But it should be borne in mind that all this was shrouded in the deepest secrecy. That there had been any hesitation among the members of the Commission in fixing the sentence of Mrs. Surratt--any more than in the cases of Herold, Atzerodt and Payne--much more that it had been found necessary to resort to a petition to the President, was entirely unknown to the public at large. As to what had taken place in the sessions of the Court when the sentences were made up, every member thereof and the three Judge-Advocates were sworn to secrecy; and, outside these officers, the knowledge of the petition was confined to the Secretary of War (possibly the Attorney-General) and one or two subordinates in the War Department. The record of the findings and sentences, to which the petition was attached, was kept from the official reporters, and not a soul outside a close coterie in the War Department was allowed to set eyes on it.
In the recital of the death sentences in the order of the Adjutant-General directing their execution, the sentence of the woman differed in no respect from the three sentences of the men which preceded it. So far as the public eye could discover, there was not a gleam of mercy for the woman in the bosom of the Commission.
It is true, that even before the execution there were rumors that the Court had united in a recommendation to mercy, and it was stated in the newspapers of the 6th and 7th of July that five members of the Commission had signed such a recommendation and the whole Court concurred in it. It is also certain, that almost immediately after the execution the story sprang up that the President had never been allowed to see the recommendation which the Court had addressed to him.
But all these statements remained without corroboration from any authentic source, and could not stand before the indubitable facts of the sentence, its approval by the President, and its summary execution. The single indication that in all these reports the paper is miscalled "a recommendation to mercy" shows of itself that the real nature of the secret was well kept.
In November, 1865, there appeared a volume compiled by Benn Pitman styled "The Recorder to the Commission," claiming to be "An authentic record of the trial of the assassins of the late President," to which was prefixed a certificate "to its faithfulness and accuracy" by Colonel Burnett, who had been assigned by Judge Holt to superintend the compilation and "made responsible for its strict accuracy." This work, so authenticated, was on its face intended by its compiler to be a complete history "for future use and reference" of the proceedings of the Commission, from the order of the President convening it to the approval of the President of its findings and sentences. It had for frontispiece portraits of the conspirators and a map of portions of Maryland and Virginia showing the route of Booth, and for afterpiece a diagram of the stage of Ford's theatre and a diagram of the streets in its vicinity. Beside matter strictly of record, such as the testimony and the findings and sentences, it included the arguments of all the counsel, the approval of the President, the order changing the place of imprisonment from Albany to the Dry Tortugas, the proceedings under the writ of habeas corpus in the case of Mrs. Surratt; and (in the appendix) the opinion of Attorney-General Speed; army instructions in ten sections; a proclamation of President Lincoln; a poisonous affidavit of Weichman, inclosed in a letter to Colonel Burnett; and an affidavit of Captain Dutton, who took Dr. Mudd to the Dry Tortugas, giving the confessions the Captain swears the Doctor made on the way, sent to General Holt in obedience to his request for such information. Nevertheless, amid all this wealth of illustration, there is not the faintest allusion to any such thing as a recommendation to mercy, in the volume. On the one hand, Pittman may not have seen the paper. His findings and sentences are obviously taken from the order of the Adjutant-General, and not from the original record, as he puts them in the same order, which is not the order of the record. But, if he never saw the paper, it must have been purposely kept from his knowledge, and thus from the knowledge of the public, by some person interested in its suppression. And Colonel Burnett, who had himself attached the paper "at the end" of the record, instead of certifying to the "faithfulness and accuracy" of a compilation omitting it, ought rather to have insisted that so important and interesting a document, about the existence of which so much talk had arisen, be at last given to the world.