachment of President Johnson. There was also a
difference of opinion upon the question of the responsibility of the
Confederate authorities for the assassination of Mr. Lincoln. As a
consequence of this diversity of opinion the witnesses were subjected
to the equivalent of a cross-examination in a court of justice. Some
of the impressions of men that I received in the many hearings, and
some of the opinions I formed, are recorded here.
In each branch of these comprehensive inquiries there may be found
something in the nature of evidence that may appear to have a bearing
upon the assassination of Mr. Lincoln. It is my purpose in these
paragraphs to bring in to view the testimony which relates directly to
John Wilkes Booth, the most conspicuous and without question the chief
criminal in the tragedy of the assassination of President Lincoln, and
the attempt upon the life of Mr. Seward.
The first step in the proceedings which culminated in the murder was
the deposit at Surrattsville (a place about five miles from Washington,
and owned by the Surratt family) of a carbine, two bottles of whiskey,
a small coil of rope, a field glass, a monkey wrench, and some other
articles.
The house was kept by a man named Lloyd, and neither the character of
the house nor that of the keeper could bear a rigid test in ethics.
The deposit was made about the first of March by John H. Surratt,
Atzerodt and David E. Herold, all of whom were afterwards implicated
in the crime. The articles were received and secreted by Lloyd, but
only after objections by him, as appears from his testimony. Lloyd
connected Mrs. Surratt with the crime by these facts as related by
him. She called upon Lloyd the Tuesday preceding the fatal Friday
and gave him this message: "She told me to have them ready (speaking
of the shooting-iron) that they would be called for or wanted soon,
I have forgotten which."
Mrs. Surratt made a second call the afternoon preceding the murder,
when this conversation took place, as stated by Lloyd: "When I drove
up in my buggy to the back yard Mrs. Surratt came out to meet me. She
handed me a package, and told me as well as I remember to get the guns
or those things--I really forget now which, though my impression is
that guns was the expression she made use of--and a couple of bottles
of whisky and give them to whoever should call for them that night."
That night, after the murder, Booth and Herold called, and took the
carbine and drank of the whisky. In these facts there is a basis for
a reasonable theory. The theory is this. Previous to the fall of
Richmond and the surrender of Lee's army the Confederate authorities
set on foot a scheme for the capture and abduction of Mr. Lincoln.
The articles deposited, including the rope and the monkey wrench,
might be useful had Mr. Lincoln been abducted, but when the crime
became murder the rope and wrench were neglected.
This view derives support from two directions. In Booth's diary is
this entry. "April 13-14 Friday. The Ides. Until to-day nothing was
ever thought of sacrificing to our country's wrongs. For six months
we had worked to capture. But our cause being almost lost something
decisive and great must be done. But its failure was owing to others
who did not strike for their country with a heart."
Colonel Baker, a detective, testified that when he was in Canada,
engaged in negotiations for the purchase of letters that had passed
between the Confederate authorities at Richmond and Clay, Tucker,
Thompson and others, he read a letter from Jefferson Davis to Jacob
Thompson dated March 8, 1865, in which was this expression: "The
consummation of the act that would have done more to have ended this
terrible strife, being delayed, has probably ruined our cause."
The scheme for the abduction of Mr. Lincoln was a wild scheme, born of
desperation, and its success would have worked only evil to the
Confederacy. The purpose of the North would have been strengthened,
the public feeling would have been embittered and the friendship of
England and of the Continental states would have been suppressed.
When Lee had surrendered, when Davis was fleeing from Richmond, when
Benjamin was preparing to leave the country, the leaders of the
Confederacy could not have entertained a project for the capture of
Mr. Lincoln, nor of any injury to him whatever. Their opposition to
Mr. Lincoln was not tainted with personal hostility. One fact remains;
the persons who had knowledge of the project to abduct Mr. Lincoln and
who were engaged in it at Washington, were implicated in the final
crime.
If Booth's diary can be accepted as a faithful representation of his
mental condition it will appear that he had on that fatal Friday
submitted himself to the influence of three strong passions. He had
accepted the South as his country, and he had come to look upon Mr.
Lincoln as a tyrant and as its enemy. Hence he was influenced with
hatred for Mr. Lincoln. Finally he had become maddened by an ambition
to rival, or to excel Brutus. The influence of his possession is to
be seen in the entries in his diary in the days following the 14th of
April:
"I can never repent it, though we hated to kill. Our country owed all
our troubles to him, and God simply made me the instrument of his
punishment.
