Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever Page 15

  A messenger arrives carrying a note for Grant. It’s from Julia and she’s not happy. Mrs. Grant wants her husband back at the Willard Hotel immediately, so that they can catch the 6:00 P.M. to Burlington, New Jersey.

  General Grant’s decision has now been made for him. After months and years of men obeying his every order, he bows to an even greater authority than the president of the United States: his wife.

  “I am sorry, Mr. President,” Grant says when the cabinet meeting ends, just after one-thirty. “It is certain that I will be on this afternoon’s train to Burlington. I regret that I cannot attend the theater.”

  Lincoln tries to change Grant’s mind, telling him that the people of Washington will be at Ford’s to see him. But the situation is out of the general’s hands. Lincoln senses that and says good-bye to his dear friend.

  The Grants will make their train. Julia is so eager to leave town that she has chosen the local, which takes thirteen long hours to reach Burlington. The faster option would be the seven-thirty express in the morning, but that would mean a night at the theater with the daft and unbalanced Mary Lincoln. Julia Grant’s mind is made up.

  What Ulysses S. Grant does not know is that he will be returning to Washington by the same train within twenty-four hours.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1865

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  2:00 P.M.

  Two thousand years after the execution of Jesus, there are still many unanswered questions about who was directly responsible for his death and what happened in the aftermath. And so it is, on Good Friday 1865, that a series of bizarre occurrences will take place.

  In the hours to come guards will inexplicably leave their posts, bridges that should be closed will miraculously be open, and telegrams alerting the army to begin a manhunt for Lincoln’s killer will not be sent—all happenings that have been tied to a murky conspiracy that most likely will never be uncovered. What we do know is that in these hours, John Wilkes Booth is putting the final touches on his murderous plan.

  Booth is on an emotional roller coaster, his spirits rising and falling as he ponders the assassination and its consequences, all the while running down his checklist, completing the tasks that must be done for tonight. He is dressed in dashing fashion, with tight black pants, a tailored black coat, and a black hat. With those clothes and his broad black mustache, he couldn’t look more like a villain. The only thing he wears that isn’t black are his boots—they’re tan.

  The first stop is Mary Surratt’s boardinghouse on H Street. She is walking out the door for a trip into the country to collect on an old debt, but Booth catches her just in time. He hands her a spyglass wrapped in brown paper and tied with a string, telling her to make sure that it doesn’t get wet or break. One of Surratt’s tenants, Louis Weichmann, is a soldier and government clerk whose job deals with the care and housing of prisoners of war. Weichmann senses that there’s something shady about Booth, having listened to his rants and spent enough time around the Surratts to discern the pro-Confederate leanings of the crowd. So he leans in to eavesdrop as Mary and Booth confer by the marble fireplace.

  Mary catches him. She calmly orders Weichmann to leave her house at once and pick up a horse and buggy for her journey.

  By the time Weichmann returns with the horse and buggy, Booth is gone, walking the five blocks to Herndon House, where Lewis Powell is lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling. He and Booth discuss the evening’s plan. The trick in killing Secretary of State Seward, Booth reminds him, isn’t the actual murder—Seward is still barely conscious and in great pain after his carriage accident. He is incapable of putting up any resistance.

  No, the hard part will be getting in and out of Seward’s home. There is at least one male military nurse to protect the secretary, along with Seward’s wife and three of his children. In a worst-case scenario, Powell will have to kill them all, Booth says. Powell, mentally impaired since that long-ago mule kick to the head, says he has no problem with mass murder.

  Then Booth is on the move again, headed for Pumphrey’s stable to arrange for his getaway horse. He prefers a small sorrel, but it’s already gone for the day. Instead, Booth rents a compact bay mare with a white star on her forehead. Pumphrey warns Booth that although the mare is just fourteen hands high, she’s extremely high-spirited. She mustn’t be tied to a post if he leaves her anywhere, because she’ll pull away and escape. Better to have someone hold her reins at all times.

