Blood on the Moon

by Edward , Jr. Steers

  When asked what he would do with the rebel leaders, Lincoln said that he would just as soon see them flee the country: “I should not be sorry to see them out of the country; but I should be for following them up pretty close to make sure of their going.”13 When it was pointed out that Davis’s Confederate commissioner, Jacob Thompson, was in Maine and about to flee to England, Lincoln replied that it reminded him of a story. “There was an Irish soldier here last summer, who wanted something to drink stronger than water,” Lincoln said. “He stopped at a drug shop where he spied a soda fountain. ‘Give me plase a glass of soda water, an if yez can put in a few drops of whiskey unbeknown to anyone, I’ll be obliged.’” “Now,” Lincoln continued, “ if Jake Thompson is permitted to go through Maine unbeknown to anyone, what’s the harm?”14

  Not everyone agreed. Stanton was among the group that felt the top leaders, certainly Jefferson Davis, should be arrested and tried for treason. Stanton, who weeks later would insist on a military trial for the accused conspirators, relented in Davis’s case, saying that he would have no objection to handing him over to the civil authorities in Virginia.15 Stanton believed the Confederacy’s president should be tried in the civil courts for treason. There seemed no doubt that Davis would be captured and imprisoned.

  One of the cabinet members asked if there was any word from General Sherman in North Carolina. Grant said he was expecting to hear something in an hour or two. At this point Lincoln told the men seated around the table that he expected the news to be good. He knew it would be good news because of a dream he had the night before. Lincoln said that it was a recurring dream, one that always followed a great or important event in the war. Welles asked what this remarkable dream was about. Lincoln told of being “in some singular, indescribable vessel... moving rapidly toward an indefinite shore.” He had the dream just before the attack on Fort Sumter and the battles of Bull Run, Antietam, Gettysburg, Stones River, Vicksburg, and Wilmington. Lincoln told his cabinet members, “I had this strange dream again last night, and we shall, judging from the past, have great news very soon.” Grant reminded Lincoln that Stone’s River was no victory and “he knew of no great results that followed from it.”16

  The cabinet meeting broke up around two o’clock and Grant stayed behind to talk with the president. Lincoln had invited the general and his wife to attend the play at Ford’s Theatre that evening with Mrs. Lincoln and himself. It would be a good time to relax and show themselves to the jubilant public. Grant accepted the invitation contingent on one condition. His wife, Julia, wanted to leave that evening and visit their children who were attending school in Burlington, New Jersey. Julia would later recall the occasion: “As soon as I received the invitation to go with Mrs. Lincoln, I dispatched a note to General Grant entreating him to go home that evening; that I did not want to go to the theater.”17 Grant told the president that if he were able to finish his paperwork early enough to catch the evening train, he and Julia would leave and visit the children.18 It now seemed certain that Grant would be able to finish his work in time to catch the train. Lincoln said he was disappointed, but that he understood.

  There are some writers who have suggested that Grant’s decision not to attend the theater stemmed from an incident involving his wife, Julia, and Mary Lincoln. Julia Grant had been the target of a particularly nasty tirade by Mary Lincoln only weeks earlier. On March 23, Lincoln visited Grant at his military base at City Point, Virginia. Mary Lincoln accompanied her husband on the trip and the two stayed aboard the steamer River Queen. On March 25 Lincoln was scheduled to review part of the Union troops bivouacked in the area. Mary and Julia would travel to the review area in an ambulance provided by the army. Lincoln went ahead on horseback. When the two women arrived on the scene they saw the wife of the Fifth Army Corps commander, General Charles Griffin, riding alongside of the president. Mary Lincoln became extremely upset and visibly shaken. She considered Mrs. Griffin’s presence with the president a serious breach of protocol. In her excited state, Mary tried to climb out of the ambulance. She had to be restrained for fear she would jump into the deep mud surrounding the ambulance. It was a humiliating experience for Julia, who was Mary’s hostess.

