Something I've Wondered About....

[Linda Anderson]

(06-28-2014 05:19 PM)LincolnToddFan Wrote:  Where in the world did the idea that Powell slept like a baby and scarfed his breakfast get started? I have that in more than one account, not just the NY Times and James Swanson.

Maybe that is how so many apparently incorrect legends around the young man persist to this day...that he was Booth's efficient, ruthless, bloodless killing machine, and that unlike the others he went to the gallows unrepentant. I even remember reading somewhere that he might have had brain damage.

Either way, the perception has always been that Powell wasn't quite normal.

Powell's attorney, Colonel Doster, tried an insanity defense which fell apart when the doctors decided Powell wasn't insane. There wasn't much else Doster could use in Powell's defense since Powell was identified as Seward's assailant.