John Bingham
was born in Mercer, Pennsylvania, on 21st January, 1815. He worked
in a printing office for two years before attending Franklin College,
Ohio. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1840. Bingham
worked as a lawyer in New Philadelphia, Ohio, before becoming the
district attorney for Tuscarawas County (1846-49).
Bingham joined the Republican Party
and was elected to the 34th Congress and served between March, 1855
to March 1863. An opponent of slavery,
he said after the Battle of Bull Run
that: "we need these reverses to bring our people up to the peril
of not abolishing slavery."
An unsuccessful candidate for the 38th Congress, Abraham
Lincoln decided in 1864 to appoint him as judge advocate of the
Union Army. After the assassination of
Lincoln, Andrew Johnson ordered the
formation of a nine-man military commission to try the suspected conspirators.
It was argued by Edwin M. Stanton, the
Secretary of War, that the men should be tried by a military court
as Lincoln had been Commander in Chief of the United
States Army.
As Judge Advocate of the Union Army,
Bingham, along with Joseph Holt, the Advocate
General, had the task of helping present the government case against
Mary Surratt, Lewis
Paine, George Atzerodt, David
Herold, Samuel Mudd, Michael
O'Laughlin, Edman Spangler and
Samuel Arnold.
The trial began on 10th May, 1865. The military commission included
leading generals such as David Hunter,
Lewis Wallace, Robert
Foster, August Kautz, Thomas
Harris and Albion Howe.
Bingham and Joseph Holt attempted to obscure
the fact that there were two plots: the first to kidnap and the second
to assassinate. It was important for the prosecution not to reveal
the existence of a diary taken from the body of John
Wilkes Booth. The diary made it clear that the assassination plan
dated from 14th April. The defence surprisingly did not call for Booth's
diary to be produced in court.
On 29th June, 1865 Mary Surratt, Lewis
Paine, George Atzerodt, David
Herold, Samuel Mudd, Michael
O'Laughlin, Edman Spangler and
Samuel Arnold were found guilty of being
involved in the conspiracy to murder Abraham
Lincoln. Surratt, Paine, Atzerodt and Herold were hanged at Washington
Penitentiary on 7th July, 1865. Surratt, who was expected to be reprieved,
was the first woman in American history to be executed.
Bingham was elected to the 39th Congress and over the next couple
of years became one of the leading opponents of the new president,
Andrew Johnson. A strong opponent of
slavery, Bingham, like many people in
the Republican Party, objected to
Johnson's attempts to veto the Civil Rights
Bill and the Reconstruction Acts.
Bingham played an important role in the impeachment of Johnson and
gave the closing, three-day summation.
In 1873 President Ulysses S. Grant appointed
Bingham as his minister to Japan. He served in the post for twelve
years and did not return to live in the United States until 1885.
John Bingham died in Cadiz, Ohio, on 19th March, 1900.
Available from Amazon Books
(order below)
