General Martin D. Hardin at the conspirators execution ?

[John E.]

Hello Folks,

I believe I have spotted General Martin Hardin standing on the wall behind the gallows. Please take a look at the following collage and state your opinion. I'm in the process of hopefully finding some collaborative evidence that states he was present.

Gen. Hardin escorted Fanny Seward and her brother to the Navy Yard in order to identify Powell on the Saugus. He was also a close family friend of President Lincoln's. It was in his father's house that Abraham met Mary Todd during a party. As you can see, his most notable characteristics were his missing arm and bushy mustache. It's very difficult to make out his rank.

[Linda Anderson]

Great find, John! He looks like General Hardin to me.

I remember something about Hardin and a newspaper interview many years later but I can't remember if he gave it himself or someone else was talking about him.

[BettyO]

Congratulations, John!!! Looks like a "keeper" to me!

[Linda Anderson]

(09-05-2013 05:32 PM)Linda Anderson Wrote:  Great find, John! He looks like General Hardin to me.

I remember something about Hardin and a newspaper interview many years later but I can't remember if he gave it himself or someone else was talking about him.

I found Henry Harrison Atwater's account in several newspaper articles dated April 11, 1915 that John discovered a while back. Harrison was on the monitor when Fanny came aboard with her brother Gus and General Hardin, among others.

"While Payne was confined on the monitor Miss Seward, daughter of the Secretary, escorted by General Hardin, my old commander at Fort Reno, came down to identify Payne, who, it will be remembered, rushed past her and into Secretary Seward's room, where he committed the murderous deed."

According to an article by Dr. Verdi, who was also present, Fanny did not identify Payne (Powell) but Gus did.

[Jim Garrett]

John, as usual, you have an incredible eye.

[Linda Anderson]

John, the Hardin family papers which include "Martin D. Hardin’s “Reminiscences,” written in 1880-1881" are at the Chicago Historical Society.

http://chsmedia.org/media/fa/fa/M-H/Hardin.htm

[John E.]

(09-05-2013 09:22 PM)Linda Anderson Wrote:  John, the Hardin family papers which include "Martin D. Hardin’s “Reminiscences,” written in 1880-1881" are at the Chicago Historical Society.

http://chsmedia.org/media/fa/fa/M-H/Hardin.htm

Thanks Linda, I'm aware of the Hardin family papers at CHS but haven't called them just yet. Unfortunately, Gen. Hardin started writing his memoirs but he only got as far as right before the Civil War. I'm hoping that he may have written a letter regarding the execution.

A very nice gentleman named James Huffstodt in Tallahassee has been researching Hardin for quite a while now and shared some of his contacts with me. He also believes the man on the wall is indeed Gen. Hardin.

I love these visual mysteries.

[Linda Anderson]

I should have known you'd know about the Hardin papers, John!

When I was googling Hardin I came across a book titled The Fall of the House of Walworth: A Tale of Madness and Murder in Gilded Age America that was written about Hardin's sister, Ellen Hardin Walworth, who led an extraordinary life herself.

"Ellen Hardin Walworth (Oct. 20, 1832 – June 23, 1915) was an American author, lawyer, and activist who was a passionate advocate for the importance of studying history and historic preservation. Walworth was one of the founders of the Daughters of the American Revolution and was the organization's first secretary general.[1]"

"n her personal life, Walworth was a victim of domestic violence with tragic consequences when her son, Frank, killed his father after years of intervening to protect his mother. Walworth studied law to gain the knowledge to overturn the conviction of her son for killing her abusive former husband.[1]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Hardin_Walworth

"In 1877, after four years in prison, Frank was pardoned by newly elected Governor Lucius Robinson who, as a lawyer, had served before Chancellor Walworth."

http://www.murderbygaslight.com/2013/05/...icide.html

[John E.]

(09-06-2013 09:10 AM)Linda Anderson Wrote:  I should have known you'd know about the Hardin papers, John!

When I was googling Hardin I came across a book titled The Fall of the House of Walworth: A Tale of Madness and Murder in Gilded Age America that was written about Hardin's sister, Ellen Hardin Walworth, who led an extraordinary life herself.

"Ellen Hardin Walworth (Oct. 20, 1832 – June 23, 1915) was an American author, lawyer, and activist who was a passionate advocate for the importance of studying history and historic preservation. Walworth was one of the founders of the Daughters of the American Revolution and was the organization's first secretary general.[1]"

"n her personal life, Walworth was a victim of domestic violence with tragic consequences when her son, Frank, killed his father after years of intervening to protect his mother. Walworth studied law to gain the knowledge to overturn the conviction of her son for killing her abusive former husband.[1]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Hardin_Walworth

"In 1877, after four years in prison, Frank was pardoned by newly elected Governor Lucius Robinson who, as a lawyer, had served before Chancellor Walworth."

http://www.murderbygaslight.com/2013/05/...icide.html

This is why I love history so much. The assassination story has been a vehicle for me to learn so much more about historic personalities of that time. It's just amazing to me and an endless source of reading and entertainment.

[Gene C]

(09-06-2013 11:21 AM)John E. Wrote:  This is why I love history so much. The assassination story has been a vehicle for me to learn so much more about historic personalities of that time. It's just amazing to me and an endless source of reading and entertainment.

I agree to that. And I have been able to meet so many interesting living personalities through this site
The "Murder By Gaslight" is an interesting web site that I had never known about.

[Linda Anderson]

Everything is connected, somehow. "Murder by Gaslight" recounts the 1859 murder of Philip Barton Key by Dan Sickles in Lafayette Square. Key was carried into the Old Clubhouse to die. Seward rented the Clubhouse in 1861 after he was appointed Secretary of State by Lincoln.

Even stranger is that yesterday I was reading the story of the trunk murder in The Governor and His Lady by Earl Conrad which is about the relationship between Seward and his wife Frances.

After Colt was convicted of murdering Samuel Adams, Colt's well-connected friends sent a petition in November 1842 to ask Seward, who was in his last weeks as the Governor of New York, to pardon him.

"... any way that he [Seward] looked at the case, he saw, as the courts had decided, only a cold-blooded murder..."

Frances "had written him wondering whether there might not be merit in commuting Colt's sentence..." He answered her saying that "he probably wasn't the first governor to be in a position of being regarded as the real killer in such a manslaying. There was a reason for not pardoning Colt, he told her, which he could not, with any good effect, give to the public.

"He couldn't conscientiously pardon a well-to-do man while another, poor, unknown, had to be hanged by the state for the same offense."

Seward wrote, "'In the jail at Lockport there is lying a condemned man waiting his death, yet incapable of distinguishing day from night, and so counting the hours as they carry him along to an inevitable doom, and no one thinks of him. He is poor, a stranger, and an outcast. Colt has connections, relations and associations with the educated class...'"

http://www.murderbygaslight.com/2010/03/...crate.html