Michael O'Laughlen, Edman Spangler, Samuel Mudd, and Mary Surratt. The trial began on May 10, 1865, and lasted two months. Holt and Bingham attempted to obscure the fact that there were two plots. The first plot was to kidnap Lincoln and exchange him for Confederate prisoners held by the Union. The second was to assassinate Lincoln, Johnson, and Seward and so throw the government into chaos. On June 29, 1865, the eight were found guilty of conspiracy to kill the President. Arnold, O'Laughlen, and Mudd were sentenced to life in prison, Spangler to six years in prison, and Atzerodt, Herold, Powell, and Surratt to be hanged, the first woman ever to be executed by the US federal government. They were executed July 7, 1865. Holt's public image was besmirched by the trial and his prosecution of it, and many historians believe that the controversy surrounding it ended Holt's political career. In 1866, Holt issued a pamphlet, titled Vindication of Judge Advocate General Holt From the Foul Slanders of Traitors, Confessed Perjurers and Suborners, Acting in the Interest of Jefferson Davis, in which he attempted to defend himself against the various allegations and clear up some of the confusion stemming from the trial. Later life Holt served as Judge Advocate General until he retired on December 1, 1875. He had a quiet retirement and died in Washington on August 1, 1894. He is buried in the Holt Family Cemetery in Addison, Kentucky. Holt County, Nebraska, is named after him, as is the hamlet of Holtsville, New York and the town of Holt, Michigan. See also Camp Joe Holt List of American Civil War generals (Union) References Further reading Coulter, E. Merton. The Civil War and Readjustment in Kentucky (1926) pp 81–110. Koerting, Gayla. "For Law and Order: Joseph Holt, the Civil War, and the Judge Advocate General's Department." Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 97.1 (1999): 1-25. Online Leonard, Elizabeth D. Lincoln’s Forgotten Ally: Judge Advocate General Joseph Holt of Kentucky (U of North Carolina Press, 2011) Online Leonard, Elizabeth D. "One Kentuckian's Hard Choice: Joseph Holt and Abraham Lincoln," Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, 106 (Summer-Autumn 2008), 373-407. Online Kastenberg, Joshua E. Law in War, Law as War: Brigadier General Joseph Holt and the Judge Advocate General’s Department in the Civil War and Early Reconstruction, 1861-1865 (Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press, 2011) Primary sources Holt, Joseph, and Joshua Fry