  The following day the incident was repeated when the two women were to join their husbands at the review of the Army of the James. Following lunch aboard Admiral David Dixon Porter’s flagship, Malvern, Lincoln and Mary, General Grant and Julia, Admiral Porter, and Generals Philip Sheridan and Edward O.C. Ord went ashore two miles from the parade ground where elements of General Godfrey Weitzel’s Twenty-fifth Corps were waiting to be reviewed by the president. Lincoln, accompanied by his generals, rode on horseback the two miles to the field. Once again the two women rode to the scene in an ambulance. Mary Ord, the attractive wife of General Ord, rode horseback behind Lincoln and the generals. Arriving at the parade ground, an aide accompanying Mary Ord had her join the president and officers as they rode in review of the troops. Mary Lincoln arrived on the scene to see Mary Ord riding beside the president. Immediately she became upset. “What does the woman mean by riding by the side of the President?” When Julia Grant attempted to calm her, she turned on her and began accusing her and her husband of coveting the White House and wanting to replace the Lincolns. “I suppose you think you will get to the White House yourself?”19 The mild-mannered Julia Grant must have felt humiliated, and yet when she wrote of the incident in her memoirs years later she excused Mary’s behavior as due to her fatigue from all the traveling and to the unpleasant ride in the ambulance wagon.20 Mary wasn’t finished, however.

  On seeing the ambulance with the two women arrive, Mary Ord broke away from the procession and rode over to join the women. Mary again flew into a rage. She believed the men in the ranks would think that Mary Ord was the president’s wife while she sat behind the scenes in an ambulance wagon mired down in mud. It was too much for the first lady to take. She verbally abused Mary Ord, calling “her vile names in the presence of a crowd of officers,” asking her how she dared to ride beside the president.21 Mary Ord broke down in tears while Julia Grant continued to try and calm Mary Lincoln. The incident proved humiliating to everyone, especially the mildmannered Julia Grant, who acted graciously throughout Mary Lincoln’s tirade. In her memoirs, Julia Grant played down the incidents at the grand reviews, tactfully stating that they had been “embellished” by a member of Grant’s staff.22

  Some have speculated that the two incidents at City Point sufficiently traumatized Julia Grant that she told her husband under no circumstances would she attend the theater with Mary Lincoln and risk another humiliating confrontation. And yet the Grants had not seen their children for weeks. It seems unlikely that given the opportunity to catch an early train to New Jersey they would give up the opportunity to visit their children to attend the theater. Given Grant’s schedule, the more likely scenario was that the Grants chose their children over the theater. It was not an unreasonable choice. Even so, Julia Grant had ample reason to view a night with Mary Lincoln with great distaste.

  A great amount of speculation has also been written over what might have happened on the night of April 14 had Grant attended the theater with Lincoln. At least three writers have stated that had Grant been present Booth would not have been able to kill Lincoln. The presumption is that Grant would have been attended by a military guard that would not have allowed Booth to enter the box.23 Theodore Roscoe in his study of the assassination wrote, “Bates [David Homer Bates, telegrapher in the War Department] should have known that General Grant, surrounded by military guards and aides, would have no reason for anxiety over his theater appearance.” Roscoe pointed out that without Grant in attendance the theater party “would be deprived of the full-dress military escort customarily furnished for the public appearances of high-ranking Army leaders.”24 Roscoe was wrong. It simply was not true. Grant attended the theater on prior occasions without “full-dress military escorts” or “military guards and aides.” In fact, on February 10, jus
t two months before the fatal April 14, Grant and Lincoln attended Ford’s Theatre to see John Sleeper Clarke25 in a double performance of two comedic farces, Everybody’s Friend and Love in Livery. During the performance Major General Ambrose Burnside joined them.26 Lincoln and Grant remained to the end of the evening’s performance. There is no evidence that guards were posted outside the box or a full-dress military escort attended the generals on this evening. Grant’s absence from the theater on the night of April 14 left Lincoln no more vulnerable than on February 10 or on any of the other numerous times he attended the theater in Washington.

