character of the Rebellion — that being the word always used during the Judge- Advo cate's conduct of the case — and toward the probable complicity of its leaders in the plot of assassination. Very much of the testimony was hearsay. Only nine witnesses seem to have given evidence incriminating Mrs. Surratt, who was a boarding-house keeper, and of whose house many of the arrested conspirators had been inmates or visitors. Two years later, in the summer of 1867, many of these witnesses testified at the trial of Mrs. Surratt's son, which came on before the Criminal Court for the District of Columbia, Judge Fisher presiding, Attor ney-General Edwards Pierrepont prosecut ing, and Messrs. Bradley and Merrick, leaders of the Washington Bar, being coun sel. That trial resulted in an equal division of the jury and in its discharge with the accused never again arraigned. In effect six of the jury acquitted the mother, by to that numerical extent acquitting the son. The defense of Mrs. Surratt and her alleged co-conspirators substantially pro ceeded on the ground that Booth's original idea and down to the day of the assassina tion was only to capture and hold in hostage the government officers; and that this at the most constituted any conspiracy — if the various meetings of the accused were to be regarded as acts of conspiracy; but that the assassination came through a sudden impulse of Booth of which the others were ignorant. An entry to that effect was in the diary taken from Booth on the capture of his body, and was produced on the court trial of young Surratt; but for some reason it was withheld by the Judge-Advocate on the mother's trial. And, of course, before courtmartial the counsel of Mrs. Surratt had no such means of forcing its production as had the counsel of the son before a civil tribu nal. All the various counsel for the accused addressed the Commission at the conclusion of testimony, but probably the speech of
General Ewing may be regarded as the most important. They were answered by Assis tant-Advocate General Bingham, a very grand orator of the period; but his address, as read now, savors more of the old Sir Kdward Coke style of prosecution than of an impartial Judge-Advocate. During his address General Ewing several times digressed to ask questions of Mr. Bingham, and some of them were very searching; for instance, " How many crimes have my clients been tried for?" to which the answer came, " It is all one continuing transaction." Again, " Under what code or statute comes our alleged crime?" To which it was answered, " The common law of war." Mr. Clampitt, of the local Bar, who was especially attorney for Mrs. Surratt, in terposed with, " So this lady, a non-combat ant by the laws of war, is being tried on a nine-fold omnibus charge jointly with seven men entirely under the common law of war; and for the first time we lawyers hear of such a branch of common law." Ten days were consumed in addresses for the accused, and then two days were em ployed by Special Judge-Advocate Bingham in a speech that was both an argument for the prosecution and in the nature of a judge's charge to his associates on the Com mission. Read to-day the effort seems to have been in one aspect an appeal to the excited galleries of the American people provided by stenographers and newspapers. It generalized, and shrewdly avoided any dwelling upon details of evidence. It termed the aggregate of evidence " a combination of atrocities "; and proceeded from pro logue to epilogue on the assumption that the chief traitors against the government (meaning Davis and political associates) "secretly conspired with these hired confed erates to achieve by assassination what they vainly attempted by wager of battle. What ever may be the conviction of others, my own conviction is that Jefferson Davis is as clearly proven guilty of this conspiracy as
