Powell, Lewis (1844-1865), was a participant in the plot to kill United States President Abraham Lincoln and other federal officials in 1865, near the end of the American Civil War . Powell, a former Confederate soldier, was convicted by a military commission (court) for attempting to kill Secretary of State William H. Seward . Powell and three others were hanged for their crimes.
Powell was also known as Lewis Payne or Paine. Court documents consistently referred to him as Payne during his 1865 trial.
Lewis Thornton Powell was born in Randolph County, Alabama, on April 22, 1844. He joined the Confederate Army in May 1861, weeks after the start of the war. He was wounded at the Battle of Gettysburg , Pennsylvania, in July 1863. He was held as a prisoner of war but was soon given work caring for Confederate wounded in Union military hospitals. In September, he escaped. He fled to Virginia and joined a Confederate cavalry unit led by Colonel John Singleton Mosby . In 1864, he probably joined the Confederate secret service, a Southern spy network, where he met fellow agent John Surratt. Surratt, along with actor John Wilkes Booth, was one of the early conspirators in the Lincoln plot.
Powell, Booth, and others conspired to assassinate Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson , and Secretary of State William H. Seward. They met at the Washington, D.C., boardinghouse of John Surratt’s mother, Mary . On the evening of April 14, 1865, Powell entered Seward’s home and stabbed him several times. He also injured several members of Seward’s family, including Seward’s son Frederick. The same night, Booth shot Lincoln during a performance at Ford’s Theatre in Washington. Seward survived his wounds, but Lincoln died the next day. The plan to assassinate Johnson was not carried out. Powell hid for three days but was arrested after appearing at the Surratt boardinghouse late on April 17. Federal troops shot and killed Booth in Virginia on April 26.
Trials for Powell and seven other defendants began on May 10, 1865. Powell’s lawyer, William Doster, represented his client before the military tribunal. He first tried to show that Powell had been insane during his attempted assassination of Seward. When medical experts proved the insanity defense to be without merit, Doster changed his argument. He then defended his client on the basis that Powell had been acting as a soldier during wartime in his attack on an officer of the enemy. The court rejected this defense as well. On June 30, the commission found Powell guilty and sentenced him to death. Powell and three others were hanged on July 7.
