“She kept the nest that hatched the rotten egg.” President Johnson was referring to Mary Surratt when he declared this. Who is Mary Surratt? Not many people would be able to answer this question however, many people would be able to explain who John Wilkes Booth was if they were asked. He was the man who assassinated Abraham Lincoln. Well, Mary Surratt was a middle-aged woman during the civil war, and was wrongly accused of assisting in the plot to kill President Lincoln. During the trial, her rights were ignored, and she was eventually hanged with little proof to support her guilt. Her punishment sparked additional controversy that still influences arguments surrounding the death penalty today. The Civil War was when the United States split because of the injustice of slavery. The North insisted to free the slaves, but the South refused (Wulf et al). After four years of fighting, the south surrendered at the Appomattox court house on April 9, 1865. By that time, over 680,000 americans had died. Even though the war was over, there was still tension between the North and the South, and their anger was directed at Abraham Lincoln, which eventually lead to a story that changed the United States forever (O’Reilly and Zimmerman 33-37). Mary Surratt wasn’t a typical woman during the Civil War. Many must have perceived her as a very strong Catholic who had been widowed since 1862. She moved to her boarding house in Washington D.C. two years later (O’Reilly and Zimmerman204), (smithsonian.com). She lived with one of her two sons, John Surratt, and daughter Anna (Taylor). All this was true, but there was a lot more going on in the Surratt home that went unnoticed. Mary may have been living in the North’s capital, but she was a confederate ... ... middle of paper ... ...lizabeth. "The Story of Mary Surratt." N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Nov. 2013. . Swanson, James L. Chasing Lincoln's Killer. New York: Scholastic, 2009. Print. Taylor, Troy. "The Haunts of Mary Surratt." The Haunts of Mary Surratt. N.p., 2009. Web. 04 Nov. 2013. "What Type of Trial? A Civil Versus a Military Trial for the Lincoln Assassination Conspirators." What Type of Trial? A Civil Versus a Military Trial for the Lincoln Assassination Conspirators. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Nov. 2013. . Wulf, Andrew James., Louise Taper, Silvina Niepomniszcze, and Dustin Crozier. A. Lincoln: Railsplitter to Rushmore. Simi Valley, CA: Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum, 2013. Print.
Most Americans know John Wilkes Booth as the assassin of Abraham Lincoln- shot at a play at Ford’s Theater on April 14th, 1865. However, the names of the conspirators that surrounded Wilkes Booth are relatively unknown, especially that of Mary Surratt. Mary Surratt, a mother and boardinghouse proprietor, was arrested and tried for the assassination of Abraham Lincoln along with her son, John Surratt. Pleas from her family, lawyer, and fellow conspirators did not allow her to escape her fate, and she was hanged for her crimes on July 7th, 1865. Even from the scaffold, Lewis Powell, another conspirator condemned to die, cried, “Mrs. Surratt is innocent. She doesn't deserve to die with the rest of us.” So who was this woman, and most importantly, what role did she really play in the assassination of the President of the United States? Was she simply blindly aiding her son and thus innocent, as claimed by Lewis Powell, or did she have a more involved role in the plot? Mary Surratt opened up her home to conspirators and ended up paying the price for her decision.
“ Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer”, was written by James L. Swanson, a dedicated Lincoln scholar and attorney. He details in his book the incredible escape of John Wilkes Booth’s from authorities, with immaculate descriptions of little-known facts in the case of Lincoln’s Killer. Swanson’s nonfiction book dives into actual pieces of literature written at the time of Lincoln’s assassination by individuals who actually took part in the real-life drama, including John Wilkes Booth himself.April 14, 1865 is a day of infamy in United States history,it is the day that John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln. Swanson delves deep into the minds of Booth and his accomplices , analyzing their every move. Booth flees the scene of the crime with Davey Herold, who has been a willing participant in Booth's secret plots to kill Secretary of State William Seward, Abraham Lincoln, and Vice President Andrew Johnson.
O'Reilly, Bill, and Martin Dugard. Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination That Changed America Forever. New York: Henry Holt and, 2011. Print.
