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i just ordered (through innerliberry loan) the 3 volume transcript compiled by Benjamin Poore (no, Mr. Poore, you do not get to be a character in this story, i've got too many as it is, sorry). Poore's copy is the rarest of the transcipts and the most comprehensive. i don't know whether the library can get it for me, but i thought i would try.
in truth, i almost don't want to see it. i've gone through Pitman's copy (the most common), and also the "peanut butter" copy (which was produced by the Philadelphia Inquier ~ i call it the peanut butter copy because in my notes i write: p. x, PB, which stands for "Peterson Brothers" ~ the publishers). the peanut butter copy is the newspaper edition with questions and answers and some brief commentary. Poore's 3 volume edition is apparently the one that was taken verbatim (questions, answers, sniffles, farts, and all). because it's rare and a huge pile of paper, i was sort of ignoring it hoping that little nagging voice in the back of my brain would dissipate, but now having gone through Pitman and PB, i sorta feel i could get something useful out of Poore so long as i stick to my outline and only poke through the relevent testimonies (without getting too distracted by oooo shiny, what's that all about???). i also feel, like with the Hanty letter books, that if i'm serious about writing this novel, i can't ignore one of the obvious primary resources.
it makes me tired just thinking about it.
then i spend the evening reading the doctors' testimony of June 14th and it's so maddening and pathetic i just want to spork my eyes out ~ and i remember why i want to write this book.
so it's june 1st and i think i promised somewhere that around about june i would quit with the whole "big secret project" and code names and all that crudola. of course by now i'm so used to calling these people Poppet and Hanty, etc., it's going to be weird to stop.
that, and i still don't have a title, which is sad sad sad. so sad.
The top contenders at the moment:
the picture of the day:
Mr. Hanty and his staff on the day of the killings
(word choice very deliberate).
Hanty is sitting in the middle. he looks annoyed (it's hot and he's prolly pissed off given the circumstances). the fella sitting on Hanty's right (left to you and me) is Col. McCall ~ who is curiously not wearing or holding the hat he's described to have had that day. the fella to his left, standing, is Dr. Porter who helped Hanty get the Czar to ease up on the medievalism. the fella on the far left end is Mr. Mad ~ one of the only three people at the scene (non-reporters that i know of) who left final impressions for posterity.
a final macabre note: the chairs they are sitting on went from taking this picture straight up the steps of the scaffold to be used by the condemned while they sat in the heat waiting for the hope of an 11th hour reprieve.
in truth, i almost don't want to see it. i've gone through Pitman's copy (the most common), and also the "peanut butter" copy (which was produced by the Philadelphia Inquier ~ i call it the peanut butter copy because in my notes i write: p. x, PB, which stands for "Peterson Brothers" ~ the publishers). the peanut butter copy is the newspaper edition with questions and answers and some brief commentary. Poore's 3 volume edition is apparently the one that was taken verbatim (questions, answers, sniffles, farts, and all). because it's rare and a huge pile of paper, i was sort of ignoring it hoping that little nagging voice in the back of my brain would dissipate, but now having gone through Pitman and PB, i sorta feel i could get something useful out of Poore so long as i stick to my outline and only poke through the relevent testimonies (without getting too distracted by oooo shiny, what's that all about???). i also feel, like with the Hanty letter books, that if i'm serious about writing this novel, i can't ignore one of the obvious primary resources.
it makes me tired just thinking about it.
then i spend the evening reading the doctors' testimony of June 14th and it's so maddening and pathetic i just want to spork my eyes out ~ and i remember why i want to write this book.
so it's june 1st and i think i promised somewhere that around about june i would quit with the whole "big secret project" and code names and all that crudola. of course by now i'm so used to calling these people Poppet and Hanty, etc., it's going to be weird to stop.
that, and i still don't have a title, which is sad sad sad. so sad.
The top contenders at the moment:
In the Year King Uzziah Diedi've let Gracious Lick of a Friendly Dog fall by the wayside. i'm not crazy about any of these others either ~ but nothing yet has really throttled me as the obvious right choice.
Singing in Innocence
If Not for His Sake
The King Villain of them All
the picture of the day:
Mr. Hanty and his staff on the day of the killings
(word choice very deliberate).
Hanty is sitting in the middle. he looks annoyed (it's hot and he's prolly pissed off given the circumstances). the fella sitting on Hanty's right (left to you and me) is Col. McCall ~ who is curiously not wearing or holding the hat he's described to have had that day. the fella to his left, standing, is Dr. Porter who helped Hanty get the Czar to ease up on the medievalism. the fella on the far left end is Mr. Mad ~ one of the only three people at the scene (non-reporters that i know of) who left final impressions for posterity.
a final macabre note: the chairs they are sitting on went from taking this picture straight up the steps of the scaffold to be used by the condemned while they sat in the heat waiting for the hope of an 11th hour reprieve.