  After chatting with Grant, Lincoln spent the next hour dealing with the human side of war. Among the visitors were Governor Thomas Swann, Senator John A.J. Creswell, and Edwin H. Webster, all of Maryland. Lincoln had asked the two politicians for a list of nominees for various state offices that required his approval. Webster, who was among the ten nominees, had accompanied Swann and Creswell on another matter. Webster hoped to convince Lincoln to pardon a Confederate prisoner, George S. Herron, who was the brother of a prominent Baltimore clergyman. Herron was a member of Company C, First Maryland Cavalry, and was a prisoner in Camp Chase, Ohio. He was seriously ill with dysentery, and his brother had made several prior attempts to get his release without success. Fearing his brother would die in prison, he turned to Webster for help. Webster now brought the case to Lincoln. Lincoln took Webster’s petition and, turning it over, carefully penned across the back page, “Let this prisoner be discharged on taking the oath of Dec. 8, 1863. A. Lincoln.”27

  Senator Creswell had brought a request of his own for another Mary-lander. Benjamin F. Twilley was a Confederate prisoner who also wanted out and asked his friends to appeal to the kindhearted Lincoln. Twilley was a prisoner at Maryland’s Point Lookout prison camp in lower St. Mary’s County. Creswell had written on Twilley’s original plea for amnesty, “I respectfully ask that the within named Benjn F. Twilley be discharged on the usual terms.” Lincoln took the request from Creswell and, balancing it on his knee, penned the simple words, “Let it be done. A. Lincoln April 14, 1865.”28 Pardons were becoming a major part of Lincoln’s daily business. Now that the war was essentially over, Lincoln was seeing a large number of requests on behalf of Confederate prisoners.

  Lincoln signed several other pardons on the fourteenth. Among them was a young Confederate soldier who was awaiting execution. Lincoln signed the pardon and, turning to his young secretary Hay, said, “I think this boy can do more good above ground than under ground.”29 Lincoln wasn’t through, however. Pardoning condemned soldiers was an act he took quite seriously. Lincoln commuted the death penalty for many soldiers for reasons completely unrelated to their offense or the situation at the time. One category that always received his reprieve involved young soldiers:

  Major General Meade, Army of the Potomac.

  I am appealed to in behalf of August Bittersdorf, at Mitchells Station, Va. to be shot to-morrow as a deserter. I am unwilling for any boy under eighteen to be shot; and his father affirms that he is under sixteen. Please answer. His Regt. or Co. not given me.

  A. Lincoln30

  Lincoln was overwhelmed at times with the number of casualties piling up on both sides. With so much death he could not bring himself to be another cause added to those already at work. Speaker of the House Schuyler Colfax recalled a conversation with Lincoln in which he explained his thoughts: “Some of my generals complain that I impair discipline by my frequent pardons and reprieves; but it rests me after a hard day’s work that I can find some excuse for saving some poor fellow’s life, and I shall go to bed happy tonight as I think how joyous the signing of this name will make himself, his family and friends.”31

  Two other pardons, dated April 14, 1865, have recently been discovered among a collection of 760 cases that reside in the National Archives in Washington, D.C. Researchers Thomas Lowry and Beverly Lowry have reviewed over 37,000 court-martial cases and discovered 760 cases that contain notations in the hand of Abraham Lincoln.32 Among these 760 cases are two dated April 14, 1865. The first case is that of an Alabama man, Bradford Hambrick. The charges against Hambrick claim he hunted down loyal citizens with dogs and compelled them to join the Confederate army. Hambrick was found guilty of threatening to shoot one man’s wife and attempting to hang another man because he refused to wear a Confederate uniform. Hambrick was sentenced to one year in a penitentiary and fined $2,000. Hearing of Lincoln’s magnanimity, Hambrick shot off a letter to Lincoln asking for a pardon. Expecting not to hear back from the Yankee president, Hambrick was surprised when he received a letter with the simple notation, “Pardoned. A. Lincoln April 14, 1865.”33

  The second case discovered by the Lowrys involved a Union soldier, Patrick Murphy, who had deserted from one regiment only to reenlist in another regiment. Murphy was found guilty of desertion and sentenced to be shot. As with all sentences of death, the file was forwarded to Lincoln for review. Murphy was a special case because on his file were written the words: “not perfectly sound.” The court that had found Murphy guilty and sentenced him to death recommended clemency. Murphy’s case traveled all the way from California through the tangled maze of military bureaucracy to reach Lincoln’s desk on April 14. Lincoln studied the file and picking up his pen wrote, “This man is pardoned and hereby discharged from the service. A. Lincoln April 14, 1865.”34 Patrick Murphy would live.

