Posted on 01/18/2005 7:17:10 PM PST by churchillbuff
THE LEGEND OF JOHN WILKES BOOTH: MYTH, MEMORY, AND A MUMMY By C. Wyatt Evans University Press of Kansas , $24.95, 224 pages, illus. REVIEWED BY LYN NOFZIGER
Was John Wilkes Booth really killed by Sgt. Boston Corbett in the barn on the Garrett farm in southern Maryland, or did he escape and spend the rest of his life as a homeless, friendless wanderer, winding up, finally, as a side show mummy in a traveling carnival? Or, on the other hand did he escape to England and die there? And the second question: Why did he murder Lincoln in the first place? ...
These are questions C. Wyatt Evans struggles to answer inhis book, "The Legend of John Wilkes Booth." Eventually he exonerates both Stanton and the Southern leaders but, because this is not the purpose of the book, leaves the reader wondering just what Booth's real motive was.
...Mr. Evans rightly says that by killing Lincoln, Booth in effect deified him, making him larger than life in American culture and history.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
It couldn't have been Boston Corbett, he didn't have the balls.
By Colonel Mustard in the library with a candlestick holder
I am tired of hearing the leftist gay "historians" smearing our national heroes. I think was The History Channel that recently had a program on suggesting Lincoln was gay.
There is evidence to suggest that both Booth and Stanton were members of the Knights of the Golden Circle, or at least, strongly influenced by that organization. (See the book Shadow of the Sentinel. Booth is mentioned briefly, but the book is well worth reading).
could you enlighten those of us ignorant of the knights of the golden circle?
The History Channel leans way to the left as does A&E
the knights of the golden circle were supposedly a secret group of Southern sympathizers in the North
The Knights of the Golden Circle was an organization that was loosely based upon, and strongly influenced by, the Freemasons. Its purpose was originally to assure the success of Southern secession; but when it became clear that the South would lose the Civil War, its mission transformed into securing enough wealth and influence to allow a future (successful) effort at Southern secession. To that end, it accumulated a great deal of wealth (many millions, perhaps billions, in today's dollars), and buried that wealth at secret locations across the South and Southwest. Most of this treasure remains to be found.
The Knights of the Golden Circle counted as its members many influential and famous Americans of the 19th century. Albert Pike, the worldwide head of Scottish Rite freemasonry in the mid-19th century, Jefferson Davis, and Judah P. Benjamin (secretary of War for the Confederacy) were members. So was, apparently, the aforementioned Stanton of Lincoln's cabinet. The famous outlaw Jesse James was also a member; his robberies were conducted not to enrich himself, but to fund the treasuries of KGC. There is a lot of evidence to suggest that secessionist acts that started the Civil War were planned by the KGC. The organization was tremendously influential in the 19th century, and it is all the more amazing that most people don't know much about it.
I strongly urge you to read the book Shadow of the Sentinel. If you have any interest in American history, you won't be able to put it down...it's a compelling tale.
Stanton had a bad habit of making famous documents disappear. He was also the last known owner of the infamous Dahlgren Papers that were found of the body of a union soldier and reportedly detailed a plot to assassinate Jefferson Davis. The Dahlgren Papers' custody is well documented throughout the war and after it until they were shipped with confederate government records to Washington, D.C. Upon arrival in Washington Stanton immediately sent for them and took possession. They were never seen again.
I heard that theory as well. There's one version of it that says that Jesse James, after faking his own death of course and going underground, went on a secret KGC mission to track down and silence Booth, who had been getting drunk and revealing secrets. That version claims that Booth was tracked down and killed in secret by the James gang in the 1890's or thereabouts.
Come Retribution:
The Confederate Secret Service
and the Assassination of Lincoln
by William A. Tidwell,
with James O. Hall,
and David Winfred Gaddy
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