Lincoln's Last Days Read online

  Soon the boom of artillery breaks the morning quiet. Lee jots a quick note intended for Grant and hands it to a Confederate soldier, who gallops toward the Union lines under a white flag. Lee requests that the attack be postponed until Grant can be located.

  The Union colonel in charge tells the soldier that he does not have the authority to halt the attack. It will go forward as planned.

  As the soldier gallops back to Lee, small patrols of Union infantry march to the front and prepare to probe the Confederate lines for vulnerability.

  Lee writes another letter to Grant, asking for “a suspension of the hostilities pending the adjustment of the terms of the surrender of this army.”

  Even as fighting threatens to break out all around him, Lee waits, unruffled. But when the first wave of Union infantry is just a hundred yards away, Lee has no choice but to find safety. With a reluctant tug on Traveller’s reins, he turns back toward his men. Moments later, he is stopped. A Union messenger tells Lee that his letter has not found Grant, but it has found General George Meade, who has ordered a sixty-minute truce.

  Finally, at twelve fifteen, a lone Union officer and his Confederate escort arrive to see Lee. The officer, a colonel named Babcock, delivers a letter into Lee’s hands:

  With a mixture of sadness and relief, Lee and his three aides ride past the Union lines. The Sunday afternoon is unusually quiet after so many days and years of war.

  As directed in Grant’s letter, Lee sends his aide Colonel Charles Marshall up the road to find a meeting place. Marshall settles on a simple home. By a great twist of fate, the house belongs to a grocer named Wilmer McLean, who moved to Appomattox Court House to escape the war. A cannonball had landed in his fireplace during the first Battle of Bull Run, at the very start of the conflict. By fleeing to a quieter corner of Virginia, he had hoped to protect his family from harm.

  But the Civil War has once again found Wilmer McLean. He and his family are asked to leave the house. Soon, Lee marches up the front steps and takes a seat in the parlor. Again, he waits.

  At one thirty, after a half hour, Lee hears a large group of horsemen galloping up to the house. Moments later, General Grant walks into the parlor. He wears a private’s uniform; it is missing a button. On his shoulders he has pinned shoulder boards bearing the three stars of a lieutenant general. He has been wearing the same clothes since Wednesday night, and they are now spattered with mud from his thirty-five-mile ride this morning.

  The Wilmer McLean farmhouse at Appomattox Court House, April 1865.

  Removing his yellow cloth riding gloves, Grant steps forward and shakes Lee’s hand.

  As Grant’s generals and staff—among them Sheridan and Custer—file into the room and stand to one side, Lee’s aides gather behind their leader.

  The generals talk about Mexico, where both men fought on the same side, recalling names of long-ago battles like Churubusco and Veracruz. Grant finds the conversation so pleasant that he momentarily forgets the reason for their meeting. Lee is the one to take the initiative.

  “I suppose, General Grant, that the object of our present meeting is fully understood,” he says. “I asked to see you to ascertain upon what terms you would receive the surrender of my army.”

  Grant calls for his order book, a thin volume of yellow paper with carbon sheets. He stares at a page, composing the sequence of words that will most amicably end the war. Lee watches as Grant writes out his terms in pen.

  When he is finished, Grant hands the book over to Lee.

  Lee digests the words in silence. The kind and generous terms are remarkable. Lee will not even have to surrender his sword. The meaning is simple: Put down your guns and go home. Let’s rebuild the nation together. This is President Lincoln’s vision, and Grant agrees with it.

  * * *

  As Lee rides back to his lines, the Army of Northern Virginia spontaneously gathers on both sides of the road. Lee fights back tears as his men call out to him. His dissolved army will soon turn over their guns and battle flags. This is their last chance to show their great love and respect for their leader. “Men,” he calls out to them, “we have fought this war together and I have done the best I can for you.”

  A Currier & Ives lithograph of Lee’s surrender to Grant. This illustration is historically inaccurate. In reality, the two men sat at separate small tables at opposite ends of the room.

