Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1866-09-20
j. WILKES BOOTH AND HIS
DEAD BODY.

Wilkes Booth, whose body Secretary
Stanton took so much pains to dispose
OF, so that no man should ever know the
spot where it was buried, is reported to
be in Europe The story is, that the
man whom Boston Corbett so heroically
shot, and whose body Stanton refused to
exhibit to any one that ever saw Booth,
was poor wretch hired by the assas.
sins to personate Booth, in order to fa-
cilitate the escape of the latter Wheth-
er there be or be not any truth in this
story, it will never cease to be suspi-
cious circumstance connected with the
fate of Wilkes Booth, that Stanton re-
fused to deliver the body that was
brought up from Virginia to his friends,
or even to let them look upon it.-Louis-
uiUe Courier.
Dating a couple of months from the
time that Booth, the assassin of Presi-
dent Lincoln, was shot and killed by
Boston Corbett, in the attempt to capture
him, sensation stories like the above
have been of frequent occurrence Of
course there is not the shadow of truth
in the tale of Booth being still alive.
The body was fully recognized as being
that of Booth, and although tales were
told about it being secretly taken out to
sea and sunk, and others about it being
buried at midnight, in an obscure place,
by two men employed by Government,
and who were sworn to secrecy, yet facts,
known to but few, and carefully kept
from the newspaper press, show that the
body was given over to the relatives of
Booth, and that it was buried either in
New England or in Canada.
The facts, as we had them at the time,
on authority not to be doubted, are as
follows:
A few days before the body of Booth
so mysteriously disappeared, our inform
ant, resident of New York, and favor
ably known as a dramatic writer, was
called upon, after bank hours, to cash
the draft of an undertaken, a near neigh
Dor, who stated that he had received an
order from the Booth family, to repair to
Washington with coffin, and there to
receive the body of John Wilkes Booth,
which would be surrendered to him on
their order, and to convey it North for
burial. The undertaken said he would
return, and pass through New York, en-
route with the body, on Thursday eve
ming, or on Friday morning of the same
week.
The morning after the undertaken left
Washington, the report came by tele-
graph that the body had mysteriously
disappeared-that it had been secretly
buried-one report said in an old field,
another in the pententiary yard, and
still another that it had been taken out
to sea and sunk.
The undertaken did not return to his
family until some days had elapsed. He
came from the North, but declined to
give any information relative to the
place where John Wilkes Booth, under
another name, had been buried. Should
it get out, he said, the grave would be
violated, and the body removed, and the
family were naturally anxious that this
should not be.
These facts coming to us from the
source they did, are more than sufficient
to convince us, not only of the death of
John Wilkes Booth, but that his body,
with pledge of secrecy, freely given,
and fully kept, was given over to his
family for burial, and that, except the
relatives of Booth and the undertaken, no
living being knows where the last re-
mains Of John Wilkes Booth are inferred
No slab marks the last resting place of
the assassin. The man who dug the
grave knew not for whom it was intend
ed and in the burial permit was inserted a
false name. In his unknown grave, the
assassin viii lie until the grave gives up
its sheeted dead, and all are called to
judgment. nt.-Cin Union.