Was Stanton a murder target?

[John Fazio]

(11-01-2016 03:15 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Thank you, John. As I've stated before, of all those on trial, I have a tougher time getting a grasp on O'Laughlen than any of the others.

Roger:

I think we can summarize the matter by saying that O'Laughlen was still in the conspiracy on the 13th and 14th. That explains why Booth went to Baltimore to fetch him and why he dutifully came to Washington that evening. He didn't come to collect the $500 Booth owed him; he had already done that on March 31 with Arnold. Note that Booth did not run off to Old Point Comfort, Virginia, to fetch Arnold. Arnold was, by this time, truly out of it. Further evidence re O'Laughlen is that he not only came to Washington, but also met with Booth that evening at the National and most probably met with him again at the same place the following morning. Inasmuch as three credible witnesses and Atzerodt have him at Stanton's home on Thursday night, it seems probable that the purpose of the meetings with Booth related to that assignment. It is possible that he followed through with that assignment with an actual attempt on Stanton's life on the 14th, but there is no evidence for that. I think it more likely that he was with his friends, as they said he was, and that the would-be assassin or assassins who were at or about Stanton's home on the 14th were among the "others" with whom Booth was in contact for such a purpose, another of whom he used to trail Grant on the train to Burlington. Recall Arnold's statement in his Memoirs that "There were occasions before I had become acquainted with the fact that others than Surratt and ourselves, already spoken of, were connected in the enterprise."

The foregoing is the most likely scenario, in my opinion, of what happened on the 13th and 14th that involved O'Laughlen.

There was enough evidence tying O'Laughlen to Booth's conspiracy to send him to the gallows. Only the alibis provided by his friends and observers saved him from that fate. But it was a short-lived salvation, because what had begun over wine and cigars in Booth's room in Barnum's in early August, 1864, ended, almost exactly three years later, in a stinking, slimy dungeon, with black vomit, delirium and vermin.

John