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the Confederate cause was nearing dissolution, General Dix appointed a drum-head court-martial to condemn Captain Beal to death.
James T. Brady, of New York, counsel for defense, served his client faithfully; but drum-head court-martials sit to condemn, and not to do justice.
Judge Daniel B. Lucas, of Charlestown, West Virginia, the late James L. McClure and Albert Ritchie, of Baltimore, were all college mates of Captain Beall, and they were untiring in their efforts to secure a fair trial for Captain Beall; but it was of no avail. Secretary Seward's edict had gone forth that ‘Beall must hang.’ Mrs. John I. Sittings and Mrs. Basil B. Gordon, of Baltimore, interceded in behalf of the heroic Beall. Numbers of Congressmen signed a petition for Beall's pardon, but President Lincoln turned a deaf ear to all appeals for clemency.