  The bay tries to bite Booth as the groom cinches the English saddle under her belly and adjusts her stirrups. To demonstrate her high spirits, the groom smacks the mare on the rump. She jumps and kicks, much to Booth’s delight.

  Booth saddles up. He likes the horse with the black mane and tail, but the stirrups don’t feel right. The groom shortens them one notch and Booth is on his way, walking the mare up Sixth Street to Pennsylvania Avenue, where he jabs his spurs into her flanks so she’ll run. It’s a ludicrous idea. The street is jammed with pedestrians and carriages. Union soldiers, returning from the front, march in loose formation, dog-tired and in no mood for a horseman to romp through their ranks. But today Booth is above the law. He gallops the bay down Pennsylvania, ignoring the angry curses hurled in his mud-splattered wake.

  Booth stops at Grover’s Theatre, where the marquee announces THE GORGEOUS PLAY OF ALADDIN, OR THE WONDERFUL LAMP. He doesn’t have any business there, but theaters are safe refuges no matter what city he’s visiting. Booth knows not only the insides of the building but also each nearby bar and restaurant, where he’s sure to see a friendly face. On a day like today, when his stomach is churning and he’s battling with all his might to stay calm and focused, nothing could be more natural than making his way to a theater, just to experience a few moments of calm reassurance. For the child of actors, raised on greasepaint and footlights, it’s like going home.

  Against Pumphrey’s explicit direction, he ties the mare to a hitching post, then wanders up to Deery’s tavern and orders a bottle. Alone at the bar, nursing a brandy and water to the sounds of the clacking of billiard balls from the nearby table, he pauses to reflect on what he is about to do. Getting into the theater should be easy enough. Getting past the bodyguard at the door to the state box, however, might get bloody. And the odds of killing Lincoln and escaping are low. He accepts all that.

  But what if nobody knows it’s him?

  What if the euphoric triumph of shooting Lincoln is followed by the devastating letdown of anonymity—that is, until he reaches some safe refuge where he can shout his accomplishment to world and then parlay his infamy into some even greater glory. But what if no one believes him? What if John Wilkes Booth shoots the president and makes a clean getaway, only to be ignored when he tells everyone that he’s the man who did it?

  This cannot be. Booth craves the limelight too much. He needs to make sure he’ll get immediate credit for such a bold and dramatic act.

  Booth tosses a dollar onto the bar and walks downstairs to the Grover’s manager’s office. It’s empty. Sitting at the desk, Booth removes paper and an envelope from the pigeonholes. He then writes a letter to the editor of the National Intelligencer stating, in specific terms, what he is about to do.

  He signs his name, then adds those of Powell, Atzerodt, and Herold. They are all members of the same company, in theatrical terms. They deserve some sort of billing—even if they might not want it.

  After sealing the envelope, Booth steps outside. He is pleased to see that his feisty bay is still where he left her. A motley and dispirited group of Confederate prisoners is marching down the street as he saddles up. “Great God,” he moans, mortified by such a sad sight. “I no longer have a country.”

  But seeing those downtrodden rebels is yet another reminder of why Booth has embraced violence. Thus fortified, Booth spies fellow actor John Matthews in front of the theater. Booth leans down from his horse to hand him the envelope and gives him specific instructions to mail it the next m
orning. However, hedging his bets in case things go bad, Booth says he wants the letter back if he finds Matthews before ten tomorrow morning.

  It’s a petty and spiteful trick, designed to implicate Matthews, who will be onstage in the role of Richard Coyle during Our American Cousin. Booth had asked him to be part of the conspiracy and was turned down. The night after his aborted kidnapping attempt on the Soldiers’ Home road four weeks earlier, Booth even lounged on Matthews’s bed in a small boardinghouse across from Ford’s Theatre, trying to cajole the fellow actor to join him.

  But Matthews continued to refuse. Now Booth is getting his revenge, implicating Matthews by association.

  Matthews, completely unsuspecting, is distracted by an unusual sight. “Look,” he says to Booth. “Over there.”