"The country is not what it was. This forced union is not what I have
loved. I have not desired to outlive my country. . . . After being
hunted like a dog through swamps, woods, and last night being chased
by gunboats till I was forced to return wet, cold, and starving with
every man's hand against me, I am here in despair. And why? For doing
what Brutus was honored for--what made Tell a hero. And yet I for
striking down a greater tyrant than they ever knew, am looked upon as
a common cut-throat. My action was purer than either of theirs. One
hoped to be great. The other had not only his country's, but his own
wrongs to avenge. I knew no private wrong. I struck for my country
and that alone. A country that groaned beneath this tyranny, and
prayed for the end, and yet now behold the cold hand they extend to me.
"God cannot pardon me if I have done wrong, yet I cannot see my wrong
except in serving a degenerate people. The little, the very little I
left behind to clear my name, the Government will not allow to be
printed. So ends all. For my country I have given up all that makes
life sweet and holy, brought misery upon my family, and am sure there
is no pardon for me in Heaven since man so condemns me.
"I do not repent of the blow I struck. I may before my God but not to
man. I think I have done well. Thought I am abandoned with the curse
of Cain upon me, when if the world knew my heart that one blow would
have made me great, though I did desire no greatness."
Finally, he writes:
"I bless the entire world. Have never hated or wronged anyone. This
last was not a wrong unless God deems it so; and it is with him to
damn or bless me."
These extracts from Booth's diary reveal the influences that controlled
him in the great tragedy in which he became the principal actor.
The death of Booth was only a lesser tragedy than the death of Mr.
Lincoln.
Following the murder and escape of Booth a small military force was
organized hastily under the direction and command of Colonel Lafayette
C. Baker, a detective in the service of the War Department. The force
consisted of about thirty men chiefly convalescents from the army
hospitals in Washington. Colonel Everton G. Conger was in command of
the expedition, and his testimony contains a clear account of what
transpired at Garrett's Farm, where Booth was captured and shot.
Conger reached Garrett's Farm on the night of the 25th of April, or the
early morning of the 26th. The men were posted around the tobacco shed
in which Booth and Herold were secreted and their surrender was
demanded by Conger. Booth refused to surrender and tendered, as a
counter proposition, a personal contest with the entire force. Herold
surrendered. Upon Booth's persistent refusal to surrender, a fire was
lighted in a corner of the building. Booth then came forward with his
carbine in his hand and engaged in a conversation with Lieut. L. Byron
Baker. While so engaged a musket was fired from the opposite side of
the shed and Booth fell, wounded fatally in the neck, at or near the
spot where Mr. Lincoln had been struck. Conger had given orders to the
men not to shoot under any circumstances. The examination disclosed
the fact that the shot was fired by a sergeant, named Boston Corbett.
When Colonel Conger asked Corbett why he shot without orders Corbett
saluted the colonel and said: "Colonel, Providence directed me."
Thus the parallel runs. Booth claimed that he was the instrument of
the Almighty in the assassination of Lincoln, and Boston Corbett
claimed that he acted under the direction of Providence when he shot
Booth.
Booth was shot at about three o'clock in the morning of April 26, and
he died at fifteen minutes past seven. During that time he was
conscious for about three fourths of an hour. He asked whether a
person called Jett had betrayed him. His only other intelligible
remark was this:
"Tell my mother I died for my country."
During the afternoon preceding the assassination of Mr. Lincoln, Booth
met John Matthews a brother actor, and requested him to hand a letter
to Mr. Coyle, of the _National Intelligencer,_ the next morning.
Mathews had a part in the play at Ford's Theater. When the shot was
fired and Mathews was changing his dress to leave the theater, he
discovered the letter, which for the time he had forgotten. When he
reached his rooms he opened the letter. It contained an avowal of
Booth's purpose to murder the President, and he named three of his
associates. Booth referred to a plan that had failed, and he then
added: "The moment has at length arrived when my plans must be
changed." These statements were made by Mathews from recollection.
Mathews destroyed the letter under the influence of the apprehension
that its possession would work his ruin.
The records seem to warrant certain conclusions:
1. That the Confederate authorities at Richmond made a plan for the
capture of Mr. Lincoln, and that Booth, Mrs. Surratt and others--who
were implicated finally in the murder--were concerned in the project
to abduct the President and to hold him a hostage.