You Are Looking for Who?

While looking on eBay to see if there were listed items connected to the Lincoln Conspiracy, I found someone selling an authentic John Wilkes Booth Wanted Poster. For those familiar with the TV show Pawn Stars, you may remember the episode it was featured on.

However, there were a few different versions of the poster printed in 1865. The one being sold now does not have the pictures of Booth, John Surratt, and David Herold at the top. I'm not sure if any of those still exist, but that's the one I would purchase.

Viewing the poster, I noticed that the description of Herold was changed once again. Although the descriptions of Booth and Surratt remained almost unchanged, the one for Herold was rewritten for each new printing. (His name was also spelled wrong. It was David E. Herold but written as David C. Harold). I started searching around for images of the different posters and comparing each description. (Yes, that is what I do for fun).

I realized that without the photos that were added to later posters, the descriptions given of the men might not have been as helpful as the Union thought.

When I was younger, I used to love watching the show Cyberchase on PBS Kids. In one of the episodes, the three main characters go looking for the main villain. They were in this monster town and asked if anyone had seen a man with green skin wearing a cape. They ended up finding Dracula due to using general words to describe the person they were searching for. In a similar sense, many men were, and continue to be, mistaken for Booth because they have the same characteristics as those listed on the wanted poster.

Here are a few different versions of the John Wilkes Booth Wanted Poster.

 

 

 

The first was one of the original posters. It offered a $30,000 reward and was designed by Lafayette Baker, not Secretary of War Stanton. This version gave a longer description of Booth and one of the still unknown Lewis Powell. He had attacked Secretary of State Seward. The other two gave the same description of Booth and listed the full $100,000 reward. Also note that most of the description space went to John Surratt and not Booth. The last one featured pictures.

 

However, there was a problem with the earlier posters because they used descriptions alone. This was one of the reasons innocent men were lynched after being mistaken for Booth. Unless someone had met Booth, it was hard to locate him based only on those descriptions. Yes, Booth was a famous actor. That didn't mean everyone in the country knew him or had seen him. Furthermore, lots of men had the same build or hair color as Booth.

Here is the description of Booth on the Stanton designed poster without the pictures. The one written by Baker was not around for very long since, among other issues, it failed to produce leads.

"Booth is five feet 7 or 8 inches high, slender build, high forehead, black hair, black eyes, and wears a heavy black moustache."

 

That is not John Wilkes Booth. However, Herman Mudgett (alias H.H. Holmes) was five feet eight inches tall, had a slender build, wavy black hair, and a black moustache.
 



 

Samuel Arnold was one of Booth's co-conspirators. Notice that he had almost all the same characteristics as his boss. 

 

 

The seller of this image claims it's of Booth. It's not. However, this man also had similar features to the actor turned assassin.

 

And depending on how heavy a person thought a heavy moustache was, the description even described Robert Todd Lincoln, President Lincoln's eldest son.

 

Sometimes descriptions can be too general. In the case of Booth, they were. It wasn't until patrolling Union soldiers started showing photos of Booth that they got answers. In the end, it was Booth's picture, not his written description, that helped lead the 16th New York Cavalry to him. Maybe that's why they say a picture is worth a thousand words.

 

Until next time.

XOXO, Kate