Robert Arnold's Book The Conspiracy Between John Wilkes Booth and the Union Army

[mikegriffith1]

#4 You havent suggested any reason (please, dont bother ... I , for one, am not interested) as to why Corbett was erroneously, deliberately or otherwise, named as the killer.

Michael, I believe Dr. Arnold says that Corbett was "selected" to be the shooter because he was mentally deficient. Mike can correct me if I said that wrong because he is much more familiar with Dr. Arnold's book than I am.

No, Dr. Arnold observes that Corbett could not have been the one who shot the man in the barn. Corbett was selected to take the blame for shooting the man, but he could not have been the one who actually shot him.

Corbett said he used a pistol, but the damage to the spine clearly shows that the bullet was a high-velocity rifle bullet. Corbett also claimed that he fired because the man was about to shoot someone. Jack Garrett disputed Corbett's claim, saying that the man "made no movement to fire on anybody" (Winkler, Lincoln and Booth, p. 188).