Threaded Mode | Linear Mode

RJNorton · 02-07-2019, 03:09 PM

(12-22-2018 03:40 PM)L Verge Wrote: Rob - A wonderful post, and I don't want to see you stop posting because you can bring so much knowledge to the table. However, I certainly understand your frustration in trying to deal with someone "who is so blind he does not want to see and so deaf, he does not want to hear."

That said, would you allow me to publish what you just posted in an upcoming issue of the Surratt Conger - no editing except for removing the last two paragraphs?

I just read the article in the current Surratt Courier. Wonderful job, Rob!

Rob Wick · 02-07-2019, 08:26 PM

Thank you Roger. I think my next piece on Lafayette Foster will be of some interest to people here. After Laurie asked to reprint it, I agreed although I wanted to rewrite it to update it and give it more focus. While parts of it remain intact, much of it has a different tone, and about 2/3 of it is completely new. In the process of research, I found some things that should be somewhat controversial. Of course, the difference between that and some others here is that I provide my evidence clearly and don't suggest more from it than it will hold.

Best
Rob

Steve · 02-08-2019, 07:53 PM

(02-07-2019 08:26 PM)Rob Wick Wrote: Thank you Roger. I think my next piece on Lafayette Foster will be of some interest to people here. After Laurie asked to reprint it, I agreed although I wanted to rewrite it to update it and give it more focus. While parts of it remain intact, much of it has a different tone, and about 2/3 of it is completely new. In the process of research, I found some things that should be somewhat controversial. Of course, the difference between that and some others here is that I provide my evidence clearly and don't suggest more from it than it will hold.

Best
Rob

Well I for one, can't wait to read what you found on Lafayette Foster in the Surratt Courier!

mikegriffith1 · (This post was last modified: 04-13-2019 07:23 AM by mikegriffith1.)

(01-30-2019 07:58 PM)Steve Wrote: This will be the third time that I've asked you to respond to my earlier post about Boyd. Yet you keep bringing him up as being the person killed in Garrett's barn but yet each time you keep avoiding/not responding to my replies. I'm reprinting my earlier post below to refresh your memory and make it easier to find:

(12-29-2018 03:44 PM)mikegriffith1 Wrote: Three, Boyd was 41, which would explain why Dr. May said the body on the Montauk looked "much older" than Booth looked the last time he'd seen him, which was just over a year earlier. When Rollins was shown a picture of Booth less than 48 hours before the barn shooting, he had no problem recognizing the picture as Booth, and the only difference he noted between the picture and how Booth looked when he saw him was that Booth had no mustache when he saw him. Rollins didn't say anything like "and, oh yeah, when I saw him, Booth looked a lot older than he does in the picture."

Mike, do you believe/assert that the "Boyd" killed at Garrett's farm the James W. Boyd of the 6th Tennessee, who was released after taking the oath of allegiance and giving a promise to spy for the Union? If not, where does this "41" age that you assert for "Boyd" come from and who are you claiming he was? Specifically which Confederate soldier(s) named "James Boyd" could've been the person killed at Garrett's Farm, if it wasn't the Boyd of the 6th Tennessee?

If you can't find such a Confederate soldier named James Boyd that could've been killed at Garrett's farm:

(a) Wouldn't that be a strong indication that the person was lying and using an alias, say I dunno… like Booth?

(b) Where does that "41" year age you give "Boyd (which matches the age of James W. Boyd of the 6th Tennessee) come from?

Getting back to Rob's point about proving a point by documented evidence... here is the letter James W. Boyd, of the 6th Tennessee, wrote on February 14, 1865 where he offers to spy for the Union if he can be released as a paroled POW. He says that he wants to spy in order to earn money to help support his 7 children who have been dependent on charity following his wife's death and to get revenge for being court-martialed twice:

The letter comes from the National Archives, Record Group 94, Microfilm M797, Roll 135. From the Baker case files of the Turner-Baker papers, original case file no. 718B.

Most importantly for the purposes of this discussion, he volunteered to spy in western Tennessee and parts of Kentucky west of the Tennessee river. He even uses his knowledge of that area and its people as a selling point on why that would make him a good spy. Boyd was released the next day, so he should've been nowhere near Maryland in April 1865 if he was specifically released to help provide for his now motherless children and spy for the Union in Tennessee.

