You might want to pretend you're a prosecuting attorney and we are the (first) jury.
Try to prove means (being issued a Whitworth), motive (named individuals and their assigned units) and opportunity (within range at that date). Post-event claims count as confessions of guilt.
Start with the low-hanging fruit first.
General John Sedgewick (KIA May 9, 1864 Spotsylvania Court House, VA)
- witness to death: Brevet Major-General Martin T McMahon, U.S.V. [Chief-of-Staff, Sixth Corps],
- Suspect 1
Ben Powell 12th South Carolina. He claimed credit, although his account has been discounted because the general he shot at was mounted, possibly Brig General William H Morris (shot and wounded in the right knee by a sharpshooter, May 9th 1864 Spotsylvania Court House)
Supporting accounts -
Confederate sharpshooter battalion commander, Major W. S. Dunlop, in his authorative work, ‘Lee’s Sharpshooters’ (1889) was present at the scene and claimed Powell shot Sedgwick (at page 49).
Confederate sharpshooter, Berry Benson, in his biography,
‘Berry Benson’s Civil War Book: Memoirs of a Confederate Scout and Sharpshooter’ (2007) who was also at the scene, attests (at page 68) that Powell reported to him that day his lethal shot on Sedgwick which was confirmed later that night by Union pickets.
See
https://www.jstor.org/stable/41395894?seq=1
- Suspect 2
Thomas Burgess 15th South Carolina, cited by some veterans.
&etc, &etc...
Thank you for the extra information about the search tools.
I appreciate your legal analogy and use of analysis.
Upon closer examination, I now think that the evidence presented suggesting Ben Powell was the shooter is suspect.
The accounts by Dunlop and Berry, although both present at the scene at the time, are hearsay – they heard it said/reported by Powell or others at the time (Dunlop and Benson are witnesses, not eyewitnesses – that’s indirect evidence).
In Dunlop’s previously reported reference to Ben Powell (at page 49), he wrote:
..…”We discovered an angle protruding from their main line towards the right of the battalion, which brought a four gun battery with its infantry supports placed there for the defense of the salient, barely within reach of our long range rifles. And to these Ben Powell with his “Whitworth” and a few files on the right paid their respects. Presently an officer of rank with his staff approached the salient, and adjusting his field glasses began to take observations of the front. A few shots only had been fired at the group, when the ringing peal of Powell’s “Whitworth” was heard some distance to the right; the officer was seen to stagger and fall; and the brilliant career of that gallant and distinguished soldier, Maj. Gen. Sedgwick , commandant of the fifth Federal army corps, was closed and closed forever. Powell reported at once that he had killed a Federal general, but we knew not his name or rank until it came out a few days later in the Northern papers, announcing that Gen. Sedgwick had been killed by a Confederate sharpshooter; which fact, so published at the time, has gone into history, but the name of “the man behind the gun” has never before been mentioned.”…..
We can dissect Dunlop’s description above to learn the following:
- the shots were at long range;
- multiple shots was made by both Ben Powell (with his whitworth) and rank soldiers;
- the shot target was a high ranking officer, among a group, approaching an artillery
battery placed in a salient (no mention of whether or not he was mounted);
- the shot officer was making observations with his field glasses at the relevant time;
- the distinctive loud sound of Powell’s whitworth being fired was heard some
distance away at the relevant time;
- Powell reported soon after his shot that he killed a Federal general (unidentified);
- Northern newspapers, a few days later, reported that Sedgwick was killed by an
unknown Confederate sharpshooter.
This information does not provide much support for Powell’s later assertion that he shot Sedgwick. The described officer killed was probably not Sedgwick. Sedgwick was known to be standing shouting orders, not making observations through field glasses, at the relevant time. There were also various shots concurrently made, including Powell’s whitworth, at the time at whomever was the target.
In Benson’s previously cited biography, it was written (at page 68),
…..”This day Ben Powell came in from sharpshooting and told us he had killed (or wounded) a Yankee officer. He had fired at long range at a group of horseman whom he recognized as officers. At his shot, one fell from his horse, and the others dismounted and bore him away. That night the enemy’s pickets called over to ours that Major General Sedgwick, commanding the 6
th corps, was killed that day by a sharpshooter.”…..
Obviously this account is pure hearsay, and carries little evidential weight. If this recollection is accepted as accurate, the reference to the target being a mounted officer eliminates entirely the possibility that this was the shot that killed Sedgwick (he was on foot at the time).
Because neither of these witness accounts, including Powell’s own, could identify who was shot at the time, it is very tempting and convenient for them to form the conclusion that it was Sedgwick, after learning later he was killed that same day. It seems Powell, who post-war was reputedly an honest person of good character, came to believe this upon acquiring this knowledge afterwards (hence the claim about his rifle in the letter to his wife after the war).
I am prepared to accept, on the basis of this information, that it’s less likely (without ruling out entirely) Ben Powell shot Sedgwick. I think the other suspected whitworth shooters need to be investigated further to look for an answer.