adolphe, marquis de chambrun, a French attorney who met Lincoln during the final months of the president’s life, wrote that the assassination lent “a tragic prestige” to its victim.73
The Reverend Nathan H. Chamberlain explained this phenomenon to his congregation at St. James Church in Birmingham, Connecticut, in a sermon on April 19, 1865. Booth was still a fugitive, hidden in the thicket near Samuel Cox’s farm in Maryland, when Chamberlain told his congregation that the assassin had failed. Yes, he had killed a man, but he had done so under such circumstances as to apotheosize the victim. Lincoln was now elevated above daily political squabbles and vexatious controversies over war and reconstruction. “Martyrdom for duty lifts a man out of days to become a citizen of the ages,” said Chamberlain.74 The American diplomat John Bigelow thought similarly, writing from Paris to Secretary of State William Seward, “Mr. Lincoln could not have surrendered his life on terms more advantageous to his country or to his own fame. The manner of his death has transfigured him in the eyes of all mankind.”75
Lincoln’s ascent to Olympus began with the extraordinary events attending the return of his remains for burial to his hometown of Springfield, Illinois. The body left Washington on April 21, 1865, and made a thirteen-day, 1,700-mile trip through the principal cities of the North. Millions of Americans turned out to meet it in displays of grief and sympathy. The occasion was the most-shared event of the century—absolutely unparalleled in the nation’s history.76
“Look at that face and remember it,” said a grandfather as he held up his grandson to gaze at Lincoln’s remains during their display at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. “As you grow up you will see it in stone and bronze. Then you will be thankful that I brought you here today.”77
Memorials for the president followed, notably a striking monument in Springfield erected over his tomb. At the monument’s dedication ceremony in 1874, Governor Richard J. Oglesby, a close Lincoln friend, declared the structure a fitting tribute for “the obscure boy, the honest man, the illustrious statesman, and great liberator and the martyr President.”78
Key literary figures crafted Lincoln’s legacy during the remaining years of the century. Walt Whitman shared his love of the president throughout the 1880s with a highly popular lecture on the president’s death. It was so convincingly presented that listeners thought mistakenly that Whitman had been present at Ford’s Theatre on April 14, 1865. The poet told his audiences that Lincoln, whom he saw often during the war, was an authentic American who was down-to-earth, fraternal and democratic—one of them. In the following decade Lincoln’s secretaries John G. Nicolay and John Hay coauthored their massive Abraham Lincoln: A History (1890). If history was indeed biography, they asserted, in the heft that only ten volumes can supply, then Lincoln’s life was the life of the nation. “He is now the greatest of all Americans,” agreed the marquis de Chambrun.
The centennial of Lincoln’s birth occurred in 1909. It led the prominent journalist Horace White to reflect, “Abraham Lincoln has been in his grave more than forty-two years, and we should have expected that a considerable amount of dust would have settled upon his tomb. This is a busy world. Each generation has its own problems to grapple with, its own joys and sorrows, its cares and grief to absorb its thoughts and compel its tears,” White continued. “Time moves on, and each particular thing in it dwindles in size. So also do most men. But some men bulk larger as the years receded. The most striking fact of our time, of a psychological kind, is the growth of Lincoln’s fame since the earth closed over his remains.”79
Plans for a grand memorial on the National Mall began in 1911. Before his death six years earlier, John Hay had urged that the monument be given this eminent location for one reason. “Lincoln of all Americans next to Washington deserves this place of honor,” he claimed. “He was of the Immortals.” The Lincoln Memorial was dedicated in 1922. Above the president’s immense statue the inscription reads: “In This Temple as in The Hearts of the People for Whom He Saved the Union the Memory of Abraham Lincoln Is Enshrined Forever.” This building has become one of the most familiar structures in the world and a symbol of the nation’s capital.
The twentieth century brought a cultural outpouring of Lincolniana, not just formal histories and biographies but also films, plays, poetry, portraits, musicals, and sculpture. Over the years, and down to the present, Lincoln meant many and often conflicting things to the American people, and their understanding of him grew more nuanced, informed, and occasionally critical. Nevertheless, all who claimed him for one purpose or the other responded to his honesty, faith in democracy, devotion to law, and essential kindness.
By the time of the two-hundredth anniversary of his birth in 2009, Lincoln had become ubiquitous. He had been depicted on the ten-dollar demand note in 1861 and the fifteen-cent stamp in 1866. But when he appeared on the iconic Lincoln penny in 1909 and the five-dollar bill in 1914, his likeness was distributed in quantities that made his image one of the most recognizable on earth. In 2012 alone, six billion pennies were minted and nearly 730 million five-dollar bills were printed by the government he served. Little wonder that people around the world with no idea who he is know the features of his face. Having conquered Earth in this fashion, Lincoln moved on to Mars when a penny was taken recently to the Red Planet (as part of a camera calibration target) by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity.
bert sheldon, a washington, d.c., policeman and Lincoln enthusiast, wrote in 1945, “When Lincoln made his ascent into immortality, he took J. Wilkes Booth with him.”80 One would imagine that each found the other’s presence disagreeable.
George Alfred Townsend thought differently. No contemporary of the assassin spent more time reflecting on the life of this odd young man than did Townsend. He watched Booth’s first acting performances in Philadelphia in 1857, followed his remarkable career during the war, and talked him to only weeks before the assassination in 1865. The journalist subsequently wrote the first popular book on the assassination and the first important novel about it. Townsend spent fifty years investigating and reporting the Booth story.
Although born in a slave state, Townsend was a strong Lincoln man, a political radical, and a tireless critic of Southern leaders and society. He loved poking fun at “the rubes,” as he expressed it. Despite that, he was accused of being friendly to Booth in his 1865 articles on the conspiracy. He defended himself by replying, “Much as I denounce and deprecate his crime—holding him to be worthy of all execration, and so steeped in blood that the excuses of a century will fail to lift him out of the atmosphere of common felons—I still stand back in surprise and terror at the wonderful resources and extraordinary influence of one who I had considered a mere thespian. There must have been something in this man capable of extension and perseverance above the