Otto Eisenschiml (In The Shadow of Lincoln's Death) writes:

Three years after the assassination, he (Edwin Stanton) told some friends of his narrow escape. An unidentified man had rung his doorbell about 10 o'clock, he related, but had been frightened away by some of the Secretary's friends who were hastening from Ford's Theatre to his house with the tragic tidings. Nonetheless, their arrival would have been too late, Stanton claimed, and he also would have been murdered, had it not been for a broken doorbell. Because of it, the mysterious stranger's ring remained unanswered, and the War Minister's life was saved.

If this story be true any idea who the "unidentified man" was? Also, if true, why didn't the man simply try knocking?

Supposedly "the unidentified man" was O'Laughlen - but I've always doubted that simply because there is not enough documentation to support any such claim.

Could be, Betty. At trial the prosecution had three witnesses who claimed to have seen O'Laughlen there the night before, too.

Quote: Please do not confuse skills with character and intelligence.
Conclusion: There is nothing to rehabilitate. Let us just recognize them for what they were and move on.

Oh, please. That is a very arrogant attitude and ridiculous in my opinion. No one is trying to "rehabilitate" them. I think we can all agree that the actions *they are famous for* were downright wrong. But what about the FACT that these were human beings, no more or no less as *any* human beings who have ever lived, who lived and died in what was the most turbulent time in American history, and when Lincoln was assassinated (which was deemed a war crime, hence the military trial) the side they had supported had just lost after four years of fighting, etc? And the side that loses isn't the one to write history, is it, sir?

If you can honestly so easily dismiss these people as having "bad character" by summing them up in a sentence or two as you did, then I think you are extremely naive. Did you know any of them intimately by any chance? Could you tell me about their quirks, their interactions with *everyone* they interacted with over *the entire courses of their lives," etc. No?

Honestly? I wrote a very long post in response that I was going to submit but I deleted most of it since I already know that the entire idea that the people involved in the assassination of President Lincoln were not the completely evil or mentally challenged (or whatever other negative description left behind by history you want to throw in) is taboo and completely unthinkable to many people here. I've watched others try to convey this line of reasoning before, and certain people just refuse to go there. Which is unfortunate but understandable for some, I guess. I can't pretend that I think any of these people will ever be "redeemed" by history because they honestly won't be... but I also remember that history has not left behind their entire stories either. History rarely does for anyone, much less for people under the same circumstances the conspirators were.

Apologies if I was too harsh here (Roger, feel free to take it down if you feel the need), but attitudes like this really irritate me.

John,

I've known you for about 3-4 years now, and I know that you are a lawyer. However, after having skimmed your manuscript and then reading your diatribe above, I have to ask one important question: Are you, or have you ever been, a prosecuting attorney? Your style of "evaluating" people according to your standards and your interpretation of their character and competence - and your ability to make supposition and innuendo look like the truth - is absolutely astounding to me. Any trick in the book to make the defendant(s) appear guilty to a jury (whether it be a military court or a jury of their peers)...

Quote:...attitudes like this really irritate me.

I totally agree. These were indeed human beings - yes, they made mistakes; awful, horrid mistakes - but unless you've researched indepth, please don't just assume they were all ill bred, ill educated idiots. They were not.

Quote:Powell incarnadined the Seward home and came within an inch of murdering William and Frederick. The real Lewis Payne said he had the reputation of having killed a great many men. Doster said he seemed dull, "his mind...of the lowest order...and his moral faculties equally low."

"The REAL Lewis Payne?!" Were there TWO men, Mr. Fazio? (Please...no more Vaughn Shelton theories!) There was only one Powell (alias Paine/Payne) and I don't find any reference anywhere to the fact that he "killed a great many men." He told Dr. Gillette in the death cell that before entering the Seward House, "As far as he knew, he had never shed human blood before." In battle, one usually does not, in the heat of conflict know where one's bullets fly. While with Mosby, Powell showed the exact opposite; saving the life of a Union soldier.

As to being dull; put a bag over anyone's head in the heat of a Washington summer and see how long he retains his senses.....

(11-16-2014 11:37 AM)BettyO Wrote:  

Quote:...attitudes like this really irritate me.

I totally agree. These were indeed human beings - yes, they made mistakes; awful, horrid mistakes - but unless you've researched indepth, please don't just assume they were all ill bred, ill educated idiots. They were not.

Quote:Powell incarnadined the Seward home and came within an inch of murdering William and Frederick. The real Lewis Payne said he had the reputation of having killed a great many men. Doster said he seemed dull, "his mind...of the lowest order...and his moral faculties equally low."

