New Eyewitness Account?

[Steve]

I checked the date of the Charles Hamlin's paper according to the table of contents of the linked book is 07 March 1894, so just short of 30 years after the fact. Memory can get distorted over the decades. Did any other source claim that Mary had any blood on her clothes?

What do you think of Hamlin's identification of Flood as the man who climbed up to the box? If Hamlin's memory is accurate, then Flood approached him with his card the day after the assassination claiming to be the first into the box. According to Clara Harris's affidavit the first person into the box was a surgeon (Taft?, although Harris thought he was in the Navy) followed by a soldier (presumably Capt. Bedee) and Bedee's account said the man who preceded him in climbing into the box shouted to box that he was a physician. Were William Flood and Silas Owen going around with their accounts of being the first men into the box just a day after the assassination?

Are we now leaving Dr. Leale out of equation as being first into the box?

I was only referring to the people climbing into the box from below, which didn't include Leale, but you're right, Flood's account also contradicts Leale's as well because Flood also claimed to have taken Lincoln off his chair by himself while Leale said it was him and two other gentlemen.

I was just wondering about Flood supposedly introducing himself to Hamlin the day after as one of the persons climbing into the box that night.

[AussieMick]

Couple of points on previous posts (I'm a bit of a slow reader)...

Laurie raised an issue about the blood on Keene's dress which I think needs to be emphasized. We have no way of knowing whose blood it was. Rathbone was severely injured. 'nearly to the bone and severed an artery' (wikipeadia).
My understanding is that a cut artery will result in an enormous blood loss. Possibly Rathbone's injury was initially disguised by his jacket and the blood would have been pouring down his arm.

Concerning Mary 'leading' the way out of the box. I have difficulty in believing Mary turned her back on Lincoln (even for a second) and taking the risk that she would be separated from him at that time ... its just not the likely act of a distraught wife whom we know her to have been. I'd guess rather that she stuck close to him and when the body was taken from the box she was right behind it.

[RJNorton]

Are we now leaving Dr. Leale out of equation as being first into the box?

W. Emerson Reck has Leale being the first person to reach the box via the dress circle, and Flood being the first to enter getting up from the stage. Following Leale (using Leale's route) were Dr. Albert King and William Kent. Following Flood (using Flood's method) was Dr. Charles Sabin Taft. Although Reck covers Leale's arrival before Flood's, I cannot tell from the way the material is presented whether the author had a definite opinion of which man arrived first. It's possible, I suppose, that Leale and Flood arrived nearly simultaneously.

[Steve]

Are we now leaving Dr. Leale out of equation as being first into the box?

W. Emerson Reck has Leale being the first person to reach the box via the dress circle, and Flood being the first to enter getting up from the stage. Following Leale (using Leale's route) were Dr. Albert King and William Kent. Following Flood (using Flood's method) was Dr. Charles Sabin Taft. Although Reck covers Leale's arrival before Flood's, I cannot tell from the way the material is presented whether the author had a definite opinion of which man arrived first. It's possible, I suppose, that Leale and Flood arrived nearly simultaneously.

But Flood's account is contradicted by both Clara Harris and Dr. Leale's affidavits recorded just after the assassination.

[RJNorton]

There are numerous problems with Flood's account.

https://books.google.com/books?id=hbesCQ...od&f=false

[RJNorton]

Many thanks to Steve for sending these interviews with Jeannie Gourlay. One is from a February 9, 1924, edition of the Catholic Advance and the other from the February 12, 1916, edition of the Idaho Statesman. Again, Jeannie makes some questionable claims such as it was her father who led Laura Keene to the State Box (William J. Ferguson claimed it was he who did this), and it was her father who helped carry Lincoln out of the theater.

Jeannie mentions at least one thing that I had not heard before. She says that Alexander Williamson, Tad Lincoln's tutor, was present in the audience at Ford's. Has anyone ever read this?

[L Verge]

I thought Tad was with his tutor at Grover's?

[RJNorton]

I thought Tad was with his tutor at Grover's?

Laurie, like you, I have seen that in some sources. But other sources say Tad was at Grover's with Alphonso Donn, one of the group of Metropolitan Washington police officers assigned to the White House.

[JMadonna]

I guess we can add TC Gourlay to the list of men who moved the wounded Lincoln.

[L Verge]

I thought Tad was with his tutor at Grover's?

Laurie, like you, I have seen that in some sources. But other sources say Tad was at Grover's with Alphonso Donn, one of the group of Metropolitan Washington police officers assigned to the White House.

You're right. It was Alphonso Donn that is credited with being with Tad that night.

[Rsmyth]

The article posted says a Scotchman named Wiiluamson whose father was Tad's tutor.

[RJNorton]

Thanks for noticing that, Rich. Here's where I became confused. In the first article it says:

Later in the article, though, it seems clear the reference to Williamson was to the son, not the father.

[RJNorton]

Thanks to Steve for sending this article. We have previously discussed Silas Owens' wildly incorrect accounts of the assassination, and this is another hilarious description by same. This is from the
January 8, 1880, edition of the Ellsworth Reporter (KS).

[Steve]

Thanks for noticing that, Rich. Here's where I became confused. In the first article it says:

Later in the article, though, it seems clear the reference to Williamson was to the son, not the father.

A mention of Williamson's son being at Ford's Theatre from the notes of American Brutus:

https://books.google.com/books?id=UpeODQ...22&f=false


Also, Lincoln ordering the discharge of Williamson's son from the Collected Works:

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/l/lincoln/lin...w=fulltext

[RJNorton]

Many thanks to Steve for sending these articles relating to Willie and Tad's tutor, Alexander Williamson. I think my favorite claim of Williamson's is where he says he was holding Lincoln's ankle at the time of death on Saturday morning. As far as I know, there is no evidence Williamson was in the room at the Petersen House when Lincoln passed.

The articles consist of:

- A brief interview of Williamson about Willie and Tad's opinions of Hannibal Hamlin from page 13 of the 27 Sept. 1891 edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.

- One long interview from page 17 of the 20 July 1890 edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.

- A copy of a 05 July 1866 letter from Mary Todd Lincoln to Williamson complaining about the racist mistreatment of orphans of colored soldiers; which Williamson forwarded to a newspaper in his hometown Edinburgh, Scotland, The Caledonian Mercury, which was printed on page 3 of the paper's 01 Sept. 1866 edition.

- One short account, given by Williamson, of the assassination night from page 8 of the 06 Jan. 1901 St. Louis Post-Dispatch

- Two versions of his obituary that quote an unknown account of the assassination night that he gave
From the 5 June 1903 Washington Evening Star and 09 June 1903 Topeka Daily Herald (KS)