April 14, 1865, Good Friday, began as a day of jubilation in Washington, DC. The Civil War was effectively over. Confederate general Robert E. Lee (1807–1870) had surrendered five days earlier. That evening, President Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) and First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln (1818–1882) celebrated by attending a play, Our American Cousin, at Ford’s Theater. When they arrived at their flag-draped box a few minutes late, the audience erupted into cheers, and the orchestra stopped the performance to play “Hail to the Chief.”

John Wilkes Booth (1838–1865), who was boarding at a house a few blocks away from the theater, was already nationally famous as the day began, a renowned Shakespearean actor considered by some to be the handsomest man in America.

But Booth was also a Confederate sympathizer who was enraged by the South’s impending defeat. In 1864, he had devised a plot to kidnap Lincoln. That morning, however, Booth hatched a new plan: He would kill Lincoln, and several of his coconspirators would kill other top government officials.

Booth was the only plotter who managed to complete his mission. He sneaked into Lincoln’s box, shot him in the back of the head, and then leaped from the box onto the stage. According to most accounts of the assassination, he shouted, “Sic semper tyrannis”—Latin for “Thus always to tyrants”—and fled on horseback to Maryland.

The killing of Lincoln stunned the nation, provoked a massive manhunt for the conspirators, and probably had the opposite of Booth’s intended effect by ensuring harsher treatment for the defeated Confederacy. Four of the conspirators were apprehended, tried at courts-martial, and hanged in July 1865. Booth was a fugitive for twelve days, until he was tracked down by Union forces at a barn in rural Virginia. He was shot in the ensuing melee; he was twenty-six at the time of his death.

ADDITIONAL FACTS

  1. Ford’s Theater was reopened by President Barack Obama (1961–) in 2009 after an extensive renovation. (He sat in the front row, not in the presidential box.)
  2. The Maryland doctor who treated Booth’s broken leg after the assassination, Samuel A. Mudd (1833–1883), was convicted of aiding and abetting and sentenced to life in prison. He was pardoned and released four years later.
  3. Booth’s plot also targeted secretary of state William Seward (1801–1872) and vice president Andrew Johnson (1808–1875). Seward was stabbed several times by Lewis Powell (1844–1865) but survived; George Atzerodt (1835–1865) was supposed to kill Johnson, but got cold feet at the last minute. Both Powell and Atzerodt were arrested, convicted at courts-martial, and hanged on July 7, 1865.

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