“I know. Just let me put everything away.”
“That would take all summer,” Mary teased as her blue eyes ran over Robert’s crowded, cluttered library.
“Just my desk, then.” He smiled sleepily. “And then I’m yours. I promise.”
Mary kissed her husband and left him to his work.
Robert put on his spectacles and raised his head. The brass clock on his mantelpiece showed it was well past midnight. The gold pocket watch on his desk, however, remained frozen at a different hour. Robert closed the silent timepiece and slipped it into his pocket.
Within his scarlet library, seven steamer trunks formed a fortress around Robert’s desk. Prepared by Charles Sweet, Robert’s Chicago secretary, the chests contained every correspondence, letter, and note then-Captain Robert T. Lincoln packed in Washington nearly fifty years ago. It was a treasure trove of history and one of the greatest private archives in the world: the presidential papers of Abraham Lincoln.
Among the many files scattered across Robert’s desk was an open folder. It was marked “A” for “assassination” by his father’s own hand. The file contained just a fraction of the more than ten thousand death threats his father received in his first term, not counting the innumerable jars of poisoned fruit sent to him by Southerners before his inauguration. Since Abraham never took any of these threats seriously, Robert imagined that Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton or Allan Pinkerton had urged his father to collect them for further investigation. He never could understand why his father was so convinced no one would ever harm him. It was a fatal mistake, thought Robert. He closed the folder and stowed it in its trunk, dejected that its contents brought him no closer to solving the mysteries of his enigmatic pocket watch.
Also on Robert’s desk was an open book with a clipping from the Washington Evening Star in it. Dated April 14, 1894, the article featured the personal account of Detective James A. McDevitt of the Washington Metropolitan Police during the earliest hours of the manhunt for John Wilkes Booth and his accomplices. The clipping retold the search for Lewis Powell “Payne,” the madman who nearly murdered Secretary of State William H. Seward, his son Frederick, and many others the night of the assassination:
TRAGIC MEMORIES
Some Interesting Reminiscences of a Thrilling Night.
WHY BOOTH WAS NOT SOON CAPTURED
Detective McDevitt’s Recollections Following the Assassination.
MR. AL. DAGGETT’S STORY
Interests.
Written for The Evening Star …
A Hint Given.
“The crowd acted very well, indeed. They received my speech in good faith and made way for us thereafter, as we came and went with our witnesses. I was out on one of these scouting expeditions when I met a man whose face seemed very familiar. He was evidently an actor whom I had seen on the stage, and the impression left on my mind was that it was John McCullough, the afterward famous tragedian. I do not want to speak positively on this point, for I have never ascertained whether McCullough was in Washington at that time or not. At any rate, the man stopped me, called me by name and gave me this startling hint:
“‘If you want to find out all about this desperate business, keep an eye on Mrs. Surrratt’s house in H street.’
“Mark you, this was the first intimation given or received by any one as to where the plot was hatched. I acted on it without delay. With some other detectives I visited Mrs. Surratt’s house and searched it; we then turned it over to the military to watch, and it was they who captured Payne as he was returning to the house…”20
Robert knew the eventual arrest of Booth’s coconspirators hinged on this crucial tip Detective McDevitt received from John McCullough so shortly after the assassination. There was just one problem with the detective’s account of that evening: the book Robert kept the clipping in. It was the Army’s official transcript of the trial for the conspirators, and one of its passages was circled:
Mr. Ewing, with the consent of the Judge Advocate, offered as evidence of the same validity, as if the same fact were testified to by Mr. John McCullough, the actor, on the stand, the following telegraphic dispatch:
MONTREAL, June 2, 1865.
To John T. Ford, National Hotel:
I left Washington on Monday evening, March 26th, and have not been there since. You can have my testimony before American Consul here, if requisite.
JOHN McCULLOUGH.21
Robert had spent the last month trying to figure out how McCullough—or anyone, for that matter—could have provided the government with such intimate details about Booth’s coconspirators when McCullough was supposedly in Canada that evening. Detective McDevitt was at the Surratt house with three other detectives less than three hours after the assassination: a fantastic feat. Almost too fantastic to be taken seriously. After researching the subject, Robert began to wonder if Detective McDevitt’s unknown source even existed. Was it possible the War Department or the Pinkertons were monitoring John Surratt, a spy and member of the Confederate secret service, just days before the assassination? That might explain why the government was convinced so early on that Surratt was involved in the plot against William and Frederick Seward, who Robert believed were the most likely candidates to have given his father the mysterious pocket watch on his desk.
Unfortunately, a letter beneath the timepiece put an untimely end to the investigation.
CHICAGO-JUNE-12-1911
MR. R. T. LINCOLN
MANCHESTER, BENNINGTON CO., VERMONT
DEAR SIR,
I AM IN RECEIPT OF YOURS OF MAY 2ND ASKING THAT I WRITE ABOUT ANY SURVELANCE MY FATHER AND/OR THE PINKERTON NATIONAL DETECTIVE AGENCY CONDUCTED ON THE SURRATT BOARDINGHOUSE PRIOR TO YOUR FATHER’S MURDER. AS SUCH, DO NOT WRITE ME AGAIN.