Here's a newspaper account of James W. Boyd's 01 Jan. 1866 murder from page 2 of the 10 Jan. 1866 edition of the Memphis Daily Avalanche, first published in the West Tennessee Whig of Jackson, Tennessee

Note, this is the year following the death of the man called "Boyd" at Garrett's farm. The article doesn't mention Boyd's 6th Tennessee military service, but fortunately another source does, the diary of a local man named Robert H. Cartmell. In the last paragraph of the first page below continuing onto the top of the second page, Cartmell says the James W. Boyd killed on 01 January 1866 in Tennessee was indeed the James W. Boyd of the 6th Tennessee. That would make it impossible for him to have been the man called "Boyd" who was killed at Garrett's farm the prior year:

Link to the full Robert H. Cartmell diary collection:

http://teva.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/landi...5138coll39

I hope this provides enough documented evidence that the man killed at Garrett's barn could not possibly be the James W. Boyd of the 6th Tennessee (ignoring all the evidence that it was Booth and just focusing on the documentary evidence from Boyd's life). Hopefully, it meets the standard of documentary evidence put forward by Rob to prove an argument and will be a useful instruction on how to craft an historical argument using evidence and logic.

Sigh. . . . I am reminded of Harry Truman's quip in response to Thomas Dewey: "It's not what you don't know that bothers me, it's what you know for sure that just ain't so."

You're talking about the wrong James Boyd. Apparently you haven't read any of the articles I've linked/referenced on this issue. Guttridge has addressed this error:

Claiming that the Confederate Captain James W. Boyd's middle name was Waters, as Steers-Chaconas do, may to the reader seem a very small error. But this one has special significance. Most of the confusion springs from garbled family records. There was neither space nor necessity in Dark Union for the story of more than one James W. Boyd. It can be summarized here. First, James William Boyd of the 6th Tennessee Infantry, Confederate States Army, in February 1865 as a prisoner of war cut a deal with Secretary Stanton for permission to go home to Jackson, Tennessee, to take care of his seven motherless children. Steers-Chaconas are remiss in failing to mention that not only did Boyd refer to Caroline Boyd as deceased in his February 14, 1865 appeal to Stanton for a private interview, in December 1864, writing to William P. Wood, chief of the Old Capitol Prison, he makes clear that his wife had died. The proof is easily found in War Department records at the National Archives. Within twenty-four hours of his request for a personal interview with Stanton, Boyd was released. There his official record ends.

The other James W. Boyd? His middle name was Waters and he was born in Ireland in 1807. He became sheriff of McNairy County, Tennessee, in the 1830s. He fought a two-hours bare-knuckles fight in a horse pasture outside Purdy with a Joel Rowark whom he had wrongfully arrested for horse-stealing and the Rowarks swore vengeance. Their chance came during the Civil War when Boyd, accompanied by two Chickasaw Indians named Ollie and Ossie Feather, rode with the Union colonel, Fielding Hurst, and acquired a reputation for killing and torturing Confederate prisoners of war.

A rebel military posse ambushed Boyd near Sweet Lips Creek and hanged his Indians. Boyd escaped. On January 1, 1866, he was at the Jackson railroad depot awaiting the train for Nashville where he expected to sign on as a deputy federal marshal. There Joel Rowark's son killed him with a shotgun. Self-defense, the local sheriff decided and rewarded Billy with $500.

Certain “assassination experts” hoped that discovery of Captain James W. Boyd's grave in Tennessee would bolster their claim that he couldn't have been the man killed at Richard H. Garrett's farm in Virginia eight months earlier. They reportedly searched, and found nothing. We searched and, led by a descendant of Colonel Fielding Hurst, found James W. Boyd's grave, the stone half sunken but plainly bearing his name. And the date 1807-1866. This obviously was not Captain Boyd's grave, who was born in 1822. Moreover, nearby we saw and photographed stones that marked where the Feather brothers were buried, side by side.

What set the “experts” on a course of error? Robert Cartmell, a local farmer who periodically entered Jackson and picked up items of gossip, kept a journal. He learned of the shooting at the railroad depot but identified the victim as James W. Boyd, “who was a Lieut. in 6th Regmt of Tennessee Vol.” A Nashville newspaper reference to the shooting of James W. Boyd in Jackson on New Year's Day names his killer Rowark, but gives the victim no military title.(http://hnn.us/articles/3873.html)

mikegriffith1 · (This post was last modified: 05-05-2019 07:51 AM by mikegriffith1.)

In his excellent book John Wilkes Booth: Beyond the Grave, W. C. Jameson raises a possibility that had occurred to me but that I didn't consider seriously enough at the time: Jameson suggests that the body at the 1869 viewing was not the same body that was autopsied on the Montauk. He supports his suggestion with evidence that I was not aware of until I read his book. When I read Jameson's suggestion, I thought, "That would certainly explain a lot of things."

Jameson's suggestion would indeed explain a number of strange discrepancies, such as the damage near/on the right knee (no such damage was noted on the Montauk body), the different numbers of fillings, the differences in footwear, the severed head, and the hair that was far longer than Booth's hair.

