The trial wasn't the finest hour of American justice as the treatment of the prisoners seemed medieval in its barbarism. Almost all of the male prisoners were dragged into the courtroom with linen masks shielding their faces and chains and heavy iron balls strapped to their ankles. With clanking irons, they shuffled in and, once seated, their hoods were removed. The military commission took testimony for seven weeks and ultimately found all eight defendants guilty, with four of them {Mary Surratt, Lewis Powell, David Herold, and George Atzerodt} sentenced to hang while three others {including Michael O'Laughlen} were given life imprisonment and one a six-year term. Mary Surratt, who ran a boardinghouse where Booth colluded with other conspirators, went down in historical annals as the first woman ever executed by the federal government.
( Ron Chernow )
[ Grant ]
www.QuoteSweet.com