Louis J. Weichmann
Testimony Before the Military Commission
With Booth dead and John Surratt still a fugitive, the government chose to try eight persons—Lewis Powell; David Herold; George Atzerodt; Mary Surratt; Samuel Mudd, the physician who set Booth’s broken leg; Edman (Ned) Spangler, a stagehand at Ford’s Theatre; and Samuel Arnold and Michael O’Laughlen, two friends of Booth from Baltimore—out of the hundreds who had been arrested during the assassination investigation. Attorney General James Speed considered the conspirators to be “secret active public enemies” who had committed offenses against the laws of war, and agreed with Stanton that they should be tried by a military tribunal. President Johnson concurred, and ordered the formation of a commission on May 1. Its nine members, all army officers, included Major General David Hunter, whose abolitionism early in the war had made him a hero to the Radical Republicans; Major General Lew Wallace, the future author of Ben-Hur, who spent much of his time at the trial drawing expert sketches of the accused; and Brigadier General August Kautz, who had led a division of African-American soldiers into Richmond the previous month. Joseph Holt, the army judge advocate general, headed the prosecution, and was assisted by John Bingham and Henry Burnett. The defendants were represented by seven civilian lawyers, including Reverdy Johnson, a Democratic senator from Maryland, and Thomas Ewing Jr., a former Union general and brother-in-law of William T. Sherman. (Some of the defense lawyers represented more than one defendant.) After rejecting a challenge to its jurisdiction, the commission began hearing testimony on May 12. The following day the prosecution called its most important witness. Louis Weichmann (or Wiechmann, 1842–1902) was a War Department clerk who had moved into Mary Surratt’s Washington boardinghouse in November 1864. He had gone to the police on April 15 and subsequently provided testimony that linked Booth to Mary and John Surratt, Mudd, Atzerodt, Herold, and Powell, alias Payne. Under other circumstances, Weichmann might have been charged as a conspirator himself, but under the law as it stood in 1865, a defendant could not testify in a criminal case, and prosecutors needed his testimony. During his direct examination, Weichmann testified regarding Powell’s visit to the Surratt house in March 1865, and under cross-examination by Reverdy Johnson, he described coming across a suspicious object belonging to Powell.
Q. Will you state whether you remember, some time in the month of March, of a man calling at Mrs. Surratt’s, where you were boarding, and giving himself the name of Wood, and inquiring for John H. Surratt?
A. Yes, sir: I myself went to open the door; and he inquired for Mr. Surratt. I told him Mr. Surratt was not at home; but I would introduce him to the family if he desired it. He thereupon expressed a desire to see Mrs. Surratt; and I accordingly introduced him, having first asked his name. He gave the name of Wood.
Q. Do you recognize him among these prisoners?
A. That is the man (pointing to Lewis Payne, one of the accused).
Q. He called himself Wood?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. How long did he remain with Mrs. Surratt?
A. That evening, he stopped in the house all night. He had supper served up to him in my own room. I brought him supper from the kitchen.
Q. When was that?
A. As near as I can remember, it must have been about eight weeks previous to the assassination. I have no exact knowledge of the date.
Q. Did he bring any baggage with him to the house?
A. No, sir. He had a black overcoat on, and a black frock-coat, with gray pants, at that time.
Q. You say he remained until the next day?
A. He remained until the next morning, leaving in the earliest train for Baltimore.
Q. Do you remember whether, some weeks after this, the same man called again?
A. I should think it was about three weeks afterwards that he called again; and I again went to the door, and again ushered him into the parlor: and, in the mean time, I had forgotten his name, and I asked him his name. That time he gave the name of Payne.
Q. Was it the same man?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Did he have an interview then with Mrs. Surratt?
A. He was ushered into the parlor. Mrs. Surratt, Miss Surratt, and Miss Honora Fitzpatrick, were present.
Q. How long did he remain?
A. He remained about three days at that time. He represented himself as a Baptist preacher: he also said that he had been in prison in Baltimore for about a week, and that he had taken the oath of allegiance, and was going to become a good and loyal citizen.
Q. Are not the family of Mrs. Surratt and Mrs. Surratt herself Catholics?
A. Yes, sir. Mr. Surratt is himself a Catholic, and was a student of divinity at the same college.
Q. Did you hear any explanation made why a Baptist preacher should go there seeking hospitality?
A. No, sir. They only looked upon it as odd, and laughed at it. Mrs. Surratt herself remarked that he was a great looking Baptist preacher.
Q. Did they not seem to recognize him as the “Wood” of former days who had been there?
A. Yes, sir. In the course of conversation, one of the young ladies called him Wood; and then I recollected, that, on his first visit, he had given the name of Wood.
Q. How was he dressed on the last occasion?
A. He was dressed in gray,—a complete suit of gray.
Q. Did he have any baggage with him on the last occasion?
A. Yes, sir. He had a linen coat, and two linen shirts.
Q. Did you observe any traces of disguise about him, or attempted preparations for disguise?
A. I would say, that one day, returning from my office, I found a false mustache on the table in my room. I took the mustache, and threw it into a little toilet-box I had on the table. This man Payne searched around the table, and inquired for his mustache. I was sitting on the chair, and did not say any thing. I have retained the mustache since, and it was found in my baggage: it was among a box of paints that I had in my trunk.
Q. Did you ever see Payne during that visit, and John H. Surratt, together in their room by themselves?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. What were they occupied with doing?
A. It was on the same day. On returning from my office, I went up stairs to the third story; and I found John H. Surratt and this man Payne seated on a bed, playing with bowie-knives. It was the occasion of Payne’s last visit.
Q. Were there any other weapons about them?
A. Two revolvers, and four sets of new spurs.
Q. You say you found upon your own table a false mustache. What was the color of the hair?
A. It was black.
Q. Was it a large or diminutive mustache?
A. It was about a medium-sized mustache. It was not a very small one, nor was it what I would call a very large one.
Q. Was it so large that it would entirely change the appearance of the wearer?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. You think it was?
A. I think so.
Q. You took that off the table where you found it; and you put it in your own box, where you had your paints?
A. Yes, sir: I put it first in my toilet-box, a box standing on the table; and afterwards removed it from that box, and put it in a box of paints which was in my trunk.
Q. And you have kept it ever since?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. When he came home, as I understood you, he seemed to be feeling for something; said he had lost something. Did he not ask for the mustache?
A. Yes, sir: he said, “Where is my mustache?”
Q. Why did you not give it to him? It was not yours.
A. No, sir: it was not mine.
Q. Why did you not give it to him? Did you suspect him at that time of intending any thing wrong?
A. I thought it rather queer that a Baptist preacher should use a mustache; and I did not care about having false mustaches lying around on my table.
Q. But you locked it up?
A. I know I locked it up.
Q. What did you intend to do with it?
A. I did not intend to do any thing with it. I took it, and exhibited it to some of the clerks in the office the day afterwards, and was fooling with it. I put on a pair of spectacles and the mustache, and was making fun of it.
Q. Your only reason for not giving it to him, when he said it was his, was, that you thought it was singular that a Baptist preacher should be fooling with a mustache?
A. Yes, sir; and I did not want a false mustache about my room.
Q. It would not have been about your room if you had given it to him, would it?
A. No, sir.
Q. That would have taken it out of your room; but, to keep it out of your room, you locked it up in a box, and kept the box with you?
A. Then, again, I thought no honest person had any reason to wear a false mustache.