  Booth is stunned to see General and Mrs. Grant leaving town in an open carriage piled high with luggage. Julia is inside, with another female passenger, while the general sits up top, next to the coachman.

  Booth trots after them, just to see for himself. He parades his horse past the carriage, turns around, and guides the bay back toward the Grants at a walk. He stares as the carriage passes, glaring at Sam Grant with such intensity that Julia will later recall quite vividly the crazed man who stared them down. It is only after the assassination that Mrs. Grant will realize who he was.

  “I thought he was going to Ford’s tonight, with Lincoln,” Booth says to a stranger.

  “Somebody said he’s going to Jersey,” the man responds, confirming Booth’s worst fears. Glumly, he realizes that one of his two primary targets will not be at Ford’s this evening. He wheels the horse around and heads for that theater.

  Washington, D.C., is a relatively small city. All the locations associated with Booth’s activities throughout the week are situated close together. Mary Surratt’s boardinghouse is just a few blocks from the National Hotel, which is just a few blocks from Kirkwood House, where Vice President Johnson is staying, which is just a few blocks from the White House, which is right across the street from Secretary Seward’s home. The National, the White House, and Mary Surratt’s boardinghouse constitute the three corners of a broad triangle. Within that triangle are all the other locations. And in the very center is Ford’s Theatre, which is right across the alley from Herndon House, where Lewis Powell is now eating an early dinner of cold beef and potatoes before checking out.

  The alley is known as Baptist Alley, due to Ford’s origins as a house of worship. A maid at Ford’s hears the sound of galloping hooves coming from the alley. When she looks outside, she sees a most unusual sight: the famous actor John Wilkes Booth racing a horse north up the alley from E Street, then galloping out the other end on F Street. He does this twice. The maid, Margaret Rozier, watches as Booth dismounts after the second dry run of his escape, not in a million years imagining what she has just witnessed. When he is done, Booth stops at Ford’s stage door, where he invites stagehands Jim Maddox and Ned Spangler to join him for a drink next door at Jim Ferguson’s Greenback Saloon.

  As they come back outside after their drink, Booth mounts the bay and says hello to Jim Ferguson himself. Ferguson has heard about the Lincolns and is making plans to see Our American Cousin tonight. “She is a very nice horse,” Booth says, noting the way Ferguson admires her. “She can gallop and can almost kick me in the back.”

  Booth prods her with his spurs and gallops back to the National Hotel, his errands complete. The energy whooshes out of him as the alcohol wears off and the brute realization of what he is about to do hits him hard. His face is so pale that the desk clerk inquires about his health.

  Booth says he’s fine, orders a cup of tea, and heads upstairs to rest.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1865

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  3:30 P.M.

  “Crook,” Abraham Lincoln says to his bodyguard, “I believe there are men who want to take my life. And I have no doubt that they will do it.”

  The two men are walking down Pennsylvania Avenue, on their way back to the War Department for their second meeting of the day. Lincoln wants a short session with Stanton to discuss the fate of a Confederate ringleader who very recently made the mistake of crossing the border from Canada back into the United States. Stanton is in favor of arresting the man, while Lincoln prefers to let him slip away to England on the morning steamer. As soon as Lincoln makes his point, he aims to hurry back to the White House for the carriage ride he promised Mary.

  William Crook is fond of the president and deeply unsettled by the comments.

  “Why do you think so, Mr. President?”

  Crook steps forward as they come upon a group of angry drunks. He puts his body between theirs and Lincoln’s, thus clearing the way for the president’s safe passage. Crook’s actions, while brave, are unnecessary—if the drunks realize that the president of the United States is sharing the same sidewalk, they give no notice.

  Lincoln waits until Crook is beside him again, then continues his train of thought. “Other men have been assassinated,” Lincoln says.

  “I hope you are mistaken, Mr. President.”

  “I have perfect confidence in those around me. In every one of you men. I know that no one could do it and escape alive,” Lincoln says. The two men walk in silence before he finishes his thought: “But if it is to be done, it is impossible to prevent it.”

