Archives: historian tampered with Lincoln pardon

[snopes]

The National Archives says a longtime Abraham Lincoln researcher has been caught telling a big lie about Honest Abe.

The Archives said that historian Thomas P. Lowry, 78, of Woodbridge, has acknowledged that he used a fountain pen with special ink to change the date on a presidential pardon issued by Lincoln to a military deserter, making it appear that Lowry had uncovered a document of historical significance.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...TAM&SECTION=US

[Bonnie]

Just hours before Abraham Lincoln “put on his hat and headed for Ford’s Theater,” on April 14, 1865, the president is said to have spared a mentally incompetent Army private the death penalty for desertion.

The legendary act of compassion was revealed by Thomas Lowry, an amateur historian, who said he found the pardon among hundreds of untapped Lincoln documents in the National Archives in 1998 and described it in a book the following year. His discovery was hailed by scholars as one of the biggest findings of Lincoln memorabilia in the 20th century.

But on Monday, the National Archives disclosed that Dr. Lowry had altered the date on the original pardon to promote his book, changing the year to 1865 from 1864, possibly to make it look as if the pardon was one of the president’s final acts — and thus historic.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/25/us/25lincoln.html

[snopes]

Thomas P. Lowry says he was coerced into confessing to the National Archives that he had changed the date on a presidential pardon to make it appear more important than it was.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationwo...,3947007.story