Impeached: The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln's Legacy

by David O. Stewart

  Others pegged him: E.g., Globe Supp., p. 231 (April 18, 1868) (Ross votes to admit testimony of Cabinet members); Baltimore Sun, May 12, 1868, and New York Herald, May 13, 1868 (Ross doubtful); New York Times, May 11, 12, and 14, 1868 (Ross for conviction on four articles); Mark A. Plummer, “Profile in Courage? Edmund G. Ross and the Impeachment Trial,” Midwest Quarterly 27:30, 35 (1985) (Kansas newspapers recording Ross as voting to convict).

  “I never allow”: C. C. Warner to Butler, April 15, 1868, in Butler Papers, Box 45 (Butler’s cover note is written in the margins of the letter).

  if the President: Browning Diary, vol. 2, p. 195 (May 4, 1868).

  A deal between Wade and Pomeroy: Plummer, “Profile in Courage?” pp. 33–34; Berwanger, pp. 236, 239; Kansas Weekly Patriot (Burlington, KS), June 20, 1868. Accounts at the time were not clear on whether Pomeroy expected to be trusted with Kansas patronage under a Wade presidency or would have even larger influence.

  Ross confirmed: Impeachment Money, p. 31.

  Ross’s position seemed: Cincinnati Gazette, May 18, 1868; Daily Cleveland Herald, May 19, 1868 (the newspaper correspondent was the respected Henry Van Ness Boynton; the senator was Alexander Cattell, a New Jersey Republican); Impeachment Money, p. 30 (testimony of Mr. Green).

  Without being specific: Impeachment Money, p. 32; New York Tribune, May 16, 1868.

  Supposedly offered $20,000: Philadelphia Press, May 18, 1868; Bangor Daily Whig and Courier, May 27, 1868, reprinting report of Rochester Express; Bumgardner, p. 78.

  Kansas repudiates you: Text of telegrams copied in memorandum, Ross Papers; Plummer, “Profile in Courage?” p. 36. Though he came from Rochester, New York, Anthony had a frontier swagger. One report has him tracking down Ross in the early 1870s and beating the former senator with his cane. Kubicek, p. 151. Anthony later survived a dramatic shooting at the Leavenworth Opera House, New York Times, September 18, 1875. His son, Daniel Anthony, Jr., succeeded him as editor of the newspaper and represented Kansas in Congress for twenty-two years.

  He left the Pomeroys: Bumgardner, p. 79; Impeachment Money, p. 32.

  At midnight: Impeachment Money, p. 30; Ross to Major Hoxie, November 2, 1896, in Hoxie-Ream Papers, Box 3.

  Out in the early morning hours: In Kansas, it was said during the Johnson Administration that “a good fee, and Thomas Ewing, Jr., on one’s side, is all that is necessary to secure almost anything in the line of Indian contracts or government lands from the Department of the Interior.” Gates, Fifty Million Acres, p. 158.

  Ross then assured Sickles: Stanton was Sickles’s defense lawyer in an 1859 murder trial. Sickles had shot and killed Philip Barton Key, son of Francis Scott Key, because of an affair between Key and Sickles’s wife. Stanton argued that Sickles, stunned by his wife’s betrayal, was temporarily insane, and won his client’s acquittal. Nat Brandt, The Congressman Who Got Away with Murder, Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press (1991), pp. 113–89; Thomas Kenneally, American Scoundrel: The Life of the Notorious Civil War General Dan Sickles, New York: Nan A. Talese/Doubleday (2002), pp. 122–200.

  When young Vinnie: Baltimore Gazette, May 29, 1868; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 30, 1868; Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 2d sess. (May 29, 1868), pp. 2674–75 (Rep. Morgan; Rep. Julian).

  Miss Ream differed: New York Sun, October 25, 1896; Vinnie Ream Hoxie to General O. O. Howard, November 14, 1896, in Hoxie-Ream Papers.

  This time, with Thad Stevens: Impeachment Money, pp. 30, 32.

