Miss Porterfield meets Booth

[LincolnMan]

(02-02-2017 04:54 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Interesting story, Bill. I wonder if he included the word 'tyrannis' in the letter he wrote and gave to John Mathews (which Mathews burned). That might explain why he was concerned with spelling.

I have seen portions of Miss Porterfield's story in a few books including Tom Goodrich's The Darkest Dawn. There is at least one item in her full story that makes me a little suspect - he tells Miss Porterfield that he was awakened in the morning by a man whose name she recalled as Surratt. I think the evidence is pretty solid that John Surratt was not in Washington on the 13th.

This is also mentioned in the article. And as you indicate, Surratt was not in Washington City at that time. We probably have to conclude a strong possibilty that she embellished her story a bit. Booth may have been awakened by somebody but it wasn't Surratt.