VERY TRULY YOURS,
W.A.PINKERTON
P.S. EDWIN M. STANTON KILLED MY FATHER AND PROBABLY YOURS AS WELL.
Robert, who wept with Stanton every morning for more than ten days after the assassination, knew he was a wholly honorable man. After closing his book, Robert crumpled Pinkerton’s letter and tossed it onto a growing pile in his fireplace.
Much more important to Robert were his letters from John Hays Hammond about the samples they had collected in Alaska. Unfortunately, they amounted to little more than an entire year of false hopes and dead ends.
One by one, Robert collected them into their folder.
August 4, 1910.
My dear Mr. Lincoln:-
I am writing to let you know I have arrived in New Haven. I am sorry I could not write you sooner, but I had to host a conference at my home in Gloucester. I hope my tardiness did not distress you.
Unfortunately, quite a few of my colleagues are on vacation, but I should be able to run some preliminary tests on our specimens starting tomorrow. Naturally, I will be operating under the utmost secrecy. No one will know where these samples came from or the purpose of my experiments. If anyone asks, I will tell them I am testing the university’s laboratory equipment in preparation for the upcoming school year.
As for those “other” samples you gave me, I have already subjected them to numerous chemical tests. The results are the same as on the airship: lead (Pb).
Are you certain these samples came from the “power source” of that artifact you described? I’ve never heard of a machine that ran off lead and cannot fathom how such an invention could work. If you were to show me this device, perhaps it would aid me in my research. Until then, I respect your privacy.
With best wishes,
Sincerely yours,
John Hays Hammond
August 10, 1910.
My dear Mr. Lincoln:-
Some news!
The top layers of several soil samples from Alaska were slightly more radioactive than their lower layers. This suggests the atmosphere above the Wrangell Mountains was radioactive in the weeks and months before we arrived. Possibly because of the planet’s recent interaction with Halley’s comet!
I a
lso analyzed the dust coating some of our rocks, earth, and ice samples and boiled them down into mineral salts. They displayed a deep blue band when measured with a spectroscope, which suggests an unusually high amount of cesium (Cs) in the region.
Could this have caused that mysterious “blue light” over the mountains?
Either way, I believe the high level of radiation on and around the Wrangell Mountains is related to, if not caused by, these surprising amounts of cesium we collected.
I suggest you ask some of your international friends if they detected high levels of cesium in their atmospheres when we passed through the comet’s tail. It would be the best use of both our time since I have to travel in the coming months.
Good luck,
Very sincerely yours,
John Hays Hammond
October 3, 1910
Dear Mr. Lincoln:
It is a pleasure to hear from you again.
Yes, I still have the air samples I collected in May. I examined them as you requested but did not detect any cesium.
Is it possible this radioactive phenomenon you described is emanating from outside the Earth’s atmosphere? I had a piece published in Physikalische Zeitschrift last month about my experience measuring radiation atop the Eiffel Tower. Please read it, because I believe it may explain the fantastic displays you monitored as a rare, but natural occurrence originating from the heavens.
However, I must confess that the high levels of cesium you detected is alarming. The element is quite explosive in elemental form.
Godspeed on your endeavor.
My deepest blessings,
Fr. Theodor Wulf, S.J.
December 6, 1910.
Dear Mr. Lincoln:-
As you’ve probably read in the papers, I will be going to Russia this winter to discuss mining operations in European Russia with the tsar.
Is there anything you would like me to ask them about Alaska?
Sincerely yours,
John Hays Hammond
December 17, 1910.
My dear Mr. Lincoln:-
That is a most unusual request, but I will do as you ask. Consider it a Christmas present.
Seasons greeting,
Very sincerely yours,
John Hays Hammond
December 29, 1910.
Mr. Lincoln:-
My meeting with the tsar ended yesterday.
Would you mind explaining why I had to make a fool of myself by asking his Majesty about Russian watchmakers in Alaska during the American Civil War? His aides laughed about it for days at my expense.
Yours,
John Hays Hammond
Zurich. 2.11.11.
Dear Sir:-
Thank you for your compliments on my writing about the link between critical opalescence and Rayleigh scattering. I am hopeful it will settle the dispute since time immemorial over why the sky as we know it is blue.
Unfortunately, I remain at a disadvantage to explain this atmospheric occurrence you described since it does not read like anything found in nature. The report you shared from Yale University involved cesium detected in soil, ice, etc. However, there is little evidence to suggest this cesium came from Halley’s comet due to our most recent understanding of the comet’s composition.
I must concur with the Yale scientists that this phenomenon somehow originated from our planet. How and why, however, remains a mystery to me.
I would like to continue this correspondence, but I am afraid it must wait. I am starting a new position in Prague and must prepare myself. Please accept my apologies.