  Shook came to Washington: Impeachment Managers’ Investigation, p. 10; Impeachment Money, pp. 21–22.

  He then reported: Handwritten table of telegrams, Butler Papers, Box 45.

  On May 15, the day before the vote: Barlow to Ward, May 12 and 15, 1868, in Barlow Papers, Box 64.

  They did not need it: Impeachment Managers’ Investigation, pp. 10–11, 20, 27, 28. In any event, Craig, the railroad man from Missouri, viewed Pomeroy as “a Blow-gun and blatherskite.” Craig to Joy, April 10, 1868, in Joy Collection.

  In his dinner invitation: Impeachment Money, p. 20. Ward explained that he signed his note to Evarts as “Horace” because he had given Evarts a volume of Horace that Ward had received from the British novelist William Makepeace Thackeray. Henry A. Beers, The Connecticut Wits and Other Essays, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press (1920), p. 112. 271 Woolley and Sheridan Shook: Thomas, pp. 345, 427–29; Galveston Daily News, May 28, 1875; Impeachment Money, p. 19.

  Most of the rumored commitments: Mark Wahlgren Summers, The Era of Good Stealings, New York: Oxford University Press (1993), p. 41.

  Paradoxically, the future president: New York Herald, May 14, 1868, reprinting article from Chicago Republican.

  Better yet: Philadelphia Press, May 11, 12, and 14, 1868; New York World, May 16, 1868; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 15, 1868. John D. Candel to Butler, May 12, 1868, in Butler Papers, Box 43: “If the present Senate will not convict Andrew Johnson, can not the taking of the vote be adjourned till such time as the new senators are admitted from the southern states and then his conviction will be sure?.

  In debate on the day: New York Times, May 15, 1868; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 16, 1868, reprinting editorial from Philadelphia Press, May 15, 1868; Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 2d sess., p. 2465 (May 15, 1868); Brodie, pp. 352–53; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 15, 1868; New York World, May 16, 1868; Philadelphia Press, March 10 and 26, 1868; New York Herald, May 8, 1868.

  Pomeroy assured them: New York Herald, May 16, 1868; New York Times, May 16, 1868; Badeau, p. 136.

  In one sermon: New York Herald, May 16, 1868.

  A warning went out: Cincinnati Gazette, May 14, 1868.

  More shocking: New York Times, May 14, 1868; Baltimore Sun, May 14, 1868; Gustavus Fox Diary, May 15, 1868.

  23. FREE AGAIN

  “Glory enough”: Impeachment Money, p. 28.

  The Republicans resolved: Chicago Tribune, May 18, 1868; Philadelphia Press, May 18, 1868; Cincinnati Gazette, May 18, 1868.

  Ignoring reporters: New York World, May 17, 1868; Howe, Portrait of An Independent, p. 108.

  The quiet: New York Tribune, May 18, 1868.

  Though it was a warm day: New York World, May 17, 1868.

  “All turns on Ross’ vote”: Baltimore Gazette, May 17, 1868; Chicago Tribune, May 18, 1868; New York Herald, May 17, 1868; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 18, 1868; Henderson, “Emancipation and Impeachment,” p. 207; Cincinnati Gazette, May 18, 1868.

  He said, clearly: New York Tribune, May 18, 1868.

  Colleagues around him: Julian, p. 316.

  Aware that every eye: Edmund Ross, “Historic Moments: The Impeachment Trial,” Scribner’s 11:524 (1892); “A Woman’s Letters from Washington,” The Independent, May 28, 1868; New York World, May 17, 1868; New York Tribune, May 18, 1868.

  John Logan spat: Blaine, vol. 2, p. 317; Baltimore Gazette, May 18, 1868; Mushkat, p. 283; Henderson, p. 208.

  “Black with rage”: W. H. Crook, Through Five Administrations, New York: Harper & Brothers (1910) (edited by Margarita Spalding Gerry), p. 133.

  Johnson and his men: Ibid., p. 134; New York World, May 17, 1868.

