Saranac soldiers tracked down John Wilkes Booth

SARANAC  — The 16th New York Volunteer Cavalry rode 60 hard hours on the heels of President Abraham Lincoln's assassin, John Wilkes Booth.

The Union Army regiment, 11 companies strong, had been organized in Plattsburgh on Jan. 17, 1863, under the command of Col. Spencer H. Olmstead, according to the New York State Military Museum’s website. 

The 16th faced off many times against Col. John Singleton Mosby's 43rd Battalion, 1st Virginia Cavalry in Northern Virginia.

In those bleak days after Lincoln's assassination, the regiment was commanded by Lt. Edward P. Doherty, who was born not that far from the North Country, in Canada East (now the province of Quebec, and educated in Montreal.

THE RIGHT PLACE

Doherty happened to be sitting on a park bench with another officer across from the White House when he was ordered by Col. L. C. Baker to hunt down the president's assassin, according to Jim Bishop's "The Day Lincoln Was Shot."

"They did like a little bugle call, and he took the first 25 people who came,” said Jan Couture, Town of Saranac historian.

“Out of that 25, five were from Saranac."

Pvt. Godfrey Hoyt, Pvt. David Baker, Pvt. Martin Kelly, Pvt. Lewis Savage and his cousin, Pvt. Abram Snay, were present when flames engulfed Richard Henry Garrett’s tobacco barn, where Booth and accomplice David Herold were cornered 150 years ago today near Port Royal, Va.

Pvt. Boston Corbett of Co. L fatally shot Booth through a barn slat. Ironically, the bullet hit Booth in the back of the head, just an inch below where Booth shot Lincoln.

Herold surrendered to Union forces.

REWARD MONEY

The federal government put up a $100,000 award for the capture of Booth, Herold and John Surratt, the son of Mary Elizabeth Jenkins Surratt, who owned the 541 H St. boarding house in Washington, D.C., where Booth plotted to kill Lincoln.

"Different rewards were given for the capture of John Wilkes Booth," Couture said. "It was about $1,200 in 1865 money.

“(But) a lot of people say they never received the money,” Couture said.

SARANAC SOLDIERS 

Today, weather permitting, she leads a tour of four local cemeteries where these Grand Army of the Republic soldiers are buried.

“David Baker is buried in Cadyville,” she said. “Martin Kelly is buried in Redford. Hoyt is buried in Saranac. Snay is buried in Peaseleeville."

The tour won't take in the burial ground in Vermontville, but Savage is buried there.

“Basically, they were farmers,” said Couture of these Union Army soldiers from Saranac.

The Saranac Independence Cemetery, between Route 3 and Gagnong Drive, also has a Civil War monument, erected May 30, 1888.

“Saranac, per capita, had more people enlist than any other town in New York,” Couture said. "The 16th Regiment was the Adirondack Regiment."

ALMOST HANGED

Growing up, the only family lore that Robert K. Summers heard about his maternal ancestor Dr. Samuel A. Mudd was how he saved many lives during the 1867 yellow-fever epidemic.

He didn't know that, when Mudd performed those praiseworthy acts, he was imprisoned at Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas Prison, off Key West, Fla., as a co-conspirator in Lincoln's assassination. 

He wasn't told that Mudd narrowly missed swinging from the gallows with Mrs. Surratt, George Atzerodt, Lewis Powell and Herold at the Old Penitentiary, Washington Arsenal (now Fort McNair), on July 7, 1865.

'CRAZY, NUTTY IDEA'

Did Summers's ancestor recognize Wilkes Booth when he set the leg the assassin had fractured in his leap from the president's box at Ford Theater?

“We know that Dr. Mudd recognized Booth,” said Summers, who has written several books on the Maryland physician on his family tree.

“He said so. The only issue is he didn’t turn Booth over to the people hunting him. 

"I’m sure he thought Booth would implicate him in the plot, and Dr. Mudd would get (hanged). That’s all there’s really to it. I think he probably knew about the (earlier) kidnapping plot; I don’t think he had an active role. I doubt he thought it would come to anything. 

"It was a crazy, nutty idea of this young 26-year-old actor up in Washington City.”

Mudd hustled Booth and Herold away once the 16th New York Vol. Cavalry stormed into Bryantown, Md., looking for them.

“He wanted to get Booth off his farm, forget about it and go back to harvesting his tobacco,” Summers said.

Email Robin Caudell:

rcaudell@pressrepublican.com

Twitter:@RobinCaudell

This is the second and final installment of a Tale of a Derringer, Denial and Derring-do.