The Elk advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Elk Co., Pa.) 186?-1868, 1867-04-25
THE LAST cgAPTER OF CoNovER.


some of the villanics of this disgracoful
traGgedy. They will, of course. some
day become matter for that history
which Mr.. Lincoln truly said we were
making, if they have not already be-
come so. We have had the first and
second acts in this great dramatic
first 10 the assassination of Mr.. Lincoln
-the second in the hanging of Mrs.
Surratt-and the curtain is now about
being raised for the third and last act,
in which the dark mystery will be fully
disclosed.
The following is from the Philadel-
phia Age, which paper has from time to
time published disconnected chapters Of
the /" great tragedy"
Our readers will not tire of the
hideous details of this case 1t has
not, we are aware, the picturesque in
terest of the Surratt trial, for there is
no clanking of fetters and no half.
stifed woman to be inundated. The
heroes of Lynchburg and the Monocacy
are not there IN full uniform. 1t is a
mere pitiful perjury in common court,
but still it is full OF interest as showing
the tools despotism is not ashamed to
nse and how they sometimes break in
its hands. We left Conover dumhfoun.
ded before the Judiciary Committee,
and a sad, dispirited committee it vas
on that May day afternoon. They
were disappointed. They were petu.
liant.
Wby| said General Thomas to
Conover, "why do you say you have
"no statement to make You have heard
how this witness contra6icts you"
And the dogged answer was: l have
"no explanation whatever to make, be-
"cause do not see that any would help
&c the case"
And yet, to their shameIbe it spoken,
this Judiciary Committee, composed of
ex-governors, and judges, and lawyers
of high pretension, had not, we wont
say, the generosity-but the decency to
report this patent perjury to the House
aad the country, but giozed it over with
wretched equivocation. They could not
screw up their courage to say what
they knew in their hearts that Holt was
willingly misled, Conover perjured, and,
on The evidence before them, Jefferson
Davis was as innocent of the murder of
Abraham Lincoln as he was of the Gun.
powder Plot. They mildly and meanly
said
When the committee entered upon this
investigation in April last, the evidence in
the War Department, If accepted as true,
was conclusive as to the guilt of jefferson
Davis.
The Judge Advocate General had taken
the affidavits of several persons who pro-
Sessed to have been in the service of the
rebel government, and who had been
present at an interview between Surratt
and Davis and Benjamin.
Those afidavits were taken by the Judge
Advocate Genearl in good faith, and in
full beliefthat the atlantis were stating
that only which was true.
The ,tatements made by these witnesses
harmonized in every important prtaicular
with facts derived from documents and
other trustworthy sources. The committee,
however, thought it wise to see and ex-
anime some of the persons whose afhdavits
had been taken by Judge Holt. Several of
the witnesses when brought before the
committee retracted entirely the statements
which they had made in their affidavits,
and eclared that their testimony as gipen
as-s<,. fs.I.
They failed, however, to state to the
committee any inducement or consdera-
ton which seemed to the committee a
reasonable explanation for the course
they had pursued and the committee are
not at this time able to say, as the result OF
the investigations they have made, whether
he original statements of these witnesses
true 'er false.
But for the promptitude and ability
displayed by Mr.. Rogers, of New Jer-
sey, in his minority report, the world
would have known nothing of this euor-
nifty, and the record of these conglome>
rate perjuries would have been slowed
away along with Booths diary, in the
darkest archives of the Bureau of Mill
aryJ Justice, perhaps annotated by" dear
Lieber," Were we at all disposed to
ievity on such a subject, we might az
ford to smile at the spasmodic efforts of
Mr.. Boutwell,, of Massachusetts,, to dis.
credit the Iccreant witnesses of the gov
ernment by such questions as he ad-
dressed to them and repeated several
times. Snevel is asked by BoutNell
Q. Are you acquainted with any person
in New York, resident or otherwise who
sympathized with the rebellion
A. No, sir.
@. Did goa ever viSt lie NcW York Hotel
A. No, sir.
And to Campbell it is thus put
Q. Are you acquainted at the New FORK
Hotel in New York City
A. No, sir.
@. Hare you uisited at that Hotel during
the progress of the war at any time?
A. No, sir never was inside of it,
to my recollection.
That Mr.. Cranstun's generous hOSpi.