New Eyewitness Account?

[RJNorton]

Thanks to Steve for sending this article from the April 17, 1865, edition of the New York Herald. Steve writes, "She (Keene) does mention reaching the box, but doesn't mention holding the President's head. She does say that she tried to console Mrs. Lincoln, though."

One reaction I had to the article is I wonder when/where this interview with Keene took place. I know she departed Washington quickly (not sure exactly when), and she was arrested in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on April 17.

[John Fazio]

(06-25-2018 04:40 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  Thanks to Steve for sending this article from the April 17, 1865, edition of the New York Herald. Steve writes, "She (Keene) does mention reaching the box, but doesn't mention holding the President's head. She does say that she tried to console Mrs. Lincoln, though."

One reaction I had to the article is I wonder when/where this interview with Keene took place. I know she departed Washington quickly (not sure exactly when), and she was arrested in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on April 17.

Roger:

Ms. Keene's address to the audience ("For God's sake have presence of mind...etc.) squares exactly with many other eyewitness accounts. We may regard this sentence, therefore, as certain. As for cradling the president's head, the evidence is not as clear. A 1919 newspaper article by Henry Mason and Timothy S. Good favor it, but one would suppose that this April 17 account, from her, would have mentioned it, unless she felt that mentioning it would have appeared to be self-serving. On the other hand, do we not have evidence of her dress being bloodied? Yes, we do. If she did not cradle Lincoln's head in her lap, from whence did the blood come? I would conclude by saying that it is probable that she cradled his head. As for her making her way to the box, there is conflict here too. One account has stagehand Ferguson escorting her through the dress circle (i.e. Booth's route); another has stage manager Gourlay escorting her using an outside staircase that bypassed most of the crowd. This April 17 account offers some of both, saying it was a "circuitous" route (consistent with Gourlay's account) through the dress circle (consistent with Ferguson's account). I tend to favor Gourlay's account, because the dress circle route to the passageway beyond the outer door and to the box itself would, by this time, have been jammed and all but impassable.

John

[RJNorton]

Thanks to Steve for sending a couple more eyewitness accounts. Steve writes:

"On the Eyewitness thread talk about the differences between Gournay and William J. Ferguson helping Keene to the box. I dug into newspaper accounts and found this joint interview of Harry Hawk and William J. Ferguson in the 12 Feb. 1909 edition of the Detroit Free Press. In this account, Ferguson said that he stayed behind when Laura Keene went up to the box. I don't know if Ferguson had given the account of going to the box with Keene prior to this article but refrained from mentioning to prevent being challenged by Hawk or if he came up with it later. Either way, I think it's pretty clear Ferguson exaggerated when he said he escorted Keene to the box. (The rubber box in action!) Hawk's account in the article is interesting too because of his description of the aftermath.

"I've also an interview with Jeannie Gourlay from page 6 of the 10 Feb. 1916 Davenport Democrat and Leader (IA) to post as well."

[RJNorton]

(06-25-2018 08:47 PM)John Fazio Wrote:  On the other hand, do we not have evidence of her dress being bloodied? Yes, we do. If she did not cradle Lincoln's head in her lap, from whence did the blood come? I would conclude by saying that it is probable that she cradled his head.

John, my issue with this is in attempting to reconcile these two accounts:

Attorney Seaton Munroe said, "Her hair and dress were in disorder, and not only was her gown soaked with Lincoln’s blood, but her hands, ever her cheeks where her fingers had strayed were bedaubed with the sorry stains."

Dr. Charles Sabin Taft reported, "The wound in the head had been found before leaving the box, but at that time there was no blood oozing from it."

[John Fazio]

(06-26-2018 04:55 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  

(06-25-2018 08:47 PM)John Fazio Wrote:  On the other hand, do we not have evidence of her dress being bloodied? Yes, we do. If she did not cradle Lincoln's head in her lap, from whence did the blood come? I would conclude by saying that it is probable that she cradled his head.

John, my issue with this is in attempting to reconcile these two accounts:

Attorney Seaton Munroe said, "Her hair and dress were in disorder, and not only was her gown soaked with Lincoln’s blood, but her hands, ever her cheeks where her fingers had strayed were bedaubed with the sorry stains."

Dr. Charles Sabin Taft reported, "The wound in the head had been found before leaving the box, but at that time there was no blood oozing from it."

Roger:

It is more than these two accounts that need to be reconciled. A quick Google will bring forth dozens of accounts, some claiming that at no time was she even in the box! It comes down to whom one believes. I believe Dr. Charles Leale. He was otherwise an excellent witness, being the first doctor in the box and writing his accounts from notes he had made contemporaneously with the events. He said she was in the box and that she did ask for his permission to cradle Lincoln's head and that he gave it. Further, she allegedly said that while she cradled the president's head, she bathed it in the water she had brought with her. That would account for the blood stains even though bleeding was minimal at the time. Apparently, whenever Leale removed the clot at the surface of the wound, some blood did ooze out. There are many references to her bloodied dress. I favor the conclusion that she was there, most likely escorted by Thomas Gourlay (the actress's husband) by the back ("circuitous") route, rather than through the crush of people in the dress circle, that she did cradle Lincoln's head and that her dress was in some degree bloodied as a consequence, though one man's "soaked" might be another man's "discolored" or another man's "stained", etc.

John

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(06-26-2018 02:39 PM)John Fazio Wrote:  

(06-26-2018 04:55 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  

(06-25-2018 08:47 PM)John Fazio Wrote:  On the other hand, do we not have evidence of her dress being bloodied? Yes, we do. If she did not cradle Lincoln's head in her lap, from whence did the blood come? I would conclude by saying that it is probable that she cradled his head.

John, my issue with this is in attempting to reconcile these two accounts:

Attorney Seaton Munroe said, "Her hair and dress were in disorder, and not only was her gown soaked with Lincoln’s blood, but her hands, ever her cheeks where her fingers had strayed were bedaubed with the sorry stains."

Dr. Charles Sabin Taft reported, "The wound in the head had been found before leaving the box, but at that time there was no blood oozing from it."

Roger:

It is more than these two accounts that need to be reconciled. A quick Google will bring forth dozens of accounts, some claiming that at no time was she even in the box! It comes down to whom one believes. I believe Dr. Charles Leale. He was otherwise an excellent witness, being the first doctor in the box and writing his accounts from notes he had made contemporaneously with the events. He said she was in the box and that she did ask for his permission to cradle Lincoln's head and that he gave it. Further, she allegedly said that while she cradled the president's head, she bathed it in the water she had brought with her. That would account for the blood stains even though bleeding was minimal at the time. Apparently, whenever Leale removed the clot at the surface of the wound, some blood did ooze out. There are many references to her bloodied dress. I favor the conclusion that she was there, most likely escorted by Thomas Gourlay (the actress's husband) by the back ("circuitous") route, rather than through the crush of people in the dress circle, that she did cradle Lincoln's head and that her dress was in some degree bloodied as a consequence, though one man's "soaked" might be another man's "discolored" or another man's "stained", etc.

John

Roger:

Thomas Gourlay was Jeannie's father, not her husband.

Sorry.

John

[RJNorton]

(06-26-2018 02:39 PM)John Fazio Wrote:  It is more than these two accounts that need to be reconciled.

John, I agree with you 100%!

(06-26-2018 02:39 PM)John Fazio Wrote:  I believe Dr. Charles Leale. He was otherwise an excellent witness, being the first doctor in the box and writing his accounts from notes he had made contemporaneously with the events. He said she was in the box and that she did ask for his permission to cradle Lincoln's head and that he gave it.

My problem with this is that you are using his 1909 account. There are several Leale accounts 1865-1867, and none of them mentions Keene being present in the box. The first time Keene appears in a Leale account is 44 years after the fact. I also wonder about the "circuitous" route claimed by Jeannie Gourlay regarding her father leading Keene to the box. Her account also says her father, Thomas, helped carry Lincoln to the Petersen House. This is not supported by other eyewitnesses regarding the names of the men who carried Lincoln across the street. Thomas Gourlay, himself, never made any of these claims; only his daughter did, and that was not until the 20th century (possibly 1880s, but I think the teens or twenties of the 20th century). As far as I know, Thomas Gourlay has no recorded statement of what he did after the shot was fired. I know that the Gourlay family lore is accepted by many folks, but I personally wonder about it. I may well be in the minority on this.

[L Verge]

I believe that there was at least one circuitous route that led from backstage down a passageway that ran parallel to the inside wall to the right if one stands in the rear of the theater proper. There was another stairway in that passage that came up into a room at the opposite end of the open area at the back of the dress circle (opposite the regular winding stair used by patrons and Booth). In previous years, the NPS used this room for meetings, small programs, etc., but I'm not sure what it is used for now. One just needed to open that door and walk down the right-hand side aisle to reach the presidential section.

I am willing to accept that Miss Keene had blood on her dress, but my question would be as to what amount of blood. If she was as gruesome as Munroe describes, I would bet on it being Rathbone's blood -- unless she got there, sat on the floor, and cradled Lincoln's head before his wound was discovered. That first gush of blood after the first clot was removed might have been significant in amount, but it seems that the clots formed pretty quickly to seal the wound. It would also be interesting to see what part of the dress had the most blood. If she were seated, it would seem that Lincoln's head would rest closer to the waistline than to the hem.

And, I still have reservations about Mary Lincoln allowing another woman (and an actress at that) to cradle her husband's head. Miss Keene was accepted into the box because she brought water, but I suspect that her Florence Nightingale act ended there.

[RJNorton]

Laurie, I did not mean to question the existence of a circuitous route. I do believe that there was one. My questions have to do with the accuracy of Gourlay family lore (Jeannie's claims regarding her father's actions, especially her assertion that he was one of the men who carried Lincoln to the Petersen House).

[L Verge]

(06-26-2018 04:06 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Laurie, I did not mean to question the existence of a circuitous route. I do believe that there was one. My questions have to do with the accuracy of Gourlay family lore (Jeannie's claims regarding her father's actions, especially her assertion that he was one of the men who carried Lincoln to the Petersen House).

I knew you were not questioning routes that Laura Keene could have taken to get to the Presidential Box. I was just using my useless knowledge once again to show one way that it could have been done.

FindaGrave has a new look and updated bios. Jeannie Gourlay's site is here https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/2588...-struthers and includes a photo of Jeannie in later years that I had not seen before. The bio section does follow the Thomas Gourlay theme and includes him maybe putting the spurious flag now in the possession of the Pike County Historical Society under Lincoln's head.

If so, and there is blood on the flag, it would have to have been placed on top of Miss Keene's skirts. So, that would seem to diminish the amount of blood that was supposedly all over the actress. The bio also claims that Thomas Gourlay was one of those who bore the President's body and that the flag was used in transport.

[Steve]

Roger, to answer your earlier question, Keene would had to have given the interview to the Herald reporter in Washington DC before she left. Newspaper accounts of her and Hawk's arrest said it occurred early morning on Monday the 17th. So I figure they would've had to leave Washington sometime on Sunday the 16th in either the early evening or late afternoon. (If anybody out there has copies of the relevant train schedules, please share so we can narrow down the range!) This gibes with Hawk's account where they couldn't leave Washington for "a day or two".


I also have grave doubts about the reliability of the Gournay family tradition, especially since Jeannie herself didn't actually see her father go with Keene to the box and the family tradition of what happened in the box when Thomas got there conflicts with the known facts, i.e. the head wound not being discovered until Lincoln's head was on Keene's lap (instead of Leale finding it before Keane would've arrived), the spurious flag story, Thomas Gournay carrying the body to Peterson House, etc. That, along with the discrediting of William J. Ferguson's account of escorting Keene and the lack of any other witness (or Keene herself) saying she went with somebody else to the box, make me think she went to the box with the water by herself.

[Anita]

I recently posted a thread on Hannibal Hamlin. While reading up on Hamlin I came across this. Hamiln's son Charles was at Ford's with his wife and sister the night of Lincoln's assassination. I was especially interested about his encounter with Laura Keene. Entitled the "Darkest Hour" from "War Papers: Read Before the Commandery of the State of Maine, Military Order ... By Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States. Commandery of the State of Maine

Go here to read. https://tinyurl.com/y7jagfc4

[RJNorton]

Thanks for the link to the Charles Hamlin account, Anita. On reading it a second time I did notice one difference between the Hamlin version and the image I have in my head. Hamlin notes, "As soon as I could make my way through the retiring audience I ran up the stairs leading to the second story and found they were just bringing the President out of his box, - his wife leading the way with her dress covered in blood weeping and moaning and wringing her hands all the while with the most heartrending sobs."

This is different in that I thought Mary, Clara Harris, and Henry Rathbone followed the entourage. I have not pictured Mary leading it. I wonder if Hamlin might be incorrect in this part of his recollection.

[L Verge]

I thought the same thing, and I also caught other deviations from the recorded history. Another case of whose eyewitness accounts one can trust.

[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?

[L Verge]

(06-28-2018 05:41 PM)Steve Wrote:  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?