From the critically acclaimed author of The Borden Murders comes the
thrilling story of Mary Surratt, the first woman to be executed by the
US government, for her alleged involvement in the plot to assassinate
Abraham Lincoln.
A dubious distinction belongs to Mary Surratt: on July 7, 1865, she
became the first woman to be executed by the United States government,
accused of conspiring in the plot to assassinate not only President
Abraham Lincoln, but also the vice president, the secretary of state,
and General Grant.
Mary Surratt was a widow, a Catholic, a businesswoman, a slave owner, a
Union resident, and the mother of a Confederate Secret Service courier.
As the proprietor of the boardinghouse where John Wilkes Booth and his
allies are known to have gathered, Mary Surratt was widely believed, as
President Andrew Johnson famously put it, to have "kept the nest that
hatched the egg." But did Mrs. Surratt truly commit treason by aiding
and abetting Booth in his plot to murder the president? Or was she the
victim of a spectacularly cruel coincidence? Here is YA nonfiction at
its best--gripping, thought-provoking, and unputdownable.