The Yankees' Secret Weapon

[Steve]

(09-23-2017 09:56 AM)L Verge Wrote:  The pardon in question was for Patrick Murphy, but there was another questionable one somewhere in the story also -- last name something like Hambrick??

The interesting thing is that Patrick Murphy was mentioned in Basler's works dating back to the 1930s, complete with the correct date of 1864, but none of the Lincoln scholars who were reading Lowry's work caught the error.

The other pardon that Lowry claimed was made on April 14, 1865 was for a Bradford Hambrick. However, that pardon was not forged or altered in any way. Here's an image of the April 27, 1865 letter the Adjutant General's Office sent to Maj. Gen. George Thomas informing the Department of the Cumberland of Lincoln's pardon of Hambrick:

   

The fact that the Hambrick pardon was genuine makes the whole affair even more baffling, especially if Lowry was indeed the forger.

Perhaps... I'm beating a dead horse with this 6 year-old story?