  Each group cheers as Lee approaches, only to give in to sorrow and break down in sobs as he rides past.

  Meanwhile, the reconciliation is beginning. Confederate and Union officers are renewing old friendships. “They went over, had a pleasant time with their old friends, and brought some of them back with them when they returned,” Grant will write twenty years later, recalling that the McLean household became their meeting place that night. The men swapped stories of their lives and remembrances of battles won and lost. “Here the officers of both armies came in great numbers, and seemed to enjoy the meeting as much as though they had been friends separated for a long time while fighting under the same flag.

  “For the time being it looked very much as if all thought of the war had escaped their minds.”

  But the war is not so easily forgotten by others. Unknown to all these men who risked their lives to fight great battles—men who deserved to enjoy the peace—plans will soon be hatched to seek revenge for the Union victory.

  A July 1863 photograph of the Capitol building under construction, southeast view.

  Chapter

  14

  MONDAY, APRIL 10, 1865

  Washington, D. C.

  Night

  THE WAR IS OVER! Strictly speaking, this is not true. Only Lee and his army have surrendered. The Confederacy, though dying, is not yet dead. Confederate president Jefferson Davis and his government have not been captured. And General Joseph E. Johnston’s army in North Carolina is still fighting Major General William T. Sherman’s army. But after four long years, and more than 600,000 dead from both sides, the people of the North can be forgiven the joy and excitement that now floats through the air.

  Complete strangers shake one another’s hands like long-lost friends. Crowds snake toward the White House, holding torches to light the way. The city is also lit by gas lamps atop the Capitol dome. For the first time since the beginning of the war, the building that Lincoln considers the most important in Washington glows. The people of Washington, overcome by news of the war’s end, hope to glimpse their president on this historic night. Perhaps, if they are very lucky, he will give one of the speeches for which he has become so famous.

  The crowd of more than 2,000 comes to a halt on the front lawn of the White House, waiting for Lincoln to show himself from the windows of the second-floor residence. When he doesn’t appear right away, they cry out for him. At first it’s just a few random shouts. Soon they roar as one: “Lincoln,” the people cry. “Speech!”

  An illustration of the White House in the 1870s.

  Lincoln comes to the window, smiling and holding up a hand in acknowledgment. “I am very greatly rejoiced to find that an occasion has occurred so pleasurable that the people cannot restrain themselves,” he jokes.

  He hears the cheers and the loud cry in unison of “Speech.”

  Lincoln would like to make one. But his thoughts are half formed, and the words not yet written. Instead of telling the crowd what’s on his mind, Lincoln smiles his easy grin. If you want to hear a speech, Lincoln yells to the crowd, please come back tomorrow night.

  Spying the Navy Yard brass band taking shelter under the White House eaves, he calls out a request: “I always thought that ‘Dixie’ was one of the best tunes I ever heard. Our adversaries over the way, I know, have attempted to appropriate it. But I insist that yesterday we fairly captured it.” He then directs the band to “favor us with a performance.”

  As the musicians strike up the Confederate anthem and the crowd sings and claps to that old familiar rhythm, Lincoln slips back into the White House and starts wri
ting the last speech he will ever give.

  Chapter

  15

  MONDAY, APRIL 10, 1865

  Washington, D. C.

  Night

  JOHN WILKES BOOTH PICKS UP HIS GUN.

  One mile down Pennsylvania Avenue, the twenty-six-year-old actor stands alone at a shooting range. In his fist he cradles a derringer, the sort of pint-size pistol favored by ladies and cardsharps.

  * * *

  John Wilkes Booth is one of twelve children born to his flamboyant actor father, Junius Brutus Booth. Booth’s father abandoned his first wife and two children in England and fled to America with eighteen-year-old Mary Ann Holmes, who became Booth’s mother. Booth was often lost in the confusion of the chaotic household. His upbringing was hectic, to say the least.