  One other incident during this hour on the fourteenth is worth noting. After taking care of several items of paperwork, Lincoln stepped into a small closet off of his office to wash his hands. Assistant Secretary of War Charles A. Dana found Lincoln there with his coat off and sleeves rolled up. Dana had received a dispatch from the provost marshal of Portland, Maine, which said that the Confederate agent operating in Toronto, Jacob Thompson, would be arriving in Portland that very night to board a Canadian steamer for Liverpool, England. Secretary of War Stanton had earlier told Dana to order Thompson’s arrest, but on reflection told Dana to check with Lincoln and see what he wanted to do. Stanton probably remembered Lincoln’s remarks during the morning cabinet meeting when asked what should be done with the various Confederate leaders, had said, “Frighten them out of the country, open the gates, let the bars down, scare them off.”35

  Dana read Lincoln the dispatch and asked him what he wanted to do. Lincoln asked what Stanton had said. Dana said that Stanton wanted to arrest Thompson. Lincoln, shaking his head, said, “I rather guess not. When you have an elephant in hand, and he wants to run away, you better let him run.”36 Fourteen hours later, as Lincoln lay dying, Stanton would abandon Lincoln’s policy and issue orders to track down and arrest Thompson along with every other member of the Confederate operation in Canada.37 He was convinced that Jefferson Davis and his Canadian agents were behind Lincoln’s murder.

  By three o’clock Lincoln had finished his paperwork and joined Mary for a promised carriage ride. He had told Mary earlier in the day not to invite anyone else along. “I prefer to ride by ourselves today,” he told her.38 He wanted it to just be the two of them. Of course, the cavalry escort would accompany them, if for no other reason than to keep away the boisterous citizens roaming the city who were still celebrating Lee’s surrender. The exact route the Lincolns took is unclear, but they eventually arrived at the Navy Yard in southeast Washington. It was a favorite spot for Lincoln. During the first three years of the war he visited the Yard at least sixty times, more than any other site in the Washington area except for the White House and the Soldiers’ Home.39 Most of these visits were to inspect naval vessels and witness various experiments with gunnery.40 Lincoln had a fascination for weaponry and most things mechanical. Mrs. Lincoln had a special fondness for Mrs. Gustavus Fox, wife of the Navy Yard commandant to whom Mary sent freshly cut flowers on a regular basis.41

  As with his previous trips to the Yard, Lincoln visited one of the Navy’s several ships resting at anchor. On the fourteenth, he visited the ironclad Montauk. Dr. George B. Todd,
surgeon on board the Montauk, described the visit in a letter to his brother: “The President and wife drove down to the Navy Yard and paid our ship a visit, going all over her, accompanied by us all. Both seemed very happy, and so expressed themselves, glad that this war was over, or near its end, and then drove back to the White House.”42

  Three days later, the Montauk would achieve dubious fame by serving as a prison ship for several of the accused conspirators charged with Lincoln’s murder. On the twenty-seventh of April, the Montauk would receive the body of John Wilkes Booth for identification and autopsy.

  After an hour the couple started back to the White House, chatting along the way about their circumstances and what the future now held. In a letter written seven months later Mary described their ride:

  He was almost boyish, in his mirth & reminded me, of his original nature, what I had always remembered of him, in our own home—free from care, ... I never saw him so supremely cheerful—his manner was even playful. ...

  During the drive he was so gay, that I said to him, laughingly, “Dear Husband, you almost startle me by your great cheerfulness,” he replied, “and well I may feel so, Mary, I consider this day, the war has come to a close”—and then added, “We must both, be more cheerful in the future—between the war & the loss of our darling Willie—we have both, been very miserable.” Every word then uttered, is deeply engraved, on my broken heart.43

  It was a little after five o’clock when the Lincolns arrived back at the White House. Richard Oglesby, Governor of Illinois, and General Isham Haynie44 had stopped by to pay a visit. Finding the president absent, they had just started to leave when Lincoln’s carriage pulled up. On seeing the two old friends walking away, Lincoln called to them. He invited them to join him in the reception room where they talked about things in general and where Lincoln took the opportunity to read from one of his favorite books of satire, Phoenixiana by John Phoenix.45 Lincoln loved to read the satirical works of several popular authors of the day, John Phoenix being among them. Although he loved to read to his guests, his readings were not always well received by everyone. There were some who thought it undignified for a president to read satire, especially during such grave times. Lincoln thought some of his guests simply lacked the humor to appreciate his peculiar habit of reading aloud. But he was president, and he could read anything he wanted, even out loud to his captive guests.