Jameson discusses this idea in his chapter on the body (chapter 18). Jameson notes other items of evidence that should have been found on the body if it had been Booth. He points out certain inconsistencies that I had not detected and had not read in other books.

Jameson's chapter on the shooting at the Garrett farm (chapter 17) makes a credible case that Booth was not killed there.

Given the recent development that computer-assisted facial recognition analysis has found an extremely high probability that photos of Booth and St. Helen/George are of the same person, Jameson's chapters on the Garrett farm shooting and the body are all the more relevant.

Steve · (This post was last modified: 05-05-2019 11:29 PM by Steve.)

(04-13-2019 07:20 AM)mikegriffith1 Wrote: Sigh. . . . I am reminded of Harry Truman's quip in response to Thomas Dewey: "It's not what you don't know that bothers me, it's what you know for sure that just ain't so."

You're talking about the wrong James Boyd. Apparently you haven't read any of the articles I've linked/referenced on this issue. Guttridge has addressed this error:

Claiming that the Confederate Captain James W. Boyd's middle name was Waters, as Steers-Chaconas do, may to the reader seem a very small error. But this one has special significance. Most of the confusion springs from garbled family records. There was neither space nor necessity in Dark Union for the story of more than one James W. Boyd. It can be summarized here. First, James William Boyd of the 6th Tennessee Infantry, Confederate States Army, in February 1865 as a prisoner of war cut a deal with Secretary Stanton for permission to go home to Jackson, Tennessee, to take care of his seven motherless children. Steers-Chaconas are remiss in failing to mention that not only did Boyd refer to Caroline Boyd as deceased in his February 14, 1865 appeal to Stanton for a private interview, in December 1864, writing to William P. Wood, chief of the Old Capitol Prison, he makes clear that his wife had died. The proof is easily found in War Department records at the National Archives. Within twenty-four hours of his request for a personal interview with Stanton, Boyd was released. There his official record ends.

The other James W. Boyd? His middle name was Waters and he was born in Ireland in 1807. He became sheriff of McNairy County, Tennessee, in the 1830s. He fought a two-hours bare-knuckles fight in a horse pasture outside Purdy with a Joel Rowark whom he had wrongfully arrested for horse-stealing and the Rowarks swore vengeance. Their chance came during the Civil War when Boyd, accompanied by two Chickasaw Indians named Ollie and Ossie Feather, rode with the Union colonel, Fielding Hurst, and acquired a reputation for killing and torturing Confederate prisoners of war.

A rebel military posse ambushed Boyd near Sweet Lips Creek and hanged his Indians. Boyd escaped. On January 1, 1866, he was at the Jackson railroad depot awaiting the train for Nashville where he expected to sign on as a deputy federal marshal. There Joel Rowark's son killed him with a shotgun. Self-defense, the local sheriff decided and rewarded Billy with $500.

Certain “assassination experts” hoped that discovery of Captain James W. Boyd's grave in Tennessee would bolster their claim that he couldn't have been the man killed at Richard H. Garrett's farm in Virginia eight months earlier. They reportedly searched, and found nothing. We searched and, led by a descendant of Colonel Fielding Hurst, found James W. Boyd's grave, the stone half sunken but plainly bearing his name. And the date 1807-1866. This obviously was not Captain Boyd's grave, who was born in 1822. Moreover, nearby we saw and photographed stones that marked where the Feather brothers were buried, side by side.

What set the “experts” on a course of error? Robert Cartmell, a local farmer who periodically entered Jackson and picked up items of gossip, kept a journal. He learned of the shooting at the railroad depot but identified the victim as James W. Boyd, “who was a Lieut. in 6th Regmt of Tennessee Vol.” A Nashville newspaper reference to the shooting of James W. Boyd in Jackson on New Year's Day names his killer Rowark, but gives the victim no military title.(http://hnn.us/articles/3873.html)

Sorry Mike, I didn't see your response earlier to reply. Thanks for bringing it to my attention now.

Here's the newspaper account of James W. Boyd's 01 Jan. 1866 murder from page 2 of the 10 Jan. 1866 edition of the Memphis Daily Avalanche, first published in the West Tennessee Whig:

[Image: boyd100.jpg]

The West Tennessee Whig was published in Jackson, Madison County, Tennessee. The reprinted Whig article says that the James W. Boyd who was shot on 01 Jan. 1866 was "for more than twenty years past a citizen of this place, was shot and almost instantly killed, by Mr. William Rowark, a citizen of McNairy county." The paper identifies Roark as being from McNairy county because he wasn't a local from "this place", ie Madison county, where Jackson is located.

