Identification of Booth's body

[mikegriffith1]

In reviewing Dr. John Frederick May’s three statements on the appearance of the body on the Montauk, I noticed something that I had not noticed before: In his April 27 statement, given to Joseph Holt, Dr. May said that the body looked “much older” than Booth did when he saw him less than two years earlier:

Q. Do you recognize the body as that of J. Wilkes Booth from its general appearance, and also from the particular appearance of the scar?

A. I do recognize it, though it is very much altered since I saw J. Booth. It looks to me much older, and in appearance much more freckled than he was. I do not recall that he was at all freckled.

We need to remember that this statement was buried in the National Archives for decades, and that Dr. May was not called to testify in the conspiracy trial.

Dr. May did testify at the John Surratt trial in 1867, but he was not asked about, nor did he mention, the body’s altered appearance, its older appearance, and the freckles.

Thus, for decades no one knew that the body on the Montauk looked very different from Booth, older than Booth, and that the face was noticeably freckled.

(Nor did anyone know that in his April 27 testimony, Dr. May clearly seemed to imply that the body he viewed had a beard, unlike Booth the last time he saw him: “When he came to my office, he had no beard, excepting a moustache.” It really seems like the witnesses viewed two bodies, hey?)

In April 1865, Booth was only 26 years old. When Dr. May last saw him, Booth was only 24 or 25. In Dr. May’s 1887 article “The Mark of the Scalpel,” he described Booth as a “handsome young man” (p. 53).

Now, what would have caused Booth to look “much older” at 26 than he looked at 24 or 25, less than two years earlier? Certainly not his 10-day flight. Contrary to later mythology, Booth was not “half-starved” and “haggered” during his flight. He got fed at Dr. Mudd’s house. Cox fed him and gave him an extra blanket. Jones brought him food every day while he was hiding near Cox’s house. The Rollins fed him. The Garretts fed him. He spent at least three nights indoors, and quite possibly four. This was spring time and the temperatures were not harsh. When he did sleep outdoors, he slept among many trees and under their cover.

So what could have caused Booth to look “much older” on April 27? Answer: NOTHING. Just as nothing known to science could have caused him to suddenly sprout freckles after death. Just as nothing known to science could have caused the body’s head to grow an extra 10-12 inches of hair after death. Just as nothing known to science could have caused his body’s appearance to undergo such a drastic change that its lineaments “bore no resemblance” to Booth, so much so that everyone was “shocked” by the body’s lack of resemblance to Booth.

When Conger showed William Rollins a picture of Booth less than 48 hours before the barn shooting, Rollins “without the least hesitation” identified Booth as the man he had seen on crutches. By the way, Rollins noted that the man on crutches had no mustache! Humm! So 48 hours before Booth supposedly died, he had no mustache, yet several witnesses who saw the corpse on the Montauk claimed that it had a mustache, and Rollins had no trouble recognizing Booth as the man in the picture that Conger showed him.

Testimony and memories can often be challenged, but in this case, luckily, we can appeal to science—forensic science, to be specific. We have abundant knowledge on the kinds of changes that a body undergoes after death, inside and out. Livor mortis does not cause freckling. Any first-year medical resident can tell the difference between freckles and the dark blotches of discoloration that livor mortis produces. And there is no phenomenon known to science that Booth could have experienced during his flight that will cause a person to look “much older” between the age of 24/25 and the age of 26.

When Conger showed Rollins the picture, Rollins didn’t say, “Yes, it looks like the guy on crutches, except the guy on crutches looks a lot older and he has freckles.” That’s because Booth’s appearance had not magically aged to the point that he looked “much older” than he did at 24/25, and this was less than 48 hours before he was allegedly killed.