In the aftermath of the assassination of President Lincoln, the military moved quickly to capture the conspirators. The search centered on Mary Surratt’s boarding house at 541 H Street. Eight conspirators were quickly arrested; one (John Wilkes Booth himself) was shot and killed attempting to escape, and one, John Surratt, Mary’s son, disappeared. Of the eight, four (including Mrs. Surratt) were hanged; the other four received prison sentences of varying duration.

Andrew Jampoler’s book traces the life of John Surratt, focusing on his initial escape. Jampoler takes an interesting approach; there really isn’t that much information on Surratt’s life, so the book is a series of digressions. Surratt initially fled to Canada, so there’s a digression about Canadian/American relations during the Civil War. Then Surratt sailed across the Atlantic, landing in Liverpool, so there’s digressions about Atlantic travel and about the history of Liverpool. He then made his way to Rome and enlisted in the Papal Zouaves, so there’s a digression about the Papal States, the Reunification of Italy, and the history of Zouave units. He was discovered again and fled from a Zouave jail (through the sewer) and made his way to Alexandria, so there’s a digression about Alexandria (including a discussion of Lawrence Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet). He was finally returned to the US and a trial, so there’s a long section about that, including the personalities of the prosecution and defense teams. The trial hinged on the prosecution’s argument that Surratt was in Washington DC on the day of the assassination; Surratt claimed he was in Elmira NY, scouting out the prison camp there on behalf of the Confederacy. Since Surratt had been identified in Elmira and had signed a hotel register, the prosecution and defense both produced one of the favorite lines of evidence for murder mysteries – detailed railway timetables and route maps attempting to prove that it was possible for Surratt to be in Elmira on April 13th and in Washington on April 14th (prosecution) or that it wasn’t (defense). The defense was convincing enough for a hung jury, attempts for a new trial foundered in the disorganized Justice Department during the Johnson impeachment, and Surratt was released. He embarked on a short-lived lecture tour, had a brief career as a schoolteacher, then spent the rest of his life working for a Baltimore steam packet line.

The “digressions” make the book; Jampoler is fluent and readable. The scholarship is impressive, including such things as Surratt’s physical description when he joined the Zouaves and the international shipping registry code number of the ship he took to Liverpool. Extensively footnoted and a thorough bibliography. Good illustrations, including the haunting picture of the four executed conspirators hanging – hoods over their heads, and Mrs. Surratt’s skirt strapped in two places so it wouldn’t fly up and embarrass her as the trap fell. Jampoler notes that the fact that the conspirators were tried by the military rather than a civilian court set a precedent for the later trials of Nazi spies and Taliban prisoners. (As near as I can tell, the argument was that the conspirators were “unlawful combatants” rather than “assassins”; if John Wilkes Booth had been wearing a Confederate uniform when he shot Abraham Lincoln, I don’t know how it would have worked out). ( )

Author uses the story of John Surratt's escape, capture, and trial as a framework that is expanded to cover a general history of the Civil War and it's aftermath. Contains extensive footnotes and bibliography. ( )

Tedious but interesting ( )