Lincoln and the Sleeping SentinelThe Arrest and Court-martial of William Scott

The news of the pending execution created havoc at Camp Lyon but the news hit the Vermont recruits the hardest. Even the public was shocked by the severity of the sentence. The New York Times stated that others had been pardoned for similar offenses or overlooked entirely by the army. For Americans already unnerved by the prospect of a civil war, the announcement that the army was going to shoot a young soldier as a policy lesson was not welcome news.

On September 8th, the day before the scheduled execution, the New York Times commented: "The sentence in Scott's case will be fully carried out, that an example may be made which will prevent the recurrence of a similar dereliction among our troops."

Scott's performance on picket duty came at a time when the army had decided to make an example of the next recurrence of anyone caught sleeping on sentinel duty. The Capitol was close enough to the Confederate lines to be at risk of invasion and the army was preparing its men for the march south to Richmond. The harsh verdict stemmed from the American Army's origins in the brutal British military system known for flogging and other acts of barbarity that have disappeared from modern military penal codes.

For the men of the 2nd and 3rd Vermont, the sentence was more than barbaric. Henry Herrick of St. Johnsbury, a member of Scott's regiment recalled in his diary that Scott had been on guard for several nights previously and had taken a sick friend's watch the night of the arrest.

Colonel Smith's grand idea of creating a regiment formed entirely of Vermonters may have backfired after Scott's sentence. The Vermont 2nd and 3rd brigades liked Scott. He was a big, awkward kid who was a natural at making friends. "He was always offering to do something, or help some of his comrades" wrote one of the Vermonters at Chain Bridge. At drill practice, Scott would often trip against the heels of the soldier in front of him.

It was only natural then that Smith's men, from privates on up to officers actively began to petition for Scott's release. In the files of the war department in Washington is a petition signed by almost 200 men and written by the chaplain of the 3rd Vermont, Moses Parmalee. The petition was signed on September 8th.