** NEW DISCOVERY REGARDING BOOTH AUTOPSY PHOTO

[Laurie Verge]

I went to that section and found the info that Katz gave on James Wardell and the missing Booth photo. In a nutshell: James A. Wardell lived in Alexandria, Virginia, and was a government detective with the War Department from 1862-1869. He later became a policeman in Virginia. His letter's high points say that he had been on patrol in Southern Maryland until 7 pm on April 26 and reported to the National Detective Bureau at 6 am the next morning. He was told to wait for a Patrolman Camp, who came shortly with Gardner and a darky to photograph Booth's body. An assistant (whom Katz thought was Timothy O'Sullivan) was waiting in the buggy. The party went to the Navy Yard.

They were refused entrance there because no one had issued a pass. About 10:30 am, Lafayette Baker showed up in a coach and they followed him to the pier and out to the ironclad. Barnes was already aboard the ship and instructed Gardner to produce only one photograph and to give it only to Baker or Stanton. Wardell claims that the assistant did the work and also claims to have gone to the dark room with the assistant. No mention is made of where the dark room was on the ship.

Wardell further claims that the photo was not delivered to him until 4:00 pm. Doesn't that seem like a long time to wait? Wardell took it to the War Department and gave it to Baker, who looked at it, and Wardell left. He says he appeared before the Commission, but they seemed to doubt him. Stanton denied that a photo had ever been taken. Wardell says he glanced at the photo and thought it looked like Booth.

Now comes something that waves a red flag at me: The chapter note for this letter says that Mark Katz got the TRANSCRIPT of Wardell's letter from Lloyd Ostendorf.