** NEW DISCOVERY REGARDING BOOTH AUTOPSY PHOTO

[John E.]

(06-03-2013 08:41 AM)Linda Anderson Wrote:  

(05-30-2013 12:37 PM)John E. Wrote:  I've been across the country from Andersonville, GA to Harrisburg, PA and all the way to the middle of the Gulf of Mexico in search of new discoveries that will help forward Lincoln assassination studies. Most of the time, I've come up short but at least I know I checked and can cross things off my list of unknowns.

Recently, the research Gods threw me a bone and practically rewarded me for my past efforts and time. While searching for eyewitness accounts of John Wilkes Booth's burial, I discovered a newspaper article that has been hidden and/or overlooked by researchers for nearly 125 years...

As an aside, Lawrence Gardner stated the following:

"The object of my father’s visit to the Monitor was photography, and the body in question was to be the subject. Did we take a picture? No. After everything had been prepared Gen. Eckert concluded that inasmuch as there was so little likeness in the remains to the photograph in existence of Booth, perhaps it would be best not to make the picture, and the plan was abandoned for that reason."

Other than a statement made by Alexander Gardner himself, there can be no better source than his son, to definitively say what happened to the Booth autopsy photo.

John

That's a great discovery, John! Congratulations to you and Barry.

Have you been to the Huntington Library to see the Eckert Papers? Maybe they include some documentation that will confirm Lawrence Gardner's statement.

http://beta.worldcat.org/archivegrid/data/780190980

Hi Linda,

I have not been to the Huntington library unfortunately. However, I have had access to similar papers of his located in Andersonville, GA. They were very disappointing to rummage through and not very helpful. I also had access to a personal notebook of his as well as his diary-book which is located in Auburn, University.

The diary book contained an entry for April 14 and April 15. Those entries were fantastic. Everything else though was not well thought out and consisted of an account of how much $$ he gave his wife for the week's expenses and how much she spent.

Nothing in regards to interrogating Lewis Powell or anyone else for that matter was noted.