The Lincoln Conspiracy

Not a theory — a verdict: eight convicted, four hanged, for a coordinated plot to decapitate the government in one night. The American proof-of-concept that conspiracies both exist and get caught.

The Lincoln conspiracy: the assassination was a documented conspiracy — Booth led a cell that struck at Lincoln, Seward, and (intended) Johnson the same night; eight were tried by military commission, four hanged. The lore layer extends it upward: to Confederate secret service sponsorship (argued with archival evidence in 'Come Retribution'), to War Secretary Stanton (the 1937 Eisenschiml thesis, now rejected), to the Vatican (19th-century nativist tracts). Filed as the American template: a real conspiracy at the base, speculative storeys stacked on top, each era adding its preferred villain.