David Rankin Barbee

[L Verge]

I have been familiar with the name David Rankin Barbee and his work in the Lincoln and Lincoln assassination field for many years, but I never knew anything about the man except that and the fact that he had worked in Washington journalism in the first half of the 20th century. I just googled him and found some interesting things.

Mr. Barbee was born in October of 1874, in Tennessee. His father was a minister and was commissioned as a chaplain during the Civil War with his commission signed by Jefferson Davis - the first commission signed by Mr. Davis, in fact. A grand-uncle through the Rankin side of the family (mother's), however, Rev. John Rankin, was a founder of a Southern abolitionist movement in Kentucky back in 1818.

There were other political ties: His grandfather Rankin served with Andrew Johnson in the Tennessee legislature during the 1830s, and Johnson's maternal grandfather married Barbee's great-grandmother.

"Our" David Rankin Barbee went by his middle name of "Rankin," not David, nor David Rankin -- just Rankin Barbee. As such, he worked in the FDR administration as a public relations writer and also became fairly well-known for his writings on American history, specifically Lincoln and the assassination as well as a variety of Southern stories - including on Rose Greenhow. Barbee died in Orange, Texas on March 7, 1958.

I found this comment interesting in his bio: "Barbee viewed himself as an 'unreconstructed' Southerner, yet saw the Lincoln assassination as an act 'so cruel, so cowardly, so unnecessary and so tremendous in its consequences that by common consent, it has come to be regarded as the greatest incident in American history.'"

[RJNorton]

I was reading the notes in Bettie Trindal's Mary Surratt: An American Tragedy, and Barbee felt Mary was telling the truth when she said initially that she did not recognize Lewis Powell. However, Barbee felt when Powell took off the "cap" he had made from his undershirt's sleeve, he was then recognized by Mary.

[Pamela]

Michael Schein makes this point in his book about John Surratt, p 152 "The many apologists for Mrs. Surratt have seized upon her 'poor eyesight 'to excuse this incident. But poor eyesight is reason to say, 'I can't tell', not reason for a pious woman to take an oath before God never to have seen the man before....An innocent lady with bad eyesight would say she could not tell, or ask for a lantern so she could get a good look to resolve the question. Mrs Surratt was evidently not that lady."

[Eva Elisabeth]

(08-23-2015 09:22 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  I was reading the notes in Bettie Trindal's Mary Surratt: An American Tragedy, and Barbee felt Mary was telling the truth when she said initially that she did not recognize Lewis Powell. However, Barbee felt when Powell took off the "cap" he had made from his undershirt's sleeve, he was then recognized by Mary.

He was quite tall (exceptional in those days) and physically remarkable, wasn't he? And what about his voice? I can hardly imagine she didn't recognize him. Also I find the point Pamela brought up very good.

[RJNorton]

(09-24-2015 06:12 PM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  

(08-23-2015 09:22 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  I was reading the notes in Bettie Trindal's Mary Surratt: An American Tragedy, and Barbee felt Mary was telling the truth when she said initially that she did not recognize Lewis Powell. However, Barbee felt when Powell took off the "cap" he had made from his undershirt's sleeve, he was then recognized by Mary.

He was quite tall (exceptional in those days) and physically remarkable, wasn't he? And what about his voice? I can hardly imagine she didn't recognize him. Also I find the point Pamela brought up very good.

IMO there is a such a striking difference between the books by Bettie Trindal and Kate Larson. The tone (and the way Mary Surratt is presented) of the two books is so different that it's sometimes hard to imagine both authors are actually writing about the same woman. Bettie Trindal emphasizes Mary's poor eyesight when it came to not recognizing Powell - this fits with her position that Mary was an innocent woman. I may be wrong on this, but my memory is that Bettie Trindal does not mention Mary Surratt visiting Lewis Powell at the Herndon House.

[BettyO]

I feel that Kate's book is far more unbiased (she takes more of a stance that most of us do i.e. that Mary was not a total innocent) and perhaps a tad bit more well researched than Bettie's book on Mrs. Surratt.

Re: Mrs. Surratt's recognition of Powell. I've always agreed that Mrs. Surratt had to know Powell that night. He was one big, tall lanky kid - I would also think that she most certainly knew his voice. She had spoken to him, fed him, more or less conversed with him at her dinner table and in the parlor. Supposedly he had a rather boyish, tenor voice. For one, I would have thought to myself, "I've heard that voice before!' Simply put, I feel she did recognize and know him that night, but didn't want to let on; especially if she had known "what was coming down" in regards to knowledge of the conspiracy.

[L Verge]

I agree also that Mary had to recognize Powell's height and voice, and I believe that they were in the hallway, which had gaslight for illumination.

[BettyO]

They were in the hallway when Mrs. Surratt was called out from the parlor to "identify" or clarify if Powell had indeed been "hired" by her to dig out her gutter/drain - whatever. According to testimony, one of the detectives asserted that Powell was seated in the hallway under a gas lamp and when Mrs. Surratt appeared in the parlor door, Powell stood up and the gas jet spread it's full illumination on him. If this is so, she would have had to have at least recognized him by height and size, if not by voice.