Dr. Mudd Lends a Hand

[Susan Higginbotham]

I have a PDF of Emily's telegram sent from the Barnum Hotel--will see if I can post it later today. Jason Emerson mentioned it in his biography of Robert Lincoln and was kind enough to send me a better copy than I could obtain at the Library of Congress.

Besides the soldier's diary placing Emily Helm in Richmond earlier in March, Orville Browning, who was trying to broker a cotton deal involving Emily and General James W. Singleton, records in his diary entry for March 25, 1865, that the general, Emily, and a Miss Breeden had just arrived in Washington from Richmond. Of course, none of this helps with the Mudd story, but it does make me believe that Mrs. Burnett's memory was reasonably reliable as to whom she saw in 1865.