 In 1907 , Finis L. Bates wrote Escape and Suicide of John Wilkes Booth , contending that a Booth look @-@ alike was mistakenly killed at the Garrett farm while Booth eluded his pursuers . Booth , said Bates , assumed the pseudonym " John St. Helen " and settled on the <unk> River near Glen Rose , Texas , and later moved to <unk> , Texas . After falling gravely ill and making a deathbed confession that he was the fugitive assassin , he recovered and fled , eventually committing suicide in 1903 in Enid , Oklahoma , under the alias " David E. George " . By 1913 , more than 70 @,@ 000 copies of the book had been sold , and Bates exhibited St. Helen 's mummified body in carnival sideshows . 