  “Men’s consciences”: New York Times, May 18, 1868; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 18, 1868. Mrs. Johnson received the news of the acquittal separately, from the White House steward. “I knew he’d be acquitted,” she said in response. “I knew it.” Crook, Memories of the White House, p. 67.

  After congratulating: Samuel J. Barrows and Isabel C. Barrows, “Personal Reminiscences of William H. Seward,” Atlantic Monthly 63:379, 389 (1889); Van Deusen, p. 480.

  “There goes the rascal”: Bumgardner, p. 86; Cincinnati Gazette, May 18, 1868.

  They were still drunk: Impeachment Managers’ Investigation, p. 11; Impeachment Money, p. 41.

  The president also attended: Unsigned Memorandum, May 16–18, 1868, in Butler Papers; Cincinnati Gazette, May 18, 1868; New York World, May 17, 1868.


  Less than three hours: Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 2d sess., pp. 2503–5 (May 16, 1868); Archives, Impeachment: Various House Papers (resolution drafted by John Bingham).

  He denied knowledge: Archives, Managers’ Journal, pp. 71–72. Philadelphia Press, May 18, 1868.

  “How does it happen”: Butler to James Russell Young, May 16, 1868, in Young Papers. Republican assumptions that bribery occurred are described in correspondence from Morefield Storey, aide to Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner, and in newspapers. Storey to his father, May 17, 1868, in Howe, Portrait of an Independent, pp. 112–14; Daily Cleveland Herald, May 18, 1868.

  Richmond received: New York Times, May 17, 1868; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 18, 1868; Daily News and Herald (Savannah, GA), May 18, 1868.

  Those supporting impeachment: Henderson, “Emancipation and Impeachment,” p. 208; Cincinnati Gazette, May 19, 1868 (the defectors “have been deeply mortified and greatly disappointed at the universal cry of shame, where they had expected, at least toleration, if not applause”); Arkansas Daily Gazette, June 4, 1868; Bayless, p. 86; The Independent, May 21, 1868.

  1. Bad articles: Chicago Tribune, May 17, 1868.

  Despairing of bringing Ross: Impeachment Managers’ Investigation; Blaine, vol. 2, p. 375; Archives, Managers’ Journal, p. 73 (May 23, 1868); Cincinnati Gazette, May 23, 1868; Chicago Tribune, May 23 and 26, 1868; Trefousse, Benjamin Butler, p. 204.

  The Senate never voted: Globe Supp., pp. 413–15 (May 26, 1868).

  The officer delivered: E. P. Townsend, pp. 132–33; Thomas and Hyman, pp. 608–9.

  Much of his booty: Richardson, pp. 24, 38; Ritchie, p. 87.

  Grimes called the incumbent: Globe Supp., pp. 419–20, 424.

  Henderson’s explanation: Globe Supp., pp. 457, 520.

  Finally, the senator denied: Ibid., pp. 432–33. A brief flurry of attention surrounded a report in the New York Tribune that Chief Justice Chase persuaded Van Winkle to vote for acquittal. As the story evolved, Van Winkle supposedly was influenced only by Chase’s description to the Senate of the impeachment charge in Article XI, but there was no private conversation between the two men on the subject. Daily Cleveland Herald, June 5, 1868; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 25, 1868. Chase was certainly capable of discussing his views of the impeachment articles with individual senators, and acknowledged that he did so in a letter to the Tribune’s editor (Horace Greeley) on May 19, 1868. Warden, p. 696.

  Calling them “parasitic insects”: Globe Supp., p. 472.

  Decrying the impeachment effort: Daily Cleveland Herald, June 16, 1868.

  He denied that his vote: Ross to Mrs. Ross, May 22, 1868, in Bumgardner, p. 89; Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 2d sess., p. 2599 (May 27, 1868) (Sen. Ross); Cincinnati Gazette, May 28, 1868.

  An ally of the Astor House group: Impeachment Money, p. 12.