Doing a search of the 1860 census, there are only two adult James Boyds living in Madison county. One, the James W. Boyd born around 1822 who enlisted as a Confederate in the 6th Tennessee, captured, then released after taking the oath of allegiance following his wife's death, possibly to spy for the Union around the area of Tennessee and Kentucky where he lives. The second, a James David Boyd who was a little bit younger, born in 1835. Most importantly he was still alive until 1886, so couldn't have been killed in 1866. Here's a link to his FindAGrave page:

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/138905760

I double checked with the 1850 census, just in case there was another James Boyd who had been missed in the 1860 census in Madison Co., but no such person could be found in that census either.

So, the b.1822 James W. Boyd in the 6th Tennessee is the only possible person the local newspaper could be talking about in its description of Boyd, even though it doesn't mention Boyd's military unit (or Roark's military for that matter).

That makes two different sources independent of each other which identify the same James W. Boyd as the man killed on 01 Jan. 1866!

Now to the Guthridge article you quoted. There was a James Boyd who was sheriff of McNairy county from 1836-1838:

https://archive.org/details/reminiscence...g/page/n25

I have no idea if the story of McNairy Sheriff James Boyd confronting/fighting Joel Roark is true or not, I couldn't find anything to confirm it, but that might be a too local thing to show up in an internet/newspaper search. I did confirm that the William Roark who shot and killed James W. Boyd in 1866 was the son of Joel Roark of McNairy county. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find much biographical information on Sheriff Boyd like his age or even if he had the middle initial "W". Whoever he was he seems to have either died or moved on from McNairy county by 1850; there doesn't seem to be a James Boyd old enough to have been sheriff from 1836-1838 still living in McNairy county in 1850 and 1860.

However, I can confirm that Sheriff James Boyd was NOT a member of Col Fielding Hurst's 6th Tennessee Cav. (Union). There was only one James Boyd in the entire regiment. He was James T. Boyd who enlisted at age 18 on 14 Dec. 1863 (born c.1845) at Middleton, Hardeman County, Tennessee and who was born in Mississippi. I checked all the men with the surname Boyd in the regiment and none of them were old enough to have been a sheriff from 1836-1838. There are no soldiers with the last name Feather in the unit as well. There also doesn't seem to be anything like Guttridge describes with Indian scouts in histories of Hurst's unit as well:

https://books.google.com/books?id=rJvqlu...er&f=false

mikegriffith1 · 05-05-2019, 08:29 AM

The identity of the man in the barn who died in Booth's place is a secondary issue. I still think Guttridge and others have made a credible case that his name was Boyd, especially since the Garretts said he used that name. But, maybe it was just a cosmic coincidence that a Confederate Boyd with an injured leg was in southern MD/northern VA at the same time a man named Boyd visited the Garrett farm and was shot there.

The real issue for believers in the traditional story is that there is no way on this planet that Booth would have undergone such a drastic change in appearance during his 12-day flight that his corpse bore "no resemblance" to his body in life. Let's recap:

* Booth's 12-day flight was not even close to being a harsh and brutal experience that could have changed his appearance so much as to make him unrecognizable in death. He was fed almost every day. He spent at least three nights indoors and at least five days in shaded woods with blankets to keep him warm. I have shown that the temperature were not extreme but actually rather mild. If he was the Boyd who spent his last two days at the Garrett farm, then the harsh-journey claim collapses. He got plenty of rest, had ample food, played with kids, and relaxed on the porch with the family--and no one said he looked anything like death warmed over, or terribly pained, or noticeably ragged and worn out.

* If it were possible for a journey such as Booth's to produce such a drastic change in his appearance as a corpse, surely the history of forensic science would include similar occurrences. But they don't. In fact, earlier in this thread, I documented numerous cases where bodies that were exposed to far harsher conditions than Booth was were readily identifiable by family and friends.

* When a witness was shown a photo of Booth less than 72 hours before the autopsy, he had no problem identifying the picture as a photo of Booth, whom he had seen hours earlier. This was just before Booth supposedly spent two days of leisure, good food, and lots of rest at the Garrett farm. So, humm, when did the unearthly change in appearance mandated by the traditional account happen?

* Bodies do not sprout freckles by magic just because the traditional theory requires it. Livemortis produces large patches of dark-colored skin and always on the parts of the body closest to the ground, not freckles on the face. Extensive exposure to sun can indeed cause a type of sun-burn freckling, but Booth did not experience extensive exposure to the sun--not even close.

* The "evidence" of the JWB initials only raises obvious suspicions that this whole line of evidence was fabricated. With all the people who--years later--belatedly claimed that they saw the initials on the Montauk body, never mind that they differed wildly on where the initials were located, it is just patently amazing that not one blessed word about this crucial item of identification evidence managed to find its way into the autopsy report. Not. One. Word.

