Wonderful Newspaper Site

[John Fazio]

(08-19-2015 06:37 PM)BettyO Wrote:  Thank YOU, John! I love these newspaper sites - there is always some interesting info to cull from them -

Betty:

I could not agree with you more. I have a couple of framed originals of April 18 and April 20 of the New York Herald. It was from one of these that I picked up the interesting tidbit that when Booth was standing on the sidewalk outside the Kirkwood on the 14th, chatting with someone, a young boy (Herold?) came out of the hotel and said to Booth: "Yes, he is in." Surely this must have had something to do with the mysterious message that Booth (possiibly someone else, but almost certainly Booth) left in Browning's box. It seems likely that when Booth learned, from the "boy", that Johnson was in, he called on Johnson (probably on a pretense of obtaining a pass, but with a real purpose of determining the Vice President's likely whereabouts that night), but for some reason was not successful in making contact with him. Indeed, it may well have been, at least in part, Booth's personal pique occasioned by this rebuff that induced him to leave the card in Browning's box, knowing that it would likely ruin Johnson if he somehow survived an attack from his unreliable co-conspirators, Atzerodt and Herold, in whom he had little confidence. Recall that Mark Antony did something similar with Caesar's Will. "Now let it work. Mischief, thou art afoot, take then what course thou wilt."

John

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(08-20-2015 10:37 AM)John Fazio Wrote:  

(08-19-2015 06:37 PM)BettyO Wrote:  Thank YOU, John! I love these newspaper sites - there is always some interesting info to cull from them -

Betty:

I could not agree with you more. I have a couple of framed originals of April 18 and April 20 of the New York Herald. It was from one of these that I picked up the interesting tidbit that when Booth was standing on the sidewalk outside the Kirkwood on the 14th, chatting with someone, a young boy (Herold?) came out of the hotel and said to Booth: "Yes, he is in." Surely this must have had something to do with the mysterious message that Booth (possiibly someone else, but almost certainly Booth) left in Browning's box. It seems likely that when Booth learned, from the "boy", that Johnson was in, he called on Johnson (probably on a pretense of obtaining a pass, but with a real purpose of determining the Vice President's likely whereabouts that night), but for some reason was not successful in making contact with him. Indeed, it may well have been, at least in part, Booth's personal pique occasioned by this rebuff that induced him to leave the card in Browning's box, knowing that it would likely ruin Johnson if he somehow survived an attack from his unreliable co-conspirators, Atzerodt and Herold, in whom he had little confidence. Recall that Mark Antony did something similar with Caesar's Will. "Now let it work. Mischief, thou art afoot, take then what course thou wilt."

John

Betty:

Correction: It was the New York Times, not the New York Herald. Here's the full quote:

On Friday, Booth was about the National and strolled up and down the avenue several times. During one of these strolls he stopped at the Kirkwood and sent his card up to the Vice President . A gentleman of Booth's acquaintance was talking to him and asked why he was so gloomy--"lost another $1,000 in oil?" Booth said he had been hard at work that day and was about to leave Washington, never to return. Just then, a boy came out and said "Yes, he is in his room".

John