  Booth’s hatred for Lincoln, and his deep belief in the institution of slavery, fused into a rage after the president issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. In August 1864, when a bacterial infection known as erysipelas sidelined him from the stage, Booth used his time to recruit a gang that would help him kidnap Lincoln. First he contacted his old friends Michael O’Laughlen and Samuel Arnold. They met at Barnum’s City Hotel in Baltimore, and after several drinks, Booth asked them if they would join his conspiracy. Both men agreed. From there, Booth began adding others, selecting them based on expertise with weapons, physical fitness, and knowledge of southern Maryland’s back roads and waterways. The list eventually grew to include Lewis Powell, David Herold, John H. Surratt, Jr., and the carriage repairer George Atzerodt. Booth literally bought their loyalty, giving them food, clothing, and drink. And because he was a famous actor, they quickly came to enjoy their elevated status as friends of John Wilkes Booth.

  John Wilkes Booth’s derringer.

  In October 1864, Booth traveled to the Canadian city of Montreal, where he met with agents of Jefferson Davis. The Confederate president had set aside more than $1 million in gold to pay for acts of espionage and intrigue against the Union and kept a portion of the money in Canada. Booth’s meeting with Davis’s men not only provided funding for his conspiracy, it forged a direct bond between himself and the Confederacy. He returned with a check for $1,500, along with a letter of introduction that would allow him to meet more prominent Southern sympathizers in Maryland who would become key players in his plan. Booth knew that without their help, his chances of successfully smuggling Lincoln out of Washington and into the Deep South were nonexistent.

  Samuel Arnold.

  John Surratt.

  Michael O’Laughlen.

  Now, with the surrender of Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia, Booth’s plans have changed.

  * * *

  Booth fires the derringer. Then he examines where the bullet hit the target. Satisfied, he reloads. Since Lee’s surrender, Booth’s mood is a mixture of rage and despondence. That’s why he’s at the range. He has a major decision to make. Shooting helps him think.

  Lewis Powell/Payne.

  George Atzerodt.

  David Herold.

  Booth is considering a new scheme. But it is so crazy, so downright impossible, that he isn’t certain his fellow conspirators will go along with it.

  Booth fires at the bull’s-eye.

  The derringer is less than six inches long and made of brass, with a two-inch barrel. It launches a single large .44-caliber ball instead of a bullet and is accurate only at close range.

  Booth loads his gun for one last shot, still plotting his next course of action.

  Richmond is gone, and with it the Confederate leadership. The “secesh” community—those Southern secessionist sympathizers living a secret life in the nation’s capital—is in disarray. There’s no one to offer guidance.

  Until now, Booth has taken orders from Jefferson Davis. But because he no longer has a way to communicate with Davis, Booth must decide for himself what is wrong and what is right. And Lincoln is still the enemy. He always will be.

  So if Booth is no longer a kidnapper, how will he wage war? This is the question that has bothered him all night.

  Chapter

  16

  MONDAY, APRIL 10, 1865

  Washington, D. C.

  Night

  BOOTH’S WASHINGTON RESIDENCE is the National Hotel, on the corner of Pennsylvania Avenue and Sixth Street. Just around the corner is James Pumphrey’s stable, where he often rents a horse. The actor feels perfectly at home at Pumphrey’s, for the owner is known to be a Confederate sympathizer.

  I am the man who will end Abraham Lincoln’s life. That thought motivates Booth as he walks. He returns to the idea over and over again. This is wartime. Killing the enemy is no more illegal than capturing him.

  An 1860 illustration by A. Meyer of Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C. The National Hotel is on the left.

  It occurs to him that no American president has ever been assassinated. I will be the first man to ever kill a president. He is now even more dazzled by his own violent plan.

  Booth turns onto C Street and then out of the cold, wet night into James Pumphrey’s stable. A quick glance around the stalls shows that most of the horses are already rented out for the evening. Pumphrey may be a Confederate sympathizer, but he has no qualms about making money off this night of Union celebration.

  Pumphrey is an acquaintance of twenty-year-old John Surratt, the messenger instrumental in ensuring that Booth’s operation is fully funded by the Confederacy. Surratt travels frequently between Canada, the South, New York City, and Washington, arranging deals for everything from guns to medicine.