And when Dr. May showed up and expressed strong disbelief that the body was Booth, nobody who had allegedly seen the JWB initials bothered to say, "Oh, but doctor, look, here are Booth's initials on the body's hand/wrist/arm."

* Nor did the autopsy report contain any mention of any of the visible scars that Booth was known to have. Nor did it mention the ring that Booth always wore. No one recalled seeing a ring on the Montauk body's fingers, and no ring was ever listed as being among the items taken from the body.

* The 1869 "identification" only further damages the traditional story and raises the distinct possibility that the 1869 body was not the body viewed on the Montauk--unless every "witness" on the Montauk, including both doctors, somehow missed visible damage to the knee and hair that was 10-12 inches longer than it should have been.

* If the 1869 body was Booth, the teeth should have had two fillings, not one. If we want to assume that this was one of the rare cases when a tooth falls out of a corpse's mouth, then the Booth dental chart would not have agreed with the corpse's teeth, but no such discrepancy was noted.

* Speaking of corpse teeth and dental evidence, gee, where is Dr. Merrill's report on his alleged dental-based identification of the body on the Montauk? Where is it? Why is there no trace of his being there in any official record of the Montauk autopsy proceedings? Why didn't he go to the 1869 viewing and set the record straight? He could have told them that the body would have to have two fillings if it were Booth's body.

* The 1869 body had hair that was 10-12 inches longer than Booth was ever seen to grow his hair. Colonel Pegram, a long-time Booth friend, like everyone else in his day, believed that hair continued to grow after you died, so he just assumed it had grown 10-12 inches in the preceding four years. But, of course, we now know that hair and nails either do not grow at all after death or they grow only a fraction of an inch at the most.

* Many of these issues might be cleared up if we had just one, just a single, autopsy photo of the body. But, even though a well-known photographer was brought to the Montauk for the purpose of taking these crucial photos, we are told that those in charge decided against taking any photos--because the body looked so UNlike Booth! Yet, we have a friendly, pro-government witness who said that he personally handled and transported a "Booth" autopsy photo and that the photo was given to . . . (wait for it) . . . Edwin Stanton. If that photo really did show Booth, the War Department surely would have displayed it when doubts about the body's identity became widespread.

L Verge · 05-05-2019, 03:04 PM

Mr. G. - When confronted with credible documents and history, you always resort to re-spouting your same old, unsubstantiated points. You have posted the same thing over and over again ad nauseam. We are intelligent people and, if you have succeeded in convincing anyone of your beliefs, so be it (but they certainly have not come forth in your defense). The rest of us either aren't interested in the subject or know their history. Maybe it's time to step back?

Rob Wick · 05-05-2019, 03:05 PM

Write your book. Prove everyone for 150-plus years is wrong and then just shut the heck up. You have proven your case to no one on this forum because much of your "evidence" is simply you saying "there's no way this could happen." That you continue to spout this nonsense is really not winning you any supporters here. Of course, that's not really your goal, is it?

RJNorton · 05-06-2019, 03:59 AM

(05-03-2019 07:09 PM)mikegriffith1 Wrote: In his excellent book John Wilkes Booth: Beyond the Grave, W. C. Jameson

In the book Jameson tells of a man named Andrew Jackson Donelson who said he met John Wilkes Booth living on a Pacific Island in the late 1860s.

"Booth told Donelson that his escape had taken him to Mexico, South America, Africa, Turkey, Arabia, Italy, and China. In China, he claimed, he played the title role in Richard III before American residents and naval officers."

Mike, do you honestly believe all this stuff that Jameson writes?

Steve · 05-06-2019, 04:40 AM

(05-05-2019 08:29 AM)mikegriffith1 Wrote: The identity of the man in the barn who died in Booth's place is a secondary issue. I still think Guttridge and others have made a credible case that his name was Boyd, especially since the Garretts said he used that name. But, maybe it was just a cosmic coincidence that a Confederate Boyd with an injured leg was in southern MD/northern VA at the same time a man named Boyd visited the Garrett farm and was shot there.

Without any credible evidence of Booth alive after the encounter at Garrett's Farm, how is the identity of the dead man in the barn a secondary issue? You don't doubt there was a body found, meaning that a man must've died. Herold the man captured with him said it was Booth before the man was killed. The man had Booth's "diary" and had been writing in it after he arrived at the Garretts. Since we know Herold was the other man and that he was a fugitive for his involvement in the assassination, how does it make any sense for "the other man" who is fleeing justice with Herold to give out his real name, Boyd, not knowing if the authorities have it or not?

