The Reason Lincoln Had to Die

[mikegriffith1]

(12-29-2018 08:39 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Since the diary is on public display at Ford's Theatre, Mr. G., have you analyzed it through its protective casing? Have you made any inquiries to the NPS rangers? Have you bothered to read the FBI report (since you claim things that are not in it)? Do you understand that that report was prepared at the request of several prominent historians in the assassination field -- and that, very importantly, the Vice President of the United States Walter Mondale is the one who saw to the examination being done and was satisfied with the methods used and the results?

Of course, I'm sure that your theory extends to VP Mondale being in on the secret conspiracy to continue to fool the world into thinking that Booth escaped. Maybe that's why we keep losing key players in the current administration; the President finds out that they believe Stanton masterminded the whole thing, so out they go...

AussieMick is quite correct, imo, that the diary was not important to the government's case against the conspirators who were on trial in that military court. Booth was dead and out of the picture.

The diary "was not important to the government's case"? This is just laughable. Do you have any idea how many scholars have stated that Holt and Bingham most certainly should have entered the diary into evidence at the trial? In the near future, I will be citing just some of the scholars who have said so.

Tell me: Were Booth's pipe, spur, and compass "important to the government's case"? Yet, those items were entered into evidence. But not the diary. Not the diary wherein Booth revealed that he did not consider killing Lincoln until the day of the murder. Not the diary wherein Booth said he was thinking about returning to Washington because he believed he could at least partly clear his name. Not the diary that contained not one word about Johnson or Seward. Not the diary wherein Booth denied having anything to do with the attack on Seward. Nah, who needed to know this crucial information, right?

By the way, when Butler challenged Bingham about the suppression of the diary, even the dishonest and rabid Bingham did not float the laughable claim that the diary was irrelevant to the government's case--rather, he said they withheld it because they did not want the public to read Booth's "glorification" of his deed. Butler correctly pointed out that this was a lame excuse, and that Booth's defense of his crime would have had no effect on "a patriotic and intelligent people."

Have I read the FBI report on the diary? Are you serious? If you'll recall, I'm the one who told you where you could find it online.

What things have I claimed about the report that are not in the report? Can you give me an example? I trust you're not talking about the point that I clarified regarding when the editing was done. I've stated several times that the report does not "say" that the editing was done after the War Department obtained the diary, but that my argument is that the editing that the report describes must have been done after the War Department had the diary, that there is no conceivable or rational reason that anyone would have done that kind of editing to their own diary.

As for the color of the diary, humm, that's interesting. I said it was red because Guttridge and Neff said it was red. Come to find out that they're not the only ones who've said it was red:

* Rebecca Brooks at Civil War Saga says it was red:

When John Wilkes Booth fled Ford’s Theater on April 14, 1865 and was killed on a farm in Virginia two weeks later, officers found a red leather diary on his body. (http://civilwarsaga.com/the-diary-of-joh...es-booth/)

* Professor Doug Linder says it was red:

Colonel Everton Conger removed a small red appointment book from Booth's body. (http://famous-trials.com/lincoln/2156-boothdiary)

* The New World Encyclopedia says it was red:

A small red book, which was actually an 1864 appointment book kept as a diary, was found on the body of John Wilkes Booth on April 26, 1865. (http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entr...kes_Booth)

Finally, if the diary was "not important," why did Holt and Bingham go so far as to conceal its existence even from the military tribunal's judges? When they called Conger to the stand to testify, why did they carefully phrase their questions to him so that he would not mention the diary in his answers? Hey? People hide things for a reason.