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From:
no subject
From:
no subject
i haven't even yet begun to compare the transcripts, but i could tell right away that the Pitman text seems (this is just my impression) to gloss over a lot of the bickering (particularly between Holt and Ewing) ~ this comes through a lot clearer in the PB text. there were a couple of days in may where you just want to whack crabby Holt over the head and tell him to let people talk!
i still want a copy of Pitman, but i really really want to see Poore's version so that, by looking at all three, i can get the widest possible angle on what may have happened in the court room.
most priceless unintentional hilarity during the trial: Weichman's testimony about the fake mustache. that part just cracks me up. what a dwidiot!
: D
From:
no subject
I kept having visions of lining all 4 (I'm incuding the newspaper as the 4th) versions up like people do with Bible transaltions, with little notes...pretty impossible, but it's one of those things I liek to daydream about. I really wish when Steers reprinted Pitman he had annotated it instead of just putting cool articles in the front
Yeah, Weichmann & the moustache was pretty amazing. I love imagining him going in to work and showing off the false moustache, much finer than his own, to his co-workers, and looking for once so proud.
From:
no subject
hahahahaha ~
your idea about the annotated transcript is amazing ~ that would make a helluva digital project! hurry, go write the grant ~ let's do it!
: D
From:
no subject
p.s. there's a footnote in the back of Sam Arnold's book mentioning that a large study looking into each of the witnesses at the trial was underway. Other than that, I've never heard about it -- do you know anythign about that?
From:
no subject
re: Kauffman ~ i can appreciate that wanting to be paid for your work sort of thing, but there are ways to make money online too ~ i was just thinking from a metadata standpoint, how inneresting it would be to have a cross-referenced, indexed, fully tagged parallel transcript. maybe in my dreams ~ hahahahahaha ~
: D
From:
no subject
From:
no subject
the library has it. i'll pick it up on monday ~ thank you for the tip!
: D
isn't it fun what draws us in?
From:
who are these people?
evidently I have missed something
but looking back over your last couple
of posts it is still not clear to me what
happened to whom? is there some one place
to go to get a summary of what the event is?
From:
Re: who are these people?
i had deliberately not been explaining anything because i was trying to put some distance between myself and the material ~ to better think about it from a different perspective than what's been endlessly spun over the last 140 years.
i want to take a stab at this from a more intimate point of view in order to examine questions of military jurisprudence, terrorism, and american vengeance.
Hanty is Brigadier-General John Frederick Hartranft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Hartranft), later twice governor of Pennsylvania, who briefly held the unfortunate job of provost mashall (i.e. jailer) in the conspiracy trial following the lincoln assassination.
Poppet is Brigadier-General William Emile Doster (http://www.amazon.com/Lincoln-episodes-Civil-William-Doster/dp/B0006AHC46/ref=sr_1_2/002-4587602-2096051?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1180725468&sr=8-2) who was the defense counselor for two of the eight prisoners. his brief, but oft-quoted memoir has served a lot of scholarship on lincoln, the assassination, and other notables in that era.
i'll probably (hopefully?) be a lot less confusing about this project now that i'm pretty much done with the research.
thank you for your interest!
: D
From:
no subject
doctor's name was Mud.
From:
no subject
: D
From:
Re: who are these people?
From:
Re: who are these people?
didn't mean to keep people so confused, was mostly making notes for my own considerations. now that i'm starting to write, you'll either hear less of it or (egads) even more.
: o p
From:
no subject
From:
no subject
in many ways, it feels like the most "appropriate" title. but i'm not yet in love with it.
: D
From: (Anonymous)
It's been fun eavesdropping ...
If I understood you correctly this is to be a "commercial" venture meaning you'd like to have it published ...right?
If that's the case, I wouldn't worry too much about the title --or get too invested in it. Seems publisher's always change the title and often to the attention grabbing thing possible ...think of the Brother's Wilkes book we both read. I thought that title was heart-stoppingly BAD but it did halt me in my tracks as I was crossing the library and drew me straight to it (combined with the photos so I knew what BAD and GOOD brothers it referred to).
I know what you mean about not feeling right about writing on a subject without having seen all the most cited references. I wish you best of luck with Poore.
Is Hanty described as having some unique hat? He seems to be holding the hat of the day in the photo (the flattened things most of the other fellas have) Doesn't seem likely he'd have two hats ... how peculiar.
Do you know who the guy on our far right is? He seems awfully crumpled and messy compared to the others --although I was fascinated by the range of polish on the boots of the crew (from none to highly) ha.
Anyway, thanks for the chance to listen in~
moo
P.S. I'm sorry but I'm not spell checking LJ hurts my feelings and tells me many of my words are not words.
From:
Re: It's been fun eavesdropping ...
actually, it's not Hanty, but Col. McCall (the guy sitting on the left of Hanty) who is supposed to be wearing a straw hat with a black band. at least two sources seem to indicate it, but it could be that the hat is already on someone else's head at the moment.
and i didn't mean to be so danged confusing about the orientation in the picture. the guy on the far right that you are asking about is the guy i call Mr. Mad. his real name is Christian Rath (Captain) and he is the executioner. odd fellow, that guy. he left some peculiar recollections of the execution in his old age. it's possible he's more rumpled, etc. because he's been up all night building the gallows and testing the drops.
Hanty, i must say, looks impeccable. hahahahaha ~
: D
p.s. spell checkers r dum