How can you think Guttridge makes a credible case when the other other James Boyd who's supposed to account for the known 1866 death of the James Boyd that he wants to place at Garrett's barn, is given a made up military career in Guttridge's account of Boyd that you posted a link to? That Guttridge made such an error make you wary about uncritically accepting his account as reliable without doing any research yourself?

For the record here's the some of the most important sources I used in my above post:

Here's the James W. Boyd 1860 census:

Here's the 1845 marriage license for James W. Boyd from Madison County, Tennessee:

Here's the only James Boyd in Fielding Hurst's Cav. regiment who's too young to be the same person Guttridge described:

Here are all the other Boyds in Hurst's regiment who are all too young to be who Guttridge describes:

Do you have any other sources for what Guttridge describes about the other James Boyd being the man named James W. Boyd murdered in 1866?

Gene C · (This post was last modified: 05-06-2019 06:17 AM by Gene C.)

(05-06-2019 03:59 AM)RJNorton Wrote:
(05-03-2019 07:09 PM)mikegriffith1 Wrote: In his excellent book John Wilkes Booth: Beyond the Grave, W. C. Jameson

In the book Jameson tells of a man named Andrew Jackson Donelson who said he met John Wilkes Booth living on a Pacific Island in the late 1860s.

"Booth told Donelson that his escape had taken him to Mexico, South America, Africa, Turkey, Arabia, Italy, and China. In China, he claimed, he played the title role in Richard III before American residents and naval officers."

Mike, do you honestly believe all this stuff that Jameson writes?

That sounds very much like the book, "Booth and the Spirit of Lincoln" written by Bernie Babcock in 1925. Reviewed under the Books section.

That's a lot of travel in only five years.

Steve Whitlock · 12-13-2019, 12:56 AM

(05-06-2019 04:40 AM)Steve Wrote:
(05-05-2019 08:29 AM)mikegriffith1 Wrote: The identity of the man in the barn who died in Booth's place is a secondary issue. I still think Guttridge and others have made a credible case that his name was Boyd, especially since the Garretts said he used that name. But, maybe it was just a cosmic coincidence that a Confederate Boyd with an injured leg was in southern MD/northern VA at the same time a man named Boyd visited the Garrett farm and was shot there.

Without any credible evidence of Booth alive after the encounter at Garrett's Farm, how is the identity of the dead man in the barn a secondary issue? You don't doubt there was a body found, meaning that a man must've died. Herold the man captured with him said it was Booth before the man was killed. The man had Booth's "diary" and had been writing in it after he arrived at the Garretts. Since we know Herold was the other man and that he was a fugitive for his involvement in the assassination, how does it make any sense for "the other man" who is fleeing justice with Herold to give out his real name, Boyd, not knowing if the authorities have it or not?

How can you think Guttridge makes a credible case when the other other James Boyd who's supposed to account for the known 1866 death of the James Boyd that he wants to place at Garrett's barn, is given a made up military career in Guttridge's account of Boyd that you posted a link to? That Guttridge made such an error make you wary about uncritically accepting his account as reliable without doing any research yourself?

For the record here's the some of the most important sources I used in my above post:

Here's the James W. Boyd 1860 census:

Here's the 1845 marriage license for James W. Boyd from Madison County, Tennessee:

Here's the only James Boyd in Fielding Hurst's Cav. regiment who's too young to be the same person Guttridge described:

Here are all the other Boyds in Hurst's regiment who are all too young to be who Guttridge describes:

Do you have any other sources for what Guttridge describes about the other James Boyd being the man named James W. Boyd murdered in 1866?

To add to what Steve said with the documents he so graciously provided, here is a transcription of the Robert H. Cartmell diary, along with burial information, with notes, for the daughter of James W. and Caroline Atwood (Malone) Boyd:

MY RIVERSIDE CEMETERY TOMBSTONE
INSCRIPTIONS SCRAPBOOK
By Jonathan K. T. Smith
Copyright, Jonathan K. T. Smith, 1992

NOTES BY LOT (Pages 2-9)

SOUTH SLOPE, Near the Confederate graves
[Lot 426-B, Boyd, in Tombstone Inscriptions]

ELLEN MORAN
Daughter of
J. W. & C. BOYD
Born
August 20, 1646
Died
June 13, 1646

Daughter, probably of James Boyd and Caroline Malone who were married February 6, 1645.

