Does anyone know...?

[John Fazio]

(09-13-2017 09:58 AM)L Verge Wrote:  Agreed that we are beating a dead horse. I just don't think that anyone nowadays understands the Confederate network (and frustration) in Southern Maryland and the Northern Neck of Virginia. When I first started working at Surratt House, I met a gentleman who was writing a book on Lincoln. He told me that he was amazed at the animosity that still existed among old-timers in Maryland regarding Mr. Lincoln -- more than what he had encountered in the Deep South...

"I don't know anything about Dr. Garland and I don't know anyone who does. Reference to him is made on p. 278 of my book. It derives from an oral statement made by Arnold to James L. McPhail, Provost Marshal of Maryland, to the effect that Booth had corresponded with Drs. Mudd, Garland and Queen."

That reference is exactly what put Tidwell, Hall, and Gaddy on the trail of the elusive Dr. Garland over thirty years ago. Ed Steers worked closely with Hall while researching Blood on the Moon, so I suspect that's why he picked up on the reference also.

At the time, Mr. Hall asked me to use my St. Mary's County roots to see if we could identify Dr. Garland. I wish I still had my notes on the doctor, but I don't. I just remember that there was a Dr. Garland in St. Mary's County at the beginning of the war and that he went south to serve Davis. Would he have been part of the pipeline between the Southern Maryland planters and Richmond? Don't forget that the residents of St. Mary's were just as involved in the underground as those in Prince George's and Charles Counties and that river crossings occurred in that county also.

Laurie:

If Hall, Steers, et al., couldn't get their hands around Dr. Garland, I believe he will most likely remain an elusive figure for a long time.

As for Lincoln, we need to think of the alternative to Union victory to properly assess him, his motives and his methods. Imagine a major power on the North American continent that codified guarantees of slavery in its organic law, i.e. its constitution, and this at a time when all the major powers of the world (Great Britain, France and Russia), and most of the lesser powers, had already abolished the institution. Then imagine the effect of the precedent on the political future of the country. How long would it have been before a state or group of states which were part of the CSA decided that they didn't like what what was going on in Richmond and so pulled out. The Confederate government could hardly have objected inasmuch as they had fought a 4-year war to validate the right of secession. Then imagine the same process in what was left of the United States. How long would it have been before a state or group of states in the North decided that they too didn't like what was going on in the national capital and so pulled out and established a separate county or countries. How long would it have been before the entire country looked like modern-day Europe, with all the attendant fratricide that has characterized that continent prior to the Pax Americana. Few, in my judgment, saw the matter as clearly as Lincoln, which is why he resisted the demands of the abolitionists and the radicals in his own party for immediate abolition of slavery. He knew that to do that would mean loss of the border states and therefore the war and, for the foreseeable future, emancipation. Few besides Lincoln realized that sea changes, fundamental reworkings of the order of things, could only be achieved in the fullness of time, and so he acted accordingly. Yes, he sometimes had to resort to extra-judicial and even extra-constitutional means to assure a favorable result, but as all historians know, it is sometimes necessary to go outside the law to preserve it. That is why the more thoughtful among us, North and South, do not criticize Lincoln, but honor him

John