Post on Newspapers in Databases
When I began using electronic databases to conduct research on Daniel Mountjoy Cloud and Thomas Nelson Conrad, my first step was to search for their names. Searches for Cloud’s name yielded no results in Infotrac 19th Century Newspapers, Proquest Civil War Era Newspapers, and Proquest Historical Newspapers. Searches for Conrad were more fruitful. I found his obituary from The Washington Post in Proquest Historical Newspapers. The article stated that he died on January 5, 1905 in Washington D.C. “of acute indigestion,” and that he “was a Confederate scout during the Civil War in the command of Gen. J.E.B. Stuart.” It also references the fact that he became “a general statistician in the Census Office” in 1890. (Thomas Conrad Obituary) In Infotrac 19th Century Newspapers, I found a February 20, 1868 article from The Virginia Sentinel which mentions that Conrad was appointed a County Superintendant in Fauper County. The other two articles I found in Infotrac were excerpts from his autobiography which were published by The Morning Oregonian and Chicago’s Daily Inter Ocean in November of 1892.
I then began searching for articles pertaining to Civil War espionage in the last two years of the conflict in order to increase my understanding of the context in which Cloud and Conrad allegedly planned to kidnap President Lincoln. By searching for terms such as “spies” “spies and southern” “Lincoln and plot,” I found a number of articles in Proquest Historical Newspapers concerning Confederate spies who infiltrated or attempted to infiltrate the Union. A Washington Star article reprinted in The New York Times in August of 1864 tells the story of Charles Fenton Beavers, a young “private in Mosby’s guerrilla band” who was hung after being sentenced to death by a Union Court Martial. That February, he “gave himself up as a deserter from Mosby’s force” and later left, ostensibly to go home. In June, he was “captured with arms in his hands with Mosby’s guerillas in D.C.” A Chicago Tribune article from January of 1864 reports the capture of a Confederate spy who was only caught because he became inebriated and was arrested for public drunkenness. The article claims that “it is notorious in Chicago; there are disloyal men and women who are always willing to give these spies a helping hand and aid them in securing the information so earnestly desired by rebel leaders.”
A Chicago Tribune article from March of 1864, months before Cloud and Conrad allegedly began planning to abduct President Lincoln, told of the discovery of a similar plot orchestrated by Confederate agents. The article claims that there was “a plan submitted by Col. Musgrave to the Rebel War Department in November.” It called for “one hundred and fifty picked men to go secretly North” to Washington, D.C. where they would coordinate the kidnapping. It would have likely involved armed agents accosting the President’s carriage outside the city, and taking him across the Potomac to Virginia by boat. (The Plot to Kidnap Lincoln)
The plot described in this article bears a great deal of similarity to the one Conrad describes planning in his published memoir. One explanation for this could be that he and Cloud based their attempted kidnapping on this previous plot. Another possibility is that Conrad devised the story of his attempted kidnapping in order to generate attention and revenue and based it on this true story. I would like to read some secondary sources that mention Cloud and Conrad’s plot and gain access to the primary sources cited in order to determine the veracity of the claims in the memoir. If the story is largely true, and they are included in a tour of Civil War Era Carlisle, the tour guide could mention stories of spies such as Charles Beavers to provide tourists with a contextual understanding of Civil War espionage.
Bibliography:
“Thomas Nelson Conrad Dead, Confederate Scout and Former President of Blacksburg, Va. College.” The Washington Post. 6 January 1905, 10. (Proquest Historical Newspapers)
“County Organization.” Virginia Sentinel. 20 February 1868, 1. (Infotrac)
“To Kidnap Lincoln: The Attempt Made in 1864.” Morning Oregonian. 20 November 1892, 18. (Infotrac)
“An Attempt to Kidnap Lincoln: An Interseting Story by a Former Confederate Spy.” Chicago Daily Inter Ocean. 20 November 1892, 28. (Infotrac)
“A Guerilla Executed: Hanging of Charles Fenton Beavers at Washington.” New York Times. 27 August 1864, 5. (Proquest Historical Newspapers)
“A Pretty Rebel Plot: President Lincoln to be Kidnapped.” The Chicago Tribune. 20 March 1864, 1. (Proquest Historical Newspapers)
“The Plot to Assassinate the President.” The Chicago Tribune. 27 April 1864, 2. (Proquest Historical Newspapers)
Well done and good descriptions. Please consider making this post public.