  When he is not traveling, John Surratt lives in a boardinghouse on Sixth and H Streets that is run by his mother, Mary Surratt. Like her son, the attractive forty-year-old widow is a Confederate sympathizer who has been involved with spying and smuggling weapons.

  Mary Surratt.

  Washington, D.C., with its federal employees and Union loyalties, is a city whose citizens are all too prone to report any conversation that suggests pro-Confederate leanings, making it a dangerous place for people like Mary Surratt and John Wilkes Booth. Her boardinghouse and Pumphrey’s stable are among the few places where they can speak their minds.

  It would seem natural that Booth tell the others about his new plan. They might have insights into the best possible routes of escape once the group has left the city.

  The only way out of Washington, D.C., is on a boat or over a bridge.

  The first route is over the Georgetown Aqueduct, a mile and a half northwest of the White House. The second is Long Bridge, south of the White House. The third is Benning’s Bridge, on the east side of town. And the last one is the Navy Yard Bridge, on Eleventh Street.

  But Booth has already made up his mind: the Navy Yard Bridge. The other three lead into Virginia, with its many roadblocks and Union soldiers. But the Navy Yard Bridge will take him into the quiet backcountry of Maryland, home to smugglers and back roads. The only problem is that sentries man the bridge and no traffic is allowed in or out of Washington after nine P.M.

  Ned Spangler.

  Booth walks up to Ford’s Theatre on Tenth Street. Although he performed at Ford’s one night in mid-March, his theater appearances are few and far between these days. He still, however, has his mail sent to Ford’s, and his buggy is parked in a space behind the theater that was specially created for him by a carpenter and stagehand named Ned Spangler. Booth uses Spangler often for favors and odd jobs. Thirty-nine years old and described by friends as “a very good, efficient drudge,” the hard-drinking Spangler often sleeps in either the theater or a nearby stable. Despite the late hour, Booth knows he will find him at Ford’s.

  Inside the theater, rehearsals are under way for the final performance of the farce Our American Cousin. Like most actors, Booth knows it well.

  Booth finds Spangler backstage, drunk, as usual. He asks the stagehand to clean up his carriage and find a buyer. Spangler is devastated—a great deal of work has gone into modifying the theater’s storage space s
o that the carriage will fit. It’s a waste for Booth to sell the carriage, and Spangler tells him so.

  “I have no further use for it,” Booth replies. “And anyway, I’ll soon be leaving town.”

  Ford’s Theatre is the building with five arches. This photograph by Mathew Brady was taken between 1871 and 1880.

  Chapter

  17

  TUESDAY, APRIL 11, 1865

  Washington, D. C.

  Evening

  ABRAHAM LINCOLN IS SPEAKING tonight at the White House, and everyone wants to hear.

  The spring air is warm and misty as the sea of humanity parades down Pennsylvania Avenue. Thousands upon thousands are on their way to hear the president.

  An Alfred Waud sketch of a flag-raising ceremony in front of the White House in 1861.

  John Wilkes Booth leans against a tall tree as the crowd surges by. He is close enough that Lincoln will be a mere pistol shot away. With him are David Herold and Lewis Powell. Herold is a former pharmacy clerk who was born and raised in Washington, D.C. Like Booth, he possesses matinee-idol good looks. But he is more educated and rugged. Herold received his pharmacy training from Georgetown College, and he is fond of spending his leisure time with a rifle in his hand, hunting animals. It was John Surratt who introduced the two, four months earlier. Since then, Herold has been an impassioned and committed member of Booth’s team.

  Lewis Powell—who also goes by the name Lewis Payne—is a twenty-year-old who served as a Confederate soldier and spy before joining Booth’s cause. The youngest in Booth’s group, Powell is tall, powerfully built, and very handsome—except that his face is misshapen on one side, the result of a mule’s kick. He is also a dangerous young man, with a violent, quick temper.