The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1877-1885, 1882-06-21
Man who Stabbed Seward,
and was Hanged With
Mrs S%urratt-

10 considerable trouble in his youth be-
cause Booths fellow conspirator, who
attempted to kill Mr. Seward, assumed
his name. >
Powell was also one of the men who
made the celebrated calico raid in the
Valley in the fall of 1854, when a train
load of calice was captured and the cali
CO strewR all over the country for miles
around. In retaliation for shooting
Gen. Hunters men. a soldier lined Ar
derson and several others were captured
and shot by the Federals at Front Royal.
The speed of Powell's mare was all that
saved his neck from being stretched on
that occasion. He escaped with seven
teen bullet holes through his clothing.
On one occasion the house in which
Powell was stopping was surrounded 10y
the Federals, when Powell slacked his
face with lampblack and walked out Of
the house. One of the soldiers re-
marked That Is . d--n tall niger"
and let him pass on without molestation.
| insight give a great many incidents OF
this kind in the career and adventures Of
Powell, but it is unnecessary. Such things
occur ID the lives of many soldiers.
Powell had the reputation of having
killed a great many men, and when
any desperate matter was to be under
taken he was selected.
On one occasion Powell captured "a
suffer near Orleans, with a wagon load
or tln-cups and ginger cakes. After the
War the sutler, whose name was Tnmasen
settled In Fauquier. In describing his
experiences with Powell, the old man
used to say that be made him Grive
through the woods and up into Cobbler
Mountains. where a goat could hardly
climb. There they stayed until the
Union army moved away, wheE Powell
distributed his goods and wares to the
people in the neishborbood. Fo. some
time afterwards everybody was MUNICH
ing ginger cakes and every negro had a
ioyed "afore God, Massa, since de
wah - The old fellow never failed to
wind up his narrative with "Mein Got,
mein Got he was SO clever NIT my
goods, he gives 'em every tam bit away"
Powel's ~favorite mare was a blood bay.
This animal had a habit Of foaming at
the mouth and exposing the whites of
her eyes. Mounted on this mare, this
strange man rode fast and far to share
wars fiercest perils.' The people here
in Virginia who remember Powell, as he
appeared twenty years ago, with his pale
face, SLOUGH hat and mysterious ways,
mounted on that bay mare, dashing and
.plashIng through the woods, across
field, over bitches ana fences. by day and
night, and through all kinds Of weather
almost believe that he must have been a
stray knight from the Black Forest.
There is one incident in the strange
and hayward life of Lewis Powell which
| had almost forgotten to relate. An
old man named Elias Corder became
violently insane in Upper Fauqier He
is now in the asylum at Staunton, and
will probably never know how he got
there. Powell had been on a raid, and
returning late one stormy night stopped
at AID odd vacant church near Corder's
house, spread down his blanket on the
1oor and Wa. soon fast asleep. All of a
sudden he was awakened by a crash Of
thunder and saw by the Pickering light
ming an object standing near him. He
got up and tried to find the door, but
was either too excited or too little ac-
quainted with the place to find it in the
dark. The noise he made started old
Corder into singing and shrieking. Pow
ell did not know what to do. Another
fash and he saw the figure coming to-
wards him. He had lost his pistol in
the darkness. There was no time to look
for it. The maniac was advancing.
Another flash Of lightning and he found
himself in a hand 10 hand encounter at
midnight in a deserted church with a
maniac. The noise made by Powell and
old Corder, who had wandered off in his
night clothes and was having his 'Ievo-
tons aIl to himself, aroused some of
the neighbors, who, on going to the
church, found that Powell had old Car
der down and was sitting on him, and
would occasionally give the old mans
head a bump against the floor to subdue
him. Powell was badly scratched and
bitten, but with the assistance of the
neighbors, Powell succeeded in tying the
cid man, and the next dav he was de
iiverei to the county authorities and
placed in Jail at Warrenton.
PowELL's ROMANCE.
= During the cannonading of Jackson
and Banks across the Shenandoah River,
a shell entered the gable end of a house
on the Valley Pike, exploded, struck a
bureau at which a young lady was dress
ing her hair in an upper room, clipped
off a large wedge shaped piece of the bu-
reau and drove it into her back under
the right shoulder blade. The same day
a young Confederate soldier was brought
to the house by some of his companions,
shot through the lungs. The name of the
lady was Lily Bowie. Miss Bowie was the
daughter of a gentleman from Alabama,
who mad married a Virginia lady. IN
der these singular circumstances these
two young Southern people met in Vir
ginia, wounded almost unto death, and
formed an attachment for each other
which only ended when the one breathed
out the last OF life upon the scatfold IN
Washington, and the other returned a
broken hearted woman to her far-away
home in the South.
THE MEETING WITH BOOTH.
When Powell had recovered from his
wound he went to Richmond as a guard
to some prisoners. While in Richmond
he attended the theatre for the first tim
in his life. John Wilkes Booth, who
was in Richmond at that time, appeared
| in the cast. Powell was Sc delighted
with Booths acting that he sought his
acquaintance and gained it. AT that
time Booth wa, engaged in his plan to
abduct the President of the United States
and his Cabinet. He saw in Powell