Alias “Paine”: Lewis Thornton Powell, the Mystery Man of the Lincoln Conspiracy

On the night that John Wilkes Booth killed President Abraham Lincoln, 20-year-old Lewis Powell burst into the house of William Seward and attempted to assassinate the Secretary of State. Under the alias Lewis Paine, he was convicted and hanged three months later along with three other Lincoln conspirators.

A former Confederate soldier, Powell's role in the Lincoln conspiracy has been the subject of a great deal of debate. Was Powell simply a Southern sympathizer who participated in an organized plot to kidnap Lincoln and exchange him for Confederate prisoners of war? Or was he recruited from Mosby's Rangers for special duty directed at the president and his cabinet? Through research on his life and military activities, these questions and others are answered.