In his diary, volume 3, under entry of Jan. 1, 1866. Robert H. Cartmell wrote:

Before I got to town (Jackson) this morning, a difficulty occured between James W. Boyd, who has lived a long time in the place and a man whose name I forget, did not know him. He was a lieut. in one of the companies of Newsom's (Rebel) regmt which resulted in the shooting & killing of Boyd. The difficulty originated in this man and some one else taking 2 fine horses last spring from one Major Smith's command of Yankees. Boyd with a squad of Smith's men was engaged to pursue them. Boyd leaves 5 or 6 children; his wife died last winter. Poor unfortunate man, poor fatherless and motherless children. Boyd was a wild, reckless man, considered by many, a bad man, he was certainly a wicked man. He possessed some good traits, was a man of considerable shrewdness, sad fate was his. He was a lieut. in 6th regmt of Tennessee, shot and killed a soldier at Union City. . . .

(Page 9)
************
Note that the beef with Rowark appears to have been the result of some horses being stolen last spring [of 1865] from a Yankee outfit, and James W. Boyd (previously in a Confederate outfit of Newsom's) worked with the Yankee command of Major Smith to pursue the stolen horses. That would be in keeping with the 15 Feb 1865 Oath of Allegiance that James W. Boyd signed, so he could be in Jackson, Madison, TN for spring. William Rowark [Roark] must have been involved in some manner with the horses that were stolen from Major Smith, and I suspect he resented a Southerner assisting the Yankees.

From the family and character details of James W. Boyd given by Robert H. Cartmell it is plainly obvious he knew the family and would certainly know that he was the man killed, even tho I haven't found a probate record for him. If someone could find court records there should be guardianship papers for his children involved. But that seems overkill. This IS the James William Boyd of interest, and falsely reputed to have replaced John Wilkes Booth at Garrett's Farm.

As for Leonard Guttridge and Ray Neff, it would take considerable time to list all the misinformation those folks have put out. For openers, the Kate M. Scott sworn statement is a hoax, along with the 1883 will of John Byron Wilkes. A letter attributed to Robert Burns Stewart and written to Elizabeth (Wilkes) Bossom, a daughter of the real John Byron Wilkes in Terre Haute, IN, is nonsense and appears to have an attempted forged signature. A quick look at census records proves there was no Sarah Katherine Scott (by any name), a daughter by Kate M. Scott from an alleged affair with John Wilkes Booth, born in Dec 1865 and left with Samuel Baysinger to raise, who didn't get married until 1867, to another woman than the one supposedly named by Kate M. Scott in her sworn statement, and on, and on. As Ed Steers pointed out there was no Andrew Giles Potter, (nor his brothers Earl and Luther Potter), so things that reference Mr Andrew Potter are a fiction, which includes Andrew Potter as the trustee of the Sarah Katherine Scott inheritance. It also includes the reference to Andrew Potter made in the Robert Burns Stewart letter. Why would Judge Stewart, then Atty Stewart, give an address for a nonexistent man? There were no Potters in the county named in the letter.

I would not use either Leonard Guttridge or Ray Neff as a source for anything without considerable verification from other sources. In a 1977 interview Ray Neff had the mythical Sarah Katherine Scott as the wife of Samuel Baysinger. There was no ancestry.com at that time to make fact checking so much easier.

Samuel Baysinger

in the Indiana, Marriage Index, 1800-1941

Name: Samuel Baysinger
Spouse Name: Lucinda A Wood [Lucinda A (Bruner) Wood]
Marriage Date: 11 Feb 1867
Marriage County: Putnam
***********************
Saml Baysinger

in the 1870 United States Federal Census

Name: Saml Baysinger
[Samuel Baysinger]
Age in 1870: 27
Birth Year: abt 1843
Birthplace: Kentucky
Dwelling Number: 57
Home in 1870: Jackson, Parke, Indiana
Race: White
Gender: Male
Post Office: Mansfield
Occupation: Farmer
Male Citizen over 21: Y
Personal Estate Value: 200
Inferred Spouse: Lucinda Baysinger
Inferred Children: Sylvester Baysinger
Cora A Baysinger
Household Members:
Name Age
Saml Baysinger 27
Lucinda Baysinger 25 [Lucinda A. (Bruner) Wood-Baysinger]
Sylvester Baysinger 6 [Sylvester Wood took the name Sylvester Baysinger after 1880]
Cora A Baysinger 4
*******************
Cora A. Baysinger

in the 1880 United States Federal Census

Name: Cora A. Baysinger
Age: 12
Birth Date: Abt 1868
Birthplace: Indiana
Home in 1880: Jackson, Parke, Indiana, USA
Dwelling Number: 35
Race: White
Gender: Female
Relation to Head of House: Daughter
Marital status: Single
Father's name: Samuel Baysinger
Father's Birthplace: Kentucky
Mother's name: Lucinda Baysinger
Mother's Birthplace: Indiana
Occupation: Works In House
Attended School: Yes
Neighbors:
Household Members:
Name Age
Samuel Baysinger 35
Lucinda Baysinger 34
Cora A. Baysinger 12
Francis L. Baysinger 9
Charles E. Baysinger 8
Dora E. Baysinger 5
John M. Baysinger 4
Nora O. V. Baysinger 9/12
Sylvester Wood 14
*****************************
Cora A. Baysinger (possibly Wood) married Harvey A. Ruark and was deceased before 1900, so she couldn't possibly be the daughter that Kate M. Scott claimed to have met in New Orleans in 1906, according to the sworn statement. Also, in the 1910 census Kate shows never having had any children. That's the same year she ostensibly claimed a child, Sarah Katherine Scott (also named in the bogus 1883 John Byron Wilkes of India will) in said sworn statement.