  The listing of Nye: Trefousse, Impeachment of the President, p. 169; Chicago Tribune, May 18, 1868; Benjamin C. Truman, “Anecdotes of Andrew Johnson,” Century 85:435–40 (1913); Henderson, “Emancipation and Impeachment,” p. 207; Horace White, The Life of Lyman Trumbull, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. (1913), p. 321; Impeachment Money, p. 22. Senator Nye, who voted to convict, was originally from New York, where he was an ally of Seward and Thurlow Weed. Michael Green, “Diehard or Swing Man: Senator James W. Nye and Andrew Johnson’s Impeachment and Trial,” Nevada Historical Society Quarterly 29:176 (1986); Cincinnati Commercial, March 9, 1868. Nye was described as leaning toward the president by one observer. Edmund Goold to Samuel Barlow, March 26, 1868, Barlow Papers, Box 66. Nye is listed as a vote for sale in an undated newspaper article about postal agent James Legate of Kansas, in Box 74 of the Thomas Ewing Family Papers. Chicago Tribune, May 29, 1868.

  Johnson also had expected: Moore Diary/Large Diary, p. 39 (May 17, 1868).

  24. SEARCHING FOR SCANDAL

  People here [in Washington]: Barlow Papers, Box 68.

  What about the businessman: John Bisk to Butler, May 21, 1868; Morris Alberger to Butler, June 1, 1868; Sidney Bates to Butler, May 25, 1868; S. F. Norton to Butler, May 26, 1868; G. Weitzel to Butler, May 28, 1868; R. Bartiteu to Butler, May 19, 1868; “Justice” to Butler, May 20, 1868; Thomas Church to Butler, May 19, 1868; James Pine to Butler, May 21, 1868; L. B. Halsey to Butler, all in Butler Papers, Box 45.

  Like many sporting men: Alexander Saxton, “George Wilkes: The Transformation of a Radical Ideology,” American Quarterly 33:437 (1981); New York World, May 7, 13, and 19, 1868; New York Tribune, May 15, 1868.

  Charley Morgan, Wilkes pointed out: Wilkes to Butler, May 21 and 23, 1868, in Butler Papers, Box 45. For a lurid description of Morrissey’s colorful life, there is William E. Harding, John Morrissey: His Life, Battles, and Wrangles, New York: Police Gazette (1881).

  Butler never proved: New York Times, June 1, 1868. M. Alberger to Butler, June 1, 1868, in Butler Papers, Box 45; Ward to Barlow, June 19, 1868, in Barlow Papers, Box 68. According to Ward, Butler “took me aside and begged me to believe that he had no hand in Charley’s arrest—on the contrary, he had resisted attempts of parties to have him subpoenaed and brought before the Committee to mortify me..

  Missouri’s Henderson appeared: Chicago Tribune, May 29, 1868; Archives, Managers’ Journal, p. 75; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 21, 1868; St. Louis Morning Republican, May 22, 1868. Henderson’s resentment of Butler’s methods led him to propose that the Senate investigate Butler’s investigation. Cincinnati Gazette, May 23, 1868; New York World, May 21, 1868. Such a Senate committee was approved, but it took no significant actions. Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 3d sess., p. 1865 (March 3, 1869); Ellis Paxson Oberholtzer, A History of the United States Since the Civil War, New York: Macmillan Co. (1928), pp. 146–47.

  Butler, acutely aware: Impeachment Managers’ Investigation, p. 5; Boston Post, undated, in Young Papers; Matthew Carey, Jr., The Democratic Speaker’s Handbook, Cincinnati: Miami Printing & Publishing Co. (1868), p. 59.

  Unfortunately for Woolley: Archives, Managers’ Journal, pp. 73–75; Chicago Tribune, May 21, 1868; Chicago Tribune, May 20, 1868; Impeachment Money, p. 39; Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 2d sess., p. 2947 (June 8, 1868).

  Woolley accompanied that message: D. H. Bliss to Butler, May 21, 1868, in Butler Papers, Box 45; affidavit of Charles Woolley, May 21, 1868, in Butler Papers, Box 45; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 22, 1868.

