MAY 10, 1865: The Fourth Michigan Cavalry, one element of the force that General James H. Wilson led into Alabama (see March 22 and April 2, 1865), receives intelligence that Jefferson Davis is in their vicinity, near Irwinville, Georgia. Moving in on his camp, the Union soldiers surround Davis as he attempts to escape. He surrenders, saying simply, “God’s will be done.” A rumor will quickly spread that Davis was disguised as a woman when he was captured, and Northern cartoonists will gleefully portray the scene. “Much was said at the time about the garb Mr. Davis was wearing when he was captured,” Ulysses S. Grant will write in his memoirs. “I cannot settle this question from personal knowledge of the facts; but I have been under the belief, from information given to me by General Wilson shortly after the event, that when Mr. Davis learned that he was surrounded by our cavalry he was in his tent dressed in a gentleman’s dressing gown.” Davis will be imprisoned at Fort Monroe. Also on this day, the Union blockade of Southern ports is partially lifted. In Kentucky, former Confederate guerrilla William Quantrill is mortally wounded. Other guerrillas will be pursued by Union army units for much of the year. At the White House, President Andrew Johnson proclaims armed resistance at an end (though one more small land engagement will be fought, on May 12 at Palmito Ranch, Texas). Elsewhere in Washington, a military tribunal convenes to try those charged as accomplices in the Lincoln assassination: David Herold, Lewis Paine, Samuel Arnold, George Atzerodt (whom Booth had assigned to kill Vice President Johnson), Michael O’Laughlin, Dr. Samuel Mudd (who set Booth’s broken leg the day after the assassination and did not inform authorities that he had treated him), Edmund Spangler, and Mary Surratt (owner of the boardinghouse where Booth’s cohorts, including Mary’s son, John, plotted the assassination). Each will be convicted; Atzerodt, Herold, Paine, and Mary Surratt will be hanged on July 7.¹⁴⁴

The bodies of those sentenced to death for conspiring to assassinate President Lincoln hang from the scaffold in Washington. Photograph by Alexander Gardner, July 7, 1865.

Andrew Johnson (1808–1875), seventeenth president of the United States. On May 29, 1865, Johnson granted amnesty to most persons who participated in “the existing rebellion.” More than a year later, on August 20, 1866, he officially proclaimed “that the said insurrection is at an end, and that peace, order, and tranquillity [sic] and civil authority now exist throughout the whole United States of America.”

MAY 23–24, 1865: As the military tribunal tries the accused Lincoln assassination conspirators, people flood into Washington for a happier event: the Grand Review. During the huge celebration of the Union’s preservation, regiment after regiment of the Grand Armies of the Republic parade along Pennsylvania Avenue and read the banner attached to the Capitol: “The only national debt we never can pay is the debt we owe to the victorious soldiers.” The Army of the Potomac marches the first day; General William T. Sherman’s troops (informally known as “Sherman’s bummers”) parade on May 24. Although more than 160 African American regiments were formed during the war, and the courage and accomplishments of black soldiers have been widely celebrated by the Northern press, no black regiments are included in this massive celebration. Within a year, the U.S. Army will be reduced from one million men to about eighty thousand, on its way to a regular peacetime strength of about twenty-seven thousand. Most of those initially mustered out will be white; a disproportionate number of black units will remain in service as part of an army of occupation in the South.¹⁴⁵

MAY 29, 1865: By proclamation, President Johnson grants amnesty and pardon to all persons who directly or indirectly participated in “the existing rebellion”—with some exceptions—upon the taking of an oath declaring their allegiance to the U.S. Constitution and laws. The proclamation indicates that Johnson will pursue a moderate Reconstruction policy; Radical Republican objections to some of its provisions indicate that there will be troubled waters ahead.