"The REAL Lewis Payne?!" Were there TWO men, Mr. Fazio? (Please...no more Vaughn Shelton theories!) There was only one Powell (alias Paine/Payne) and I don't find any reference anywhere to the fact that he "killed a great many men." As to being dull; put a bag over anyone's head in the heat of a Washington summer and see how long he retains his senses.....

Not to mention the fact that a good POW (and Lewis was a prisoner-of-war at that point) keeps his mouth shut and reveals nothing. That's being smart - not dumb! And a good defense lawyer should be using such silence to the defendant's advantage. Isn't "whatever trick works" kosher in the legal profession?

I think John makes some valid points, and some of you are being overly critical of him when he is expressing his opinion.

I am shocked, SHOCKED, SHOCKED to fine that John Fazio finds John Wilkes Booth and his cohorts, male and female, lied! Since when are those living and operating behind enemy lines compelled to be truthful to the occupying power? And moreover, Fazio says that Booth, et al., lacked character, common decency, and the moral courage to be called heroes.

What is heroism? Glendon Swarthout discussed Fazio's the in his book on Pershing's 1916 invasion of Mexico turned into a Gary Cooper movie in 1959, They Came to Cordura. The title is not of a true town in Mexico. Rather it means good sense or wisdom. It turns out that the several heroes Cooper recommends for the Congressional Medal of Honor all fit Fazio's condemnation of Booth and his cronies in normal life, seedy, cowardly, ne'er do well, slovenly, lacking of any morals. But when called on they rose above their short-comings to heroism--briefly--before sinking back to normal.

The same problem occurs in the Michael Caine movie Zulu, taken from the 1964 Donald Morris book, Washing of the Spears, where outnumbered British soldiers defeat the Zulu impi by arising to bravery only to return to the misfits they were in regular life. Heroism is a funny thing. or as we moderns like to say, one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.

Speaking of heroes, my own The Last Confederate Heroes will be issued in a new format sometime before the 2015 annual meeting. Fazio gave me a C- for my efforts last summer, so if you all would like to see what is wrong with my look at Booth and his people, you are in luck. I am sorry if my work doesn't live up to someone in the know like Fazio, but after my misbegotten life as an ignorant, seedy, slovenly, immoral wrangler of horses, mule skinner, and horseshoer, what do you expect? Artistry? I am from the Deep South and Southwest, after all (shudder!).

BTW it is not lying to mislead Yankees--ask any real Southerner.

Gene, Jenny, Laurie, Betty and Bill:

Gene: Thank you.

Jenny: It is not possible for an historian (or anyone) to know everything an individual does in his or her lifetime. Historians base their findings and conclusions, therefore, on records, i.e. evidence (material, eyewitness and circumstantial). I offered facts, some supported by evidence and others supportable by evidence, for every contention I made in my email. You offered neither facts nor evidence for anything you said, only emotion. If you have evidence contradicting anything I said, I would love to have it.

Laurie: Please see comments to Jenny, to which I add: There are no suppositions or innuendo in my message, only facts and evidence. I do not believe in "any trick in the book"; on the contrary, I put a premium on honesty, integrity and humility, enough to admit error when it is shown to me by evidence. Further, Powell was not completely mum after capture; he revealed quite a lot to Gillette and Eckert, though not the identities of unknown co-conspirators.

Betty: See the above comments to Jenny and Laurie, to which I add: I have almost no use for Vaughn Shelton. (Practically the only thing he said that made any sense was that the idea that Herold waited for Powell at the Seward mansion is "unbelievable".) No, my comments about Powell and the real Lewis Payne came from another source, namely a fine work titled "Alias 'Payne'", by a fine women whose name is Betty J. Ownsbey. On page 161 of her fine work, she quotes Lewis Edmonds Payne, son of Albin S. Payne (i.e. the "real Lewis Payne"), as saying "Powell had the reputation of having killed a great many men, and when any desperate matter was to be undertaken he was selected." On the same page, there is a reference to him as "the terrible Lewis Powell", which is at least consistent with the reputation. Further, as to being dull, I grant that he was a cut above Herold and Atzerodt, but there is much evidence that he was still a long way from bright. Payne again: "Booth infused the venom of his own ambition into the credulous heart of this gawky and impressionable country boy and found him an easy conquest." (p. 166)

Bill: Good to hear from you. I wasn't sure I would. I missed you at the last conference. I hope to see you at the next one.

