Louis Weichmann

[Pamela]

(09-06-2015 01:38 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Since the family business was tobacco farming and running the tavern - not truck farming, I have often wondered if the transport of fruit and vegetables into D.C. was sporadic and more in time with and coordinated with Surratt's courier runs. A bushel of apples can hide courier packets, so can floorboards on wagons, and Surratt used to joke about even hiding things in the heels of his boots.

(09-17-2015 07:43 PM)Rick Smith Wrote:  Gus Howell's testimony is not damning in regard to Mrs. Surratt, but he does refer to his conversations to Louis Weichmann; showing him how to use a cipher key and that he was interested in going South with him and asked if Howell might be able to find him a position in Richmond. I suppose this could be more of the alleged double agent business on Weichmann's part. Some of this occurred during the time that Howell was waiting for the "French Woman" who he was to escort north.

Howell's testimony was extremely damaging to Mary. There was already testimony that Mary was going to take actions to get him released from prison for rebel activities when she encountered Lloyd on the road to the Surratt tavern on the trip when she mentioned "shooting irons " the first time. She wanted Howell to take a loyalty oath so he would be released. That was the occasion where Lloyd said, "It was put in a manner as if she wanted to draw my attention to something so that anybody else could not understand." And, in fact, nobody else heard those comments including Weichmann. Howell testified to staying at her boarding house one night and to being friends with the Surratts, despite all his double talk on the stand. The defense was desperate to impeach Weichmann and failed. Howell came off sounding like he was lying, embellishing and twisting conversations with Weichmann to help out his friends, which he was, and continued to do so after the executions. After her death he must have realized his testimony added more nails to her coffin, so he continued to attack Weichmann.