Recollections of the Civil War / With the Leaders at Washington and in the Field in the Sixties

by Charles A. Dana

A few days later she came. I was not in town when Mrs. Hudspeth, as her name proved to be, arrived. I had gone to Chicago, but from the woman's testimony on May 12th, I learned that in November, 1864, just after the presidential election, and on the day, she said, on which General Butler left New York, she had overheard a curious conversation between two men in a Third Avenue car in New York city. She had observed, when a jolt of the car pushed the hat of one of the men forward, that he wore false whiskers. She had noticed that his hand was very beautiful; that he carried a pistol in his belt; that, judging from his conversation, he was a young man of education; she heard him say that he was going to Washington that day. The young men left the car before she did, and after they had gone her daughter, who was with her, had picked up a letter from the floor. Mrs. Hudspeth, thinking it belonged to her, had carried it from the car. She afterward discovered the two letters printed above, and took them to General Scott, who, upon reading them, said they were of great importance, and sent her to General Dix. When a photograph of Booth was shown to Mrs. Hudspeth, she swore that it was the man in disguise whom she had seen in the car. It was found that Booth was in New York on the day that she indicated—that is, the day General Butler left New York, November 11th—and likewise that Booth had gone from there to Washington, as she had heard this man say he was going to do. The inference was that the man who had dropped the letter was Booth.

I was afterward called to the stand, on June 9th, to testify about the letters. Judge Bingham used these documents as a link in his chain of evidence showing that a conspiracy existed "to kill and murder Abraham Lincoln, William H. Seward, Andrew Johnson, Ulysses S. Grant, Edwin M. Stanton, and others of his advisers," and that Booth was a partner in this conspiracy.

I have said that I was in Chicago when Mrs. Hudspeth gave her testimony. Just after I reached there I received from Major T. F. Eckert, the head of the military telegraph, a message saying that the court wanted me immediately as a witness in the conspiracy trial. I returned at once, and on the 18th of May appeared in court. I was wanted that I might testify to the identity of a key to a secret cipher which I had found on the 6th of April in Richmond. On that day I had gone into the office of Mr. Benjamin, the Confederate Secretary of State; on a shelf, among Mr. Benjamin's books and other things, I had found a secret cipher key.[E] I saw it was the key to the official Confederate cipher, and, as we had at times to decipher at the War Department a good many documents written in that cipher, it seemed to me of interest, and I brought it away, with several other interesting documents. When I returned to Washington I gave it to Major Eckert, who had charge of cipher dispatches in the War Department.

Now, on the night of Mr. Lincoln's assassination, Lieutenant W. H. Terry had been sent to the National Hotel to seize the trunk of J. Wilkes Booth. Among other things, he had found a paper containing a secret cipher. When this was given to Major Eckert, he immediately saw that it was the same as the one which I had found in Richmond. It was thought that possibly by means of this evidence it could be shown that Booth was in communication with the Confederate Government. I was called back to identify the cipher key. Major Eckert at the same time presented dispatches written in the cipher found in Booth's trunk and sent from Canada to the Confederates. They had been captured and taken to the War Department, where copies of them were made. By the key which I had found these dispatches could be read. These dispatches indicated plots against the leaders of our Government, though whether Booth had sent them or not was, of course, never known.

Throughout the period of the trial I was constantly receiving and answering messages and letters relative to the examination or arrest of persons suspected of being connected with the affair. In most cases neither the examinations nor arrests led to anything. The persons had been acquaintances of the known conspirators, or they had been heard to utter disloyal sentiments and had been reported to the department by zealous Unionists. It was necessary, however, under the circumstances, to follow up every clew given us, and, under Mr. Stanton's directions, I gave attention to all cases reported.

While the trial was going on in Washington, Jefferson Davis was captured, on May 10th, near Irwinsville, Ga., by a detachment of General Wilson's cavalry. Mr. Davis and his family, with Alexander H. Stephens, lately Vice-President of the Confederacy, John H. Reagan, Postmaster General, Clement C. Clay, and other State prisoners, were sent to Fortress Monroe. The propeller Clyde, with the party on board, reached Hampton Roads on May 19th. The next day, May 20th, Mr. Stanton sent for me to come to his office. He told me where Davis was, and said that he had ordered General Nelson A. Miles to go to Hampton Roads to take charge of the prisoners, transferring them from the Clyde to the fortress. Mr. Stanton was much concerned lest Davis should commit suicide; he said that he himself would do so in like circumstances. "I want you to go to Fortress Monroe," he said, "and caution General Miles against leaving Davis any possible method of suicide; tell him to put him in fetters, if necessary. Davis must be brought to trial; he must not be allowed to kill himself." Mr. Stanton also told me that he wanted a representative of the War Department down there to see what the military was doing, and to give suggestions and make criticisms and send him full reports.

The status of Jefferson Davis at the time explains Mr. Stanton's anxiety. It should be remembered that Davis had not surrendered when the capital of the Confederacy, Richmond, was captured; neither had he surrendered with either of the two principal armies under Lee and Johnston. At that time the whole Confederate army west of the Mississippi was still at large. To allow Davis to join this force was only to give the Confederacy an opportunity to reassemble the forces still unsurrendered and make another stand for life. Even more important than this consideration was the fact that Davis was charged, in President Johnson's proclamation of May 2, 1865, offering a reward for his capture, with instigating the assassination of President Lincoln:

Whereas, It appears, from evidence in the Bureau of Military Justice, that the atrocious murder of the late President, Abraham Lincoln, and the attempted assassination of the Hon. W. H. Seward, Secretary of State, were incited, concerted, and procured by and between Jefferson Davis, late of Richmond, Va., ... and other rebels and traitors against the Government of the United States, harbored in Canada;

Now, therefore, to the end that justice may be done, I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, do offer and promise for the arrest of said persons or either of them, within the limits of the United States, so that they can be brought to trial, the following rewards: One hundred thousand dollars for the arrest of Jefferson Davis.... The provost marshal general of the United States is directed to cause the descriptions of said persons, with notice of the above rewards, to be published.