But where was Booth? where Herold? where Atzerodt?
On the 20th, the Secretary of War applied the proper stimulus by issuing a proclamation to the following effect:
"$50,000 reward will be paid by this department for the apprehension of the murderer of our late beloved President.
"$25,000 reward for the apprehension of John H. Surratt, one of Booth's accomplices.
"$25,000 reward for the apprehension of Herold, another of Booth's accomplices.
"Liberal rewards will be paid for any information that shall conduce to the arrest of either of the above-named criminals or their accomplices.
"All persons harboring or secreting the said persons, or either of them, or aiding or assisting in their concealment or escape, will be treated as accomplices in the murder of the President and the attempted assassination of the Secretary of State, and shall be subject to trial before a military commission and the punishment of death."
What is noteworthy about this document is that Stanton had already made up his mind as to the guilt of the persons named as accomplices of Booth; that he needed only their arrest, being assured of their consequent conviction; and that he had already determined that their trial and the trial of all persons connected with the great crime, however remotely, should be had before a military tribunal, and that the punishment to follow conviction should be death.
At four o'clock in the morning of the very day this proclamation was issued, Atzerodt was apprehended at the house of his cousin in Montgomery County, Md., about twenty-two miles northward of Washington, by a detail of soldiers, to whom, by the way, notwithstanding the arrest preceded the proclamation, $25,000 reward was subsequently paid. With Atzerodt his cousin, Richter, was taken also. O'Laughlin, Payne, Arnold, Atzerodt and Richter, as they were severally arrested, were put into the custody of the Navy Department and confined on board the Monitor _Saugus_, which on the morning of Saturday, when the President died, had been ordered to swing out into the middle of the river opposite the Navy Yard, prepared to receive at any hour, day or night, dead or alive, the arch-assassin. Each of these prisoners was loaded with double irons and kept under a strong guard. On the 23d, Atzerodt, by order of the Secretary of War, was transferred to the Monitor _Montauk_, to separate him from his cousin, and Payne, in addition to his double irons, had a ball and chain fastened to each ankle by the direction of the same officer. On the next day Spangler, who had hitherto been confined in the Old Capitol Prison, was transferred to one of the Monitors and presumably subjected to the same treatment. On the same day the following order was issued: