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[Pamela]

Stewart made his statement of April 15, 1865 to Judge Olin at the Peterson house in the hours after the murder of Lincoln. It's amazing to think that witnesses were giving their statements to authorities just feet away from the dying President. In that statement he admitted to encountering persons he believed were in the police corps at the theater door to the alleyway as those men were coming out. Actually his statement is a little confused at that point because he first mentioned "some person" and in the next sentence said "these persons". In his trial testimony he said, "When the assassin alighted on the stage, I believed I knew who it was that had committed the deed; that it was J. Wilkes Booth, and I so informed Richards, Superintendent of the Police, that night." His testimony contained no further information as to when or where he talked to Richards that night, but likely it was at the theater.