Sincerely yours,
Albert Einstein
P.S. These designs you included for a pocket watch are elegant, but fanciful. Do the laws of thermodynamics no longer apply to clocks? If only I had known, I would have become a watchmaker!
April 8, 1911.
My dear Mr. Lincoln:-
I must regretfully report that my colleagues at the Sheffield School, the Kent and Sloan Laboratories, and the Peabody Museum have determined yet again that those samples from your “artifact” are lead and nothing but lead.
I apologize if their findings are unsatisfactory, but they have run just about every chemical test known to science on your specimens.
Yale is growing suspicious about my activities, so I am afraid we can no longer use university equipment for our research. However, I think we should consider the matter closed: your artifact does not work because it cannot work. It is scientifically impossible.
How can any device run on lead?
Very sincerely yours,
John Hays Hammond
P.S. I am including a newspaper article on some recent developments in Alaska. It looks like the Morgans and the Guggenheims have finally started moving copper out of their mines.
The clipping, which arrived with John’s letter on Good Friday, was particularly damning for Robert. It brought him closer than ever to acknowledging that the entire expedition to Alaska had been a folly: “Lincoln’s folly” if the papers ever got wind of it.
ALASKA COPPER COMING.
First Shipment Made by the Guggenheims from the Bonanza.
Special to The New York Times.
TACOMA, Wash., April 2.—The first ore shipment to the Tacoma smelter from the world-famous Bonanza copper mine, 200 miles from Cordova, will leave the mine next Thursday. The day will be celebrated as “copper day” at Cordova and along the railroad. The shipment of 2,000 tons of picked ore has been insured for $250,000.
Beginning May 1, two cargo steamships will be operated between Tacoma and Cordova, bringing Bonanza ores to the smelter here. The Superintendent of the Bonanza mine last Fall made the announcement that returns from the initial shipment to the Tacoma smelter would amaze the mining world, and it is confidently believed this promise will be fulfilled …22
Robert closed this folder and threw it into the fireplace as well.
However, there were some papers on Robert’s desk that survived the evening. One folder chronicled the war Attorney General Wickersham was currently waging against U.S. Steel.
STEEL TRUST INQUIRY ORDERED BY HOUSE
Authorizes Committee to Ascertain if It Has Violated the Anti-Trust Law.
TO BARE ITS RAMIFICATIONS
Seeks Light on Its Relations with Other Steel Concerns and with Railroad and Financial Interests.
Special to The New York Times.
WASHINGTON, May 16.—The House to-day passed the Stanley resolution for the investigation of the Steel Trust. This is the third investigation authorized by the House this session, the first being the Sugar Trust and the second the Post Office Department …23
CARNEGIE IN STEEL INQUIRY.
House Committee to Call Him on Tuesday—Wickersham to Testify.
Special to The New York Times.
WASHINGTON, May 20.—The Steel investigation will start off next Monday in full blast. The special committee has had several sessions this week, and to-day decided to call Andrew Carnegie, Attorney General Wickersham, and Herbert Knox Smith, Commissioner of Corporations. The committee will have a conference on Monday with Mr. Wickersham and Mr. Smith to draw up a programme for the conduct of the investigation …24
GATES TELLS HOW STEEL CORPORATION ACQUIRED CONTROL.
Tells Probers That Morgan, Schwab, and Himself Evolved Scheme.
John W. Gates, of New York, went on the witness stand before a select committee of the House today and told of the manner in which the United States Steel Corporation was organized and the motives which prompted that organization.
J. Pierpont Morgan, Charles Schwab, and Gates were the three men who evolved the scheme whereby Andrew Carnegie was eliminated as a factor in the steel industry and that this scheme was worked out at an all-night conference in the home of Mr. Morgan …25
ROOSEVELT CALLED IN STEEL INQUIRY
Will Be Asked to Tell What He Knows About Tennessee Coal and Iron Purchase.
DUE TO GATES’S TESTIMONY
Colonel’s
Version as Explained When President in a Letter to Bonaparte Was Contradicted.
WASHINGTON, May 29.—Theodore Roosevelt is desired as a witness before the special “Steel Trust” Investigating Committee of the House. A request has been sent to Col. Roosevelt to appear and tell what he knows about the taking over of the Tennessee Coal and Iron Company by the United States Steel Corporation …26
PROBE OF STEEL TRUST NOW SEEMS CERTAIN
Information from Reliable Source Has It That Department of Justice Will Next Move Against U.S. Steel Corporation—Report Almost Finished.
It is apparent now that the Department of Justice is seriously considering the possibility of moving against the United States Steel Corporation as a combination in violation of the Sherman anti-trust law …27
STEEL TRUST HEADS FACE CRIMINAL TRIAL
Evidence Gathered by Bureau of Corporations Now Available for Prosecution.
FREIGHT RATES AN ISSUE
Chairman Stanley Draws Attention to Charges Over Lines Owned by Steel Corporation—Gary in Washington.
The Great Abraham Lincoln Pocket Watch Conspiracy: A Novel Page 15
