Louis Weichmann

[STS Lincolnite]

In Atzerodt's (another German) lost confession his brother-in-law, detective John L. Smith, made notes of his statement. Presumably he spelled Weichmann's name phonectically. This statement of Atzerodt was made early in the investigation. Smith wrote "Weightman" and "Young Weightman". That's very different phonetically "Weakman".

That's the hard part about totally relying on phonetic spellings. It's all dependent on how well the speaker articulates, how well the listener hears and how well a transcriber spells (or even how legible their writing is).