Who is this person?

[Steve]

(03-10-2019 06:59 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Steve - one more "assignment" if you have the time. I passed on Jerry's information about Harry Cooke (real name Horatio Green Cooke) to David Goetz, who leads the Mosby's Confederacy Tours through the Shenandoah Valley, has authored several books on Mosby, and will be a speaker at our upcoming conference. He had not heard of Cooke and his run-in with the Rangers. He's checking with others, but so far no one knows anything.

According to Jerry's information and what I found on the internet, Cooke was assigned by Lincoln and Stanton to be a Federal Scout, and that's how he came to infiltrate Confederate territory and run up against the Grey Ghost. He was in the Union Army before receiving the assignment and seems to have been mainly doing orders requiring beautiful penmanship. My question: Is there a way to find his military records and perhaps prove his service as a scout?

Addendum: Just found this hint, but can't get into the papers on Fold3 Iowa Infantry Regiment 28 Company B Cooke, Horatio G.

The civil war service records of Iowa soldiers haven't been digitized and put up on Fold3 yet. But looking at other documents we can tell that Cooke:

Enlisted in Company B, Iowa 28th Infantry Regiment as a private on 20 Aug 1862. Mustered out on 26 Jun 1865 at Washington, DC. and this was the only unit he was officially in, although he could've been attached elsewhere

   

   

His regiment mustered out in Georgia in July 1865, so he appears to be attached to another unit when discharged

http://civilwarintheeast.com/us-regiment...28th-iowa/

His rank at discharge was also private:

   

This blog has some information on Cooke and his claims:

http://www.themagicdetective.com/2017/04...ncoln.html

I'm skeptical that Cooke's demonstration of 01 May 1864 to Pres. Lincoln and other dignitaries actually happened. As far as I can tell, Robert Ingersoll couldn't have been at a meeting in Washington that day, because he was campaigning in or near Peoria, Illinois for his brother Ebon Clarke Ingersoll's special election to fill a vacant congressional seat to be.

Since Cooke was discharged in Washington DC and not in Georgia like the rest of his unit, he could very well have been attached to another unit.

---

(03-11-2019 01:51 AM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  That was all fascinating, Laurie! I wonder whom Josephus Daniel referred to (assuming it did to so.), and where (locally) the name Houdini comes from.

Houdini adopted the stage name to honor French magician and clockmaker Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin. The French magician was born Jean-Eugène Robert and added his wife's maiden name, Houdin, to his surname when they married:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Eugène_Robert-Houdin