Edman (Ned) Spangler: Anyone Still Think He Was Guilty?

[John Fazio]

(11-20-2018 03:57 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Edman Spangler wrote a letter to some unknown friends shortly after arriving at Fort Jefferson. It is dated September 15, 1865, and later was reprinted in an article in the October 25, 1865, issue of the Aledo, Illinois Weekly Record. We carried it in the April 1982, edition of the Surratt Courier. If I have time, I will scan and post.

Spangler begins with a rather detailed description of Fort Jefferson and its environs and then begins much the same information as in previous statements. Personal pleas include, "Before God and all that is sacred I am perfectly innocent of all charges and specifications brought against me by the prosecution....Grate [sic] injustice has been done me by some false witnesses from whom expresses prior to my trial acted by gain or reward."

This next line is rather intriguing - "I wish you could see (name deleted in newspaper) and see whether he ever received my statement that I sent him with a young man by the name of Welch and if he has to let me know what he is going to do with it please..." He ends with asking his friends to send him "2 or 3 fly hooks in a letter and money to buy some postage stamps and some paper... and to give my love to all my enquiring friends and let me know what they think of me. I am here and suffering here wich [sic] I am innocently."

Laurie:

This is definitely the statement I had reference to. It is actually not so much a statement as a letter written when he was at Ft. Jefferson, dated Sept. 15, 1865. I regret that this letter came to my attention too late for inclusion in Decapitating[i], but there is enough in the book to make the case for his innocence.

As for the burden of proof, it may have seemed to James O. Hall that the Commission had so many advantages, which is acknowledged even by its defenders, that a shift in the burden of proof was one of them. But I seriously doubt that this ever rose to the level of codified law. After all, defendants could not very well carry the burden of proving their innocence if they were not even permitted to testify!!!

John

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(11-20-2018 05:46 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Many thanks to Steve for sending the text of the September 15, 1865, Spangler letter. It comes from page 4 of the October 13, 1865, edition of the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Roger:

Many thanks to you and Steve. This is the statement (letter) I was looking for, without doubt. This letter, together with his other statement and the other evidence adduced in Chapter 29 of Decapitating, nails his innocence, as far as I am concerned. Those montages of photos of the "conspirators" (and there are many of them), which always include a photo of Spangler---throw them all away. The many references to Spangler as a "conspirator" in almost every assassination history---ignore them.

John