Universal York

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Lincoln Conspiracy Archives

I recently took a field trip that I had been thinking about for some time. For several years I have been researching and writing about Edman “Ned” Spangler, the native Yorker who was a carpenter and stagehand at Ford’s Theater, working there shifting scenery on April 14, 1865, the night

Edman “Ned” Spangler wrote letters to friends and relatives describing his experiences while a prisoner from 1865 to 1869 at Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas. Spangler was sent there after being found guilty of helping John Wilkes Booth escape from Ford’s Theater, a charge he vehemently denied the rest

Native Yorker Edman (Ned) Spangler was among the eight defendants tried for conspiracy in the assassination of President Lincoln. He was the only one of the eight found not guilty of conspiracy. The 1865 military commission presiding at the trial did find Spangler guilty of aiding and abetting Booth’s escape

I’ve already told the story of Edman “Ned” Spangler, son of a York County sheriff and one of the so-called “Lincoln conspirators.” With all the recent to-do about the John Wilkes Booth bobble-heads that were on sale several Lincoln-related sites (insensitivity at its highest), I wanted to share another Booth