FOUR CONSPIRATORS IN LINCOLN ASSASSINATION ARE HANGED
Washington, D.C. (JFK+50) On July 7, 1865, four convicted conspirators in the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln were hanged at the Arsenal Penitentiary here in the Nation's Capital.
The conspirators included 43 year old Mary Surratt who ran a boardinghouse where the assassination plot was "hatched." She was the first woman to be hanged by the government of the United States.
The conspirators included 43 year old Mary Surratt who ran a boardinghouse where the assassination plot was "hatched." She was the first woman to be hanged by the government of the United States.
Mrs. Surratt's son, John, also implicated in the plot, was able to escape capture and although he was finally brought to trial in 1867 on a charge of "conspiracy and treason," the case was dismissed.
Along with Mrs. Surratt, George Atzerodt, David Herold and Lewis Powell were hanged. The ringleader, John Wilkes Booth, after having been surrounded in a tobacco barn in Virginia, died just 2 weeks after Lincoln's murder.
Mary Surratt, who wore a black dress, bonnet and veil, led the procession of prisoners out of their cells at 1:15 p.m. local time. They walked by "their own freshly dug graves, each with a raw pine coffin beside it" and then "slowly climbed the scaffold."
Soldiers tied the prisoner's hands behind their backs and put white hoods on their heads. At 2 p.m., the hinged trap supports on the scaffold were knocked away "and the prisoners plunged down."
SOURCE
"The Civil War: The Assassination, Death of a President," Time-Life Books, by Champ Clark and the Editors of Time-Life Books, Alexandria, Virginia, 1987.
Mary Surratt, who wore a black dress, bonnet and veil, led the procession of prisoners out of their cells at 1:15 p.m. local time. They walked by "their own freshly dug graves, each with a raw pine coffin beside it" and then "slowly climbed the scaffold."
Soldiers tied the prisoner's hands behind their backs and put white hoods on their heads. At 2 p.m., the hinged trap supports on the scaffold were knocked away "and the prisoners plunged down."
SOURCE
"The Civil War: The Assassination, Death of a President," Time-Life Books, by Champ Clark and the Editors of Time-Life Books, Alexandria, Virginia, 1987.
Mary Surratt House Marker
Washington, D.C.
June 11, 2016
Photos by John White
Washington, D.C.
June 11, 2016
Photos by John White
