One odd relic I spotted in the museum was this display of pieces of rope from the hanging of four of the Lincoln conspirators. Booth avoided hanging when was shot and killed as he resisted arrest after a long manhunt.
Below is a Library of Congress photo of the hanging of, from left to right, Mary Surratt, Lewis Powell, David Herold, and George Atzerodt. Surratt was the first woman to be executed by the United States government and there were calls for clemency on her behalf, including from several of the jurors who found her guilty. Several other conspirators who had lesser roles in the affair received prison sentences.
And they saved tiny bits of the hanging rope? A little morbid...
ReplyDeleteI love the nostalgia of these ol' photos. Abraham Lincoln was a great president ending slavery and promoting economic growth. It kind of makes you wonder why they did it?
ReplyDeleteDid you see the television movie recently made about Mary Surratt with Robin Wright? What did you think of it?
ReplyDeleteThe movie seemed to suggest that she was hanged primarily out of frustration that they couldn't hang her son.
No, I didn't see the movie. I live in Spain so I don't see American TV.
DeleteInteresting theory. I've never made a serious study of the assassination, but I'm thinking that since she was in the inner circle of conspirators she would have probably sentenced to hang anyway.
That is one creepy exhibit. Wasn't there a film about the trial of Surratt and her supposed associates, either just released or still in production?
ReplyDeletePerhaps the TV movie Dianne mentions above? I see on Internet Movie Database there are two recent movies on the subject:
Deletehttp://www.imdb.com/title/tt0968264/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1487273/
Yeah, it wasn't a TV movie, it was The Conspirator, based on the book The Assassin's Accomplice, and I was surprised that it was the only Civil War movie released last year, and received very little publicity. It was pretty good.
ReplyDeleteI watched "The Conspirator" a Robert Redford directed film. I had been resisting viewing it, expecting the usual anti-death penalty liberal Hollywood rhetoric. However, the movie was riveting. Most Americans don't realize the extent of the conspiracy to kill Lincoln. Most were caught, some excaped justice. I believe Mary Surratt was guilty of conspiracy, although the film casts reasonable doubts.
ReplyDeleteIn Lincoln's time, like today, souveneir hunters went to macabre efforts to collect memorabilla, facinated by tuffs of Lincoln's hair, bloody sheets, etc.
I recently read "The Killer Angels" by Michael Sharra, before walking the battlefield at Gettysburg, renewing my intest in Civil War history and its heroes. There is so much information out there, and no reason for people to forget that most tragic war.