  That report admitted: Impeachment Managers’ Investigation, p. 12; Cincinnati Gazette, May 24, 1868.

  The House found him: Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 2d sess., pp. 2585–90 (May 26, 1868).

  She was forced: Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 27 and 28, 1868; New York Times, May 30, 1868; Bangor Daily Whig & Courier, May 29, 1868.

  Another Seward intimate: Ransom Van Valkenburg served as a mid-level courier for Seward, and was involved in the secretary of state’s negotiation with Denmark to acquire the Virgin Islands. Impeachment Money, p. 40; Seward to Butler, October 26, 1864, in Private and Official Correspondence of General Benjamin F. Butler During the Period of Civil War, Norwood, MA: Plimpton Press (1917), p. 286.

  After the committee first questioned: The New York Times of January 22, 1893, reported that in 1868 the ride from Jersey City to Washington took eight hours and fifty-two minutes, an average speed of 25 miles per hour.

  In one of the most convincing passages: Impeachment Money, pp. 41–44.

  Stymied by this “mass of corruption”: Archives, Managers’ Journal, pp. 81, 91–94 (June 8–11, 1868); Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 2d sess., pp. 2937–47 June 8, 1868). Impeachment Money, pp. 42, 44; Fort Wayne Daily Gazette, June 13, 1868; Daily Cleveland Herald, June 17, 1868. Woolley was told that his release was purchased by a deal between Butler and the president on the appointment of a new head of the revenue service. Woolley to Johnson, June 11, 1868, in Johnson Papers 14:101–2. Johnson, however, never made the rumored appointment, preferring Perry Fuller for the position. The correspondent for the New York Tri
bune eviscerated Woolley’s claim that the $20,000 had been intended to support lobbying efforts on tax legislation. That would mean, the Tribune writer pointed out, that the money was to be used in a different corrupt effort, one to influence legislation that had died two weeks before May 17, the date on which Van Valkenburg supposedly took custody of the money from the inebriated Woolley and Shook. New York Tribune, June 10, 1868.

  John Bingham and the governor: W. G. Brownlow to Butler, June 29, 1868, in Butler Papers; Cincinnati Gazette, June 22, 1868; Impeachment Money, pp. 28–29. Butler claimed that Fowler demanded the impeachment of President Johnson as early as 1866. Cincinnati Gazette, June 22, 1868; Erving E. Beauregard, “The Chief Prosecutor of Andrew Johnson,” Midwest Quarterly 31:419 (1990), citing James R. Therry, “The Life of General Robert Cumming Schenck,” Ph.D. dissertation, Georgetown University (1968); Cincinnati Gazette, June 12, 1868.

  The Indian trader’s purpose: Legate Testimony of May 22, 1868, before Impeachment Investigation Committee, p. 3, in Butler Papers, Box 175; Impeachment Money, pp. 8–9.

  Because Butler never found out: Ward to Barlow, June 19, 1868, in Barlow Papers, Box 68; Letter of Samuel Ward, New York World, May 26, 1868; The Nation, May 28, 1868, p. 422.

  Whatever Butler missed: Ward to Butler, June 14, 1868, in Butler Papers, Box 45; Ward letter, undated, in Papers of Samuel Ward, New York Public Library, Box 1.

  He meticulously traced: Impeachment Money, p. 45.

  Yet Butler took no action: Archives, Managers’ Journal, p. 86 (June 2, 1868), p. 93 (June 10, 1868), p. 101 (June 19, 1868), p. 106 (June 25, 1868), p. 108 (June 27, 1868); A. W. Adams to Butler, June 19, 1869, in Butler Papers, Box 45; Impeachment Money, p. 24. Possibly the least explained recollection of the trial came from President Johnson’s bodyguard, who claimed he carried “many messages” between the president and Butler during the later stages of the trial. What could the president and his chief prosecutor have been communicating to each other? Did the president’s lawyers know about the communications? No one has provided a well-founded explanation. Gerry, p. 870.