Lucinda Baysinger died in Sep 1900 and Samuel remarried to a widow, Sarah Phoebe (Barnes) Smith-Bush-Baysinger in 1903.

Sarrah P Baysinger

in the 1910 United States Federal Census

Name: Sarrah P Baysinger
Age in 1910: 65
Birth Year: abt 1845
Birthplace: Indiana
Home in 1910: Madison, Putnam, Indiana
Race: White
Gender: Female
Relation to Head of House: Wife
Marital status: Married
Spouse's name: Samuel Baysinger
Father's Birthplace: Kentucky
Mother's Birthplace: Kentucky
Native Tongue: English
Able to Read: Yes
Able to Write: Yes
Years Married: 7
Number of Children Born: 2
Number of Children Living: 1
Neighbors:
Household Members:
Name Age
Samuel Baysinger 64 [2nd marriage, Lucy died in 1900]
Sarrah P Baysinger 65 [Sarah Phoebe (Barnes) Smith-Bush-Baysinger 3rd marriage]
********************************
According to Neff-Guttridge papers Sarah Katherine Scott b: 8 Dec 1865 was given to a midwife, Sarah, who was to marry Samuel Baysinger shortly and raise Kate's daughter.

"As you know, I have a daughter who was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on December 8, 1865. To this day I have never told anyone who the father was nor the circumstances of her birth. While you may know some of the facts you do not know them all nor shall you, nor shall anyone else. Some things are so sacred as to be unmentionable.

As for the payments made to me and my daughter by the law firm of Weaver and Weaver, payments to me stopped a number of years ago and in 1886 when my daughter reached her majority, she received the residue of the annuity. She is happily married and is fully aware of all there is to know. I will not reveal her identity."

"When I visited my daughter in October of 1906 I found that she had talked with cousin John Celestina when she and her husband were in New Orleans. He was health[y] and had a family and was living the life of a gentleman. He had given up the sea after his release and had bought a country home and settled down to the quiet country life."

[From "sworn statement" of Kate M. Scott] Puhhleeeze!

Steve Whitlock (the other Steve)

Gene C · 12-13-2019, 11:32 AM

Great work Steve.
I must confess I find Ray Neff's narrative a bit confusing at times, but intriguing because it seems so extremely implausible.

Not having the research skills that several of you on the forum have, I appreciate it when you uncover facts and documents and share your findings with us.

Seems like throughout our history, there is always a historical/political swamp that needs to be drained, government conspiracies to consider, and more. With this in mind, we will always have the Finis Bates, Otto Eisenschiml, Wilma Francis Minor, C A Tripp, Ray Neff, Balsiger and Seller (and more), to steer us down a false path.

Steve Whitlock · 12-13-2019, 05:29 PM

(12-13-2019 11:32 AM)Gene C Wrote: Great work Steve.
I must confess I find Ray Neff's narrative a bit confusing at times, but intriguing because it seems so extremely implausible.

Not having the research skills that several of you on the forum have, I appreciate it when you uncover facts and documents and share your findings with us.

Seems like throughout our history, there is always a historical/political swamp that needs to be drained, government conspiracies to consider, and more. With this in mind, we will always have the Finis Bates, Otto Eisenschiml, Wilma Francis Minor, C A Tripp, Ray Neff, Balsiger and Seller (and more), to steer us down a false path.

Oops! After reading the diary entry again, and checking my notes, I erred. That was William H. Roark who was in Newsome's Reg't:

"18th Regiment, Tennessee Cavalry (Newsom's)"

Roark, W.H.

Side: Confederacy
Location: Tennessee
Battle Unit: 18th Regiment, Tennessee Cavalry (Newsom's)
Function: Cavalry
********************
So, as stated from the news clip and diary, William Rowark [Roark] shot James W. Boyd, and Roark was a Lt. with Newsome's Reg't, while Boyd enlisted as a Lt in the TN 6th Confederate Reg't, but was working with the Yankee command of Major Smith to recover some fine horses.

Steve W.