John

Remind me again about how far down U.S. Grant was on the totem pole of class rankings at West Point. Describe for me his carelessness about his dress and appearance and his cigar chewing and proclivity for a good drink. Before the war, about the only thing he was supposedly good at was riding a horse. If I'm not mistaken, he was one of the big Yankee factors in turning the war around. What is it that they say about judging a book by its cover?

---

(11-16-2014 01:41 PM)Gene C Wrote:  I think John makes some valid points, and some of you are being overly critical of him when he is expressing his opinion.

Gene,

John can handle it. We're just training him for when the book reviews start coming in...

Quote:Betty: See the above comments to Jenny and Laurie, to which I add: I have almost no use for Vaughn Shelton. (Practically the only thing he said that made any sense was that the idea that Herold waited for Powell at the Seward mansion is "unbelievable".) No, my comments about Powell and the real Lewis Payne came from another source, namely a fine work titled "Alias 'Payne'", by a fine women whose name is Betty J. Ownsbey. On page 161 of her fine work, she quotes Lewis Edmonds Payne, son of Albin S. Payne (i.e. the "real Lewis Payne"), as saying "Powell had the reputation of having killed a great many men, and when any desperate matter was to be undertaken he was selected." On the same page, there is a reference to him as "the terrible Lewis Powell", which is at least consistent with the reputation. Further, as to being dull, I grant that he was a cut above Herold and Atzerodt, but there is much evidence that he was still a long way from bright. Payne again: "Booth infused the venom of his own ambition into the credulous heart of this gawky and impressionable country boy and found him an easy conquest." (p. 166)

Boy, have I got EGG on my face! Please accept my apologies, John, for jumping to the wrong conclusion- "The Real Lewis Payne" - being young Lewis Edmonds Payne. Young Payne was 11 years old when he knew Powell and the account is highly romanticized, but does carry a bit of truth. The bit about having "killed a great many men" still doesn't ring true, though.

Again, please accept my deepest apologies for a stupid blunder!

I think Egg on ones face is the order of the day.John,you are the real-deal!

(11-16-2014 06:01 PM)BettyO Wrote:  

Quote:Betty: See the above comments to Jenny and Laurie, to which I add: I have almost no use for Vaughn Shelton. (Practically the only thing he said that made any sense was that the idea that Herold waited for Powell at the Seward mansion is "unbelievable".) No, my comments about Powell and the real Lewis Payne came from another source, namely a fine work titled "Alias 'Payne'", by a fine women whose name is Betty J. Ownsbey. On page 161 of her fine work, she quotes Lewis Edmonds Payne, son of Albin S. Payne (i.e. the "real Lewis Payne"), as saying "Powell had the reputation of having killed a great many men, and when any desperate matter was to be undertaken he was selected." On the same page, there is a reference to him as "the terrible Lewis Powell", which is at least consistent with the reputation. Further, as to being dull, I grant that he was a cut above Herold and Atzerodt, but there is much evidence that he was still a long way from bright. Payne again: "Booth infused the venom of his own ambition into the credulous heart of this gawky and impressionable country boy and found him an easy conquest." (p. 166)

Boy, have I got EGG on my face! Please accept my apologies, John, for jumping to the wrong conclusion- "The Real Lewis Payne" - being young Lewis Edmonds Payne. Young Payne was 11 years old when he knew Powell and the account is highly romanticized, but does carry a bit of truth. The bit about having "killed a great many men" still doesn't ring true, though.

Again, please accept my deepest apologies for a stupid blunder!

Betty:

No apology is necessary. I have had so much egg on my face so often that some guy once mistook me for an omelet.

John

I think JWB and company would have found greater respect in both North and South if they had done the conventional thing and joined the Confederate Army and killed Yankees in a straight forward way on the battlefield.

Even the duel while illegal still had much acceptance in the South as a stylized form of warfare involving 2 armed men facing each other.

As Lincoln was shot in the back of the head and Seward was an invalid, the conspirators displayed none of the martial qualities so conspicuously displayed by so many Americans during the Civil war.

I recall John Surratt attempted without success to join a Confederate veterans organization.

Per Wild Bill's remarks,I believe that you should receive the Medal of Honor just for seeing the entire movie version of "They Came to Cordura." Even though Rita Hayworth is the leading lady and Gary Cooper's character has the striking name of Maj. Thomas Thorn, I have never survived the first 15 minutes of interminable talking.

Perhaps John Wilkes Booth should have been an extreme movie critic.
Tom