As the daughter of a wealthy plantation owner and the wife of an assistant to the confederate president, Jefferson Davis, chestnut always found herself surrounded by the wealthy and high-end confederacy’s gentlemen and their views on the civil war. Mary recorded her most significate impressions of the conflict from the begging when the first shot in Charleston South Carolina went off. Mary Chesnut's diary is a glorious and rich with vivid comments on race, genders, wealth status, and power from those who had enough but wanted more within a nation divided Mary Boykin Chesnut was an incredibly intelligent woman, whose wartime experiences brought to live intimate and important details of southern culture. Since its publication in 1905, Chesnut’s diary has become compelling reading. Chesnut’s wartime diary begins when Mary learns of Lincolns election in 1860 later catching more focus when she grew to worry about her husband’s well-being and who was in charge of giving and following Jefferson’s orders without any hesitation. Mary’s carries her persona as a feminist but she seems sad that women are not able to do nothing outside the husband’s hands in one passage
leading up to and surrounding President Abraham Lincoln’s death. The purpose of this book is to
The Civil War, beginning in 1861 and ending in 1865, was a notorious event in American history for many influential reasons. Among them was the war 's conclusive role in determining a united or divided American nation, its efforts to successfully abolish the slavery institution and bring victory to the northern states. This Civil War was first inspired by the unsettling differences that divided the northern and southern states over the power that resided in the hands of the national government to constrain slavery from taking place within the territories. There was only one victor in the Civil War. Due to the lack of resources, plethora of weaknesses, and disorganized leadership the Southern States possessed in comparison to the Northern States,
April 14, 1865 was one of the most shocking days in American history. Only 5 days after the end of the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln, our then President was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth, an actor and Confederate sympathizer. Lincoln was watching a play at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C. when Booth managed to get in Lincoln’s private box and fired a single-shot to the back of Lincoln’s head. When talking about Lincoln’s assassination you always hear Booth being mentioned, but what people don’t usually know is that there was a female participant. Mary Surratt, a Confederate sympathizer, was the only female participant in the conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln. Her and Booth, along with other conspirators which included her son John Surratt, met in her boardinghouse to plan Lincoln’s assassination. Kate Clifford Larson’s book, The Assassin’s Accomplice, tells the riveting story of the scheme to assassinate Abraham Lincoln through the eyes of Mary Surratt and her life story. Larson holds two degrees from Simmons College, an MBA from Northeastern University, and a doctorate in history from the University of New Hampshire. She part time teaches history at
Mystery is a literary genre that hooks the reader in with thrill and suspense. Mary Reilly is a 1990 parallel novel by American writer Valerie Martin inspired by Robert Louis Stevenson 's classic novel The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Faithfully weaving in details from Robert Louis Stevenson 's classic, Martin introduces an original and captivating character: Mary Reilly, a survivor who is scarred but still strong, familiar with evil but brimming with devotion and love. The novel Mary Reilly both compliments and complements Stevenson’s novel.
Without any question, most people have a very clear and distinct picture of John Wilkes Booth a in their minds. It is April 1865, the night president Lincoln decides to take a much-needed night off, to attend a stage play. Before anyone knows it a lunatic third-rate actor creeps into Lincoln's box at Ford's theater and kills the president. Leaping to the stage, he runs past a confused audience and flees into the night, only to suffer a coward’s death Selma asset some two weeks later. From the very moment that Booth pulled the trigger, the victors of the Civil War had a new enemy on their hands, and a good concept of whom they were dealing with. A close examination of the facts, however, paint a different view of Booth, a picture that is far less black and white, but a picture with many shades of gray.
The assassination of President Abraham Lincoln shocked the country. During that time she became the most hated women in the country. It was all plan at Mary Surratt’s Boarding house. The boarding house was a traven, polling place, and a post office. Mary Surratt boarding house was where John Booth came to know the Surratt family. He invited John Wilkes Booth to the boarding house. That lead to many meetings held there. The event of kidnapping the President never took place. Booth had convicted John about the plot to kidnap the president was a good idea. Investigators came to her house within six hours of the assassination. Two days later Mary was arrested at her boarding house
Mary Surratt. The first woman to be executed by the government. Mary Surratt should have been executed. She should have been executed because she lied to the authorities.
Abraham Lincoln was assassintated in April of 1865, however there was a bigger objective and a debate about wether the fate of those responsible for Lincoln’s death was correct. After two failing attempts to kidnap the president, John Wilkes Booth decided Lincoln needed to be killed along with Andrew Johnson and William Seward. The same night Lincoln delivered his speech at the Appomattix, he decided to go to a play with Major Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris. To fully understand the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, one must know who killed him, his accomplices, and the larger pla
The American Civil War, also known as the War Between the States, or simply the Civil War in the United States, was a civil war fought from 1861 to 1865, after seven Southern slave states declared their secession and formed the Confederate States of America . The states that remained in the Union were known as the "Union" or the "North". The war had its origin in the fractious issue of slavery, especially the extension of slavery into the western territories. Foreign powers did not intervene. After four years of bloody combat that left over 600,000 soldiers dead and destroyed much of the South's infrastructure, the Confederacy collapsed, slavery was abolished, and the difficult Reconstruction process of restoring national unity and guaranteeing rights to the freed slaves began.
Mary Surratt was the first woman executed by the U.S Federal Government. She was a conspirator who helped with the Lincoln assassination. She was born in 1823, got married when she was 17, and owned a boardinghouse. Mary Surratt was guilty, but she probably shouldn’t have been hanged. She was guilty because s he knew the kidnapping plan, and she lied.
“An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” is how the saying goes. Coined by the infamous Hammurabi’s Code around 1700 BC, this ancient expression has become the basis of a great political debate over the past several decades – the death penalty. While the conflict can be whittled down to a matter of morals, a more pragmatic approach shows defendable points that are far more evidence backed. Supporters of the death penalty advocate that it deters crime, provides closure, and is a just punishment for those who choose to take a human life. Those against the death penalty argue that execution is a betrayal of basic human rights, an ineffective crime deterrent, an economically wasteful option, and an outdated method. The debate has experienced varying levels of attention over the years, but has always kept in the eye of the public. While many still advocate for the continued use of capital punishment, the process is not the most cost effective, efficient, consistent, or up-to-date means of punishment that America could be using today.