A Different Viewpoint of Lew Powell's Character

[RJNorton]

Hi Ed. Join the crowd. We're all trying to figure things out and make sense of it.

Right now I am always hitting the NEW REPLY button after I am done writing a post, as all the previous posts are then not repeated when you hit the NEW REPLY button. Also, your own avatar (which, in your case, is priceless!) will then appear alongside your own words.

If others have suggestions, please so advise. I sure agree with Ed Steers that it can be confusing.

[BettyO]

(07-15-2012 01:27 PM)Ed Steers Wrote:  

(07-15-2012 06:36 AM)BettyO Wrote:  

(07-15-2012 04:30 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  I have several questions for you folks who know much more than myself. The possible role of Mosby being somehow connected to the assassination is a very weak area (knowledge-wise for me).

Here are my questions:

1. Was it Mosby who sent Harney on his "explosives" mission?

2. Did Booth know of the failure of Harney's mission?

3. If he did, could this be considered another motivating factor in the timing of the assassination because the failure took place only a few days before Booth acted?

Great question, Roger!

According to Come Retribution:

"On 1 April, a small team, including Thomas E. 'Frank' Harney, an explosives expert, was sent to Colonel Mosby with instructions to infiltrate the team into Washington. Mosby organized a special task force to carry out this mission and sent the men to raid near Burke, Virginia, near Washington, as a cover for the infiltration. There on 10 April, 1865,
unaware that Lee had surrendered the day before, the force was surprised by Union cavalry and Harney was captured. The Mosby raid was so unusual that it was clear that Harney was intended for some very important assignment. One could surmise that it was something as important to the Confederacy as blowing up the White House during a meeting of war leaders."

To further quote Messrs. Hall, Tidwell and Gaddy:

"This surmise moreover, is supported by two pieces of evidence. Lewis Thornton Powell...had scouted the White House and its surroundings earlier in the year - clearly with a view to learning if action could be taken against President Lincoln. More important, however, it was learned that George Atzerodt...had made a statement that was preserved by his defense lawyer to the effect that the group had discussed blowing up the White House when a number of high officials were inside."

The authors surmised that apparently JWB DID not know that Harney had been captured and went on with HIS mission, as he saw it....

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Let's remember that one of the more crucial pieces of evidence in support of the Harney mission is the statement by Confederate Private Snyder who went to Colonel Edward Hastings the day after Richmond fell and told Hastings that an explosive expert had left the Torpedo Bureau on a mission to harm the President. Snyder worked at the Torpedo Bureau and certainly knew Harney although he did not give Hastings Harney's name as he wouldn't. Snyder felt the war was all but over and any such action would be unwarranted. It is Snyder's statement that most supports the theory that Harney was on his way to the White House. I think this is the crucial link to Harney and his supposed mission.

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I'm still not sure how to post. That statement re Snyder was mine. Ed Steers

Hey, Ed! Thanks EVER so much for your comments! Makes a lot of sense to me -- there would be NOTHING to gain by such "work" as explosives or assassination at this point. This is why we wonder to this day just WHY JWB acted as he did by considering assassination -- Was he misinformed or just acting on his own?

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(07-15-2012 01:56 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Hi Ed. Join the crowd. We're all trying to figure things out and make sense of it.

Right now I am always hitting the NEW REPLY button after I am done writing a post, as all the previous posts are then not repeated when you hit the NEW REPLY button. Also, your own avatar (which, in your case, is priceless!) will then appear alongside your own words.

If others have suggestions, please so advise. I sure agree with Ed Steers that it can be confusing.

Ed and Roger -- if ya'll hit the reply button at the bottom of the post - usually your Avatar will appear....I just don't like how it "copies" or scolls down through the posts/replies in the thread....

I'd like to see it post without copying all the other posts in your reply.... granted it IS confusing!

Ed - btw your Avatar is everyone's favorite!

[L Verge]

Ed,

Any idea who gave the order that sent Harney on his trip to D.C.? He surely wasn't a lone wolf. You know me, I'm a fan of Come Retribution and would love to make Judah Benjamin the bad guy.

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I should also have added that blowing up the White House involved doing it when there was a Cabinet meeting going on - hence the decapitation of the executive branch. Booth's intention was the same thing with killing Lincoln, Johnson, and Seward simultaneously. There's a similarity to me there - I'm just not sure that Booth acted with Confederate sanctions at that point.

Harney's mission had probably been approved several days before the fall of Richmond in order for him to have made it as far as he did before capture.

[Craig Hipkins]

Since we are talking about Powell alias' does anyone know why Powell used the name Rev. Wood when he boarded at the Surratts?

Craig

[BettyO]

(07-16-2012 05:53 AM)Craig Hipkins Wrote:  Since we are talking about Powell alias' does anyone know why Powell used the name Rev. Wood when he boarded at the Surratts?

Craig

Powell's dad was a Baptist minister - he himself had aspirations to the ministry had not the war began . At age 15, young Powell had taught Sunday School classes in his father's church up until his enlistment at age 17.

He apparently thought that the "minister" ruse would work for him as he knew how a minister should conduct himself properly. Why the name Wood? It's anyone's guess. As far as I know there was no "Wood" in Mosby's Rangers. For some reason, Powell liked to use aliases affiliated with his service with Mosby. I assume that he was just using his imagination here. As an agent, he used different aliases. He also didn't want authorities to latch onto him. In lieu of his arrest in March in Baltimore on which his Oath had a proclamation that he should remain "North of Philadelphia" for the duration of the war, Powell was subject to arrest for violating his parole. It's my understanding that the first night he went to Surratt's in February of 1865, he went as MR. Wood and then returned a few weeks later, about the 14th of March as REV Paine.....

[L Verge]

Even though the Surratts were Catholics, I suspect that Lewis felt that a preacher (albeit a Baptist one) would get more respect - and possibly protection - from that household. Just a guess...

[Gene C]

The Baptist minister ruse, was not very convincing...Anna and some of the other members of the household thought he made a strange Baptist minister.

[BettyO]

(07-16-2012 10:47 AM)L Verge Wrote:  Even though the Surratts were Catholics, I suspect that Lewis felt that a preacher (albeit a Baptist one) would get more respect - and possibly protection - from that household. Just a guess...

I certainly agree, Laurie. Even though he was passing as a Baptist minister, he more than likely thought it would garner more respect and he would not be questioned as closely. He DID state that he had been in jail in Baltimore and was going to become a "good citizen." HA! That was a reflection on his jail spiel after he beat up Annie the maid - apparently the boy had a rather cocky sense of humor....

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(07-16-2012 10:58 AM)Gene C Wrote:  The Baptist minister ruse, was not very convincing...Anna and some of the other members of the household thought he made a strange Baptist minister.

Again, his ruse while perhaps respectable and gentlemanly, didn't hold too much water after he picked up a pack of the "Devil's Calling Cards" (playing cards) and began to play Euchre with Anna and the lady boarders! This was something which a legitimate Baptist minister of the time would certainly eschew. One of Lew Powell's comrades in the 2nd Florida had stated that although Lew Powell was not addicted to drink and rarely did so, he was extremely fond of card playing...so apparently the Reverend Paine forgot himself and decided to have a little fun at card playing with the ladies. I have found other instances where, like all young men even today, he was also extremely fond of music. He requested Anna to play the piano for him and also had young ladies play the piano for him when he was serving with Mosby's Rangers and stopped at various farm houses as a guest.

[Gene C]

BettyO, Linda, Laurie, Roger, and others......
Thanks for your insights and knowledge about all these different people. Most of us know a few of the facts, but you bring out their personalities, good points and short commings. You make them people we can identify with and understand. You make them real, and not just names in a book

[L Verge]

Thanks for saying that, Gene. To me, that's what good history is all about. You have to understand human nature and the times in which historical figures made their mark. I've preached that before in other arenas, but some people just never get it. They continue to view history through 21st-century eyes.

I think one thing that has benefited me through the years is being raised in the same house that my great-grandparents inhabited during the Civil War, growing up with their photos and belongings around me, having a grandmother born in 1874 who was raised with the Victorian mentality, and a mother that made sure I appreciated history. I absorbed a lot of my knowledge of the 19th century through osmosis, I guess.

[Linda Anderson]

Thanks for the compliment, Gene. I am always trying to see through the eyes of people who are unlike me so I, too, have gotten a lot of help from Betty, Laurie, Roger and all the others who post here.

For example, I have seen people mention that there is irony in Mary Surratt being a good Catholic considering her conviction and sentencing. However, looking at it through Mary's eyes, she was fighting a war and Catholics are not conscientious observers so I can see where Mary was coming from without condoning her actions.

[BettyO]

Thanks, Gene! I really appreciate it.

I, too want to second what Laurie and Linda have said. We have to look at people in the context of when and how they lived. These people lived in the Victorian era, so we have to assess them in like manner. Sure some things never change; but if a person has lived in a certain era, it's important to see how they were affected by what was around them; i.e. what went on at that particular time that influenced them - and that includes social mores as well. These folk were not simply thrown down or "beamed up"....they were raised in a particular era and followed certain standards as to how they were raised and with the people with whom they were raised and lived. Their parents were in all likelihood born and raised in the late Federal era - and that would have had an influence upon them as well. Like Laurie says - you can't assess 19th Century people through 21st Century eyes.... it just doesn't work....

[Craig Hipkins]

Betty, Thanks for the info on Powell's alias.

You all are right about 21st people judging 19th century Victorians. It was another era. Imagine if Lincoln could come back and see what the present day United States looks like. I wonder what his thoughts would be?

Craig

[Lindsey]

I think Davey tried to make a female following for himself, waving at girls in court and showing them his lily-irons. I think all he accomplished though was to make them nervous...

[BettyO]

(07-17-2012 09:59 AM)Lindsey Wrote:  I think Davey tried to make a female following for himself, waving at girls in court and showing them his lily-irons. I think all he accomplished though was to make them nervous...

I had read that! Poor Davey - he would have LOVED groupies! HA!