  At the War Department, Lincoln once again invites Stanton and telegraph chief Major Thomas Eckert, the man who can break fireplace pokers over his arms, to attend Our American Cousin that night. Both men turn him down once again. Lincoln is upset by their rejection, but he doesn’t show it outwardly. The only indication comes on the walk back to the White House, when he admits to Crook, “I do not want to go.” Lincoln says it like a man facing a death sentence.

  Inside the White House, Lincoln is pulled into an unscheduled last-minute meeting that will delay his carriage ride. Lincoln hides his exasperation and dutifully meets with New Hampshire congressman Edward H. Rollins. But as soon as Rollins leaves, yet another petitioner begs a few minutes of Lincoln’s time. A weary Lincoln, all too aware that Mary will be most upset if he keeps her waiting much longer, gives former military aide Colonel William Coggeshall the benefit of a few moments.

  Finally, Lincoln marches down the stairs and heads for the carriage. He notices a one-armed soldier standing off to one side of the hallway and overhears the young man tell another, “I would almost give my other hand if I could shake that of Lincoln.”

  Lincoln can’t resist. “You shall do that and it shall cost you nothing, boy,” he exclaims, smiling broadly as he walks over and grasps the young man’s hand. He asks his name, that of his regiment, and in which battle he lost the arm.

  Only then does Lincoln say his farewells and step outside. He finds Mary waiting at the carriage. She’s in a tentative mood—they’ve spent so little time alone in the past few months that being together, just the two of them, feels strange. She wonders if Lincoln might be more comfortable if they brought some friends along for the open-air ride. “I prefer to ride by ourselves today,” he insists. Lincoln helps her into the barouche and then is helped up from the gravel driveway to take his seat beside her. The four-wheeled horse-drawn carriage features two facing double seats for passengers and a retractable roof. The driver sits in a box seat up front. Lincoln opts to keep the roof open, then covers their laps with a blanket, even though the temperature is a warm sixty-eight degrees.

  The war has been hard on their marriage. Mary is delighted beyond words to see that Lincoln is in a lighthearted mood. She gazes into her husband’s eyes and recognizes the man who once courted her.

  “Dear Husband,” she laughs, “you startle me by your great cheerfulness. I have not seen you so happy since before Willie’s death.”

  “And well I may feel so, Mary. I consider this day, the war has come to a close.” The president pauses. “We must both be more cheerful in the future—between the war and the
loss of our darling Willie we have been very miserable.”

  Coachman Francis Burns guides the elegant pair of black horses down G Street. The pace is a quick trot. Behind them ride two cavalry escorts, just for safety. The citizens of Washington are startled to see the Lincolns out on the town. They hear loud laughter from Mary as the barouche passes by and see a grin spread across the president’s face. When a group calls out to him as the carriage turns onto New Jersey Avenue, he doffs his trademark stovepipe hat in greeting.

  Throughout the war, Lincoln has stayed in the moment, never allowing himself to dream of the future. But now he pours his heart out to Mary, talking about a proposed family trip to Palestine, for he is most curious about the Holy Land. And after he leaves office he wants the family to return to their roots in Illinois, where he will once again hang out his shingle as a country lawyer. The “Lincoln & Herndon” sign has never been taken down, at Lincoln’s specific request to his partner.

  “Mary,” Lincoln says, “we have had a hard time of it since we came to Washington, but the war is over, and with God’s blessing we may hope for four years of peace and happiness, and then we will go back to Illinois and pass the rest of our lives in quiet. We have laid by some money, and during this term we will try to save up more.”

  The carriage makes its way to the Navy Yard, where Lincoln steps on board USS Montauk. His intent is just a cursory peek at the storied ironclad, with its massive round turret constituting the deck’s superstructure. But soon its crew mobs Lincoln, and he is forced to politely excuse himself so that he can return to Mary. Unbeknownst to Lincoln, the Montauk will soon serve another purpose.

  Lincoln offers a final salute to the many admirers as coachman Burns turns the carriage back toward the White House. It’s getting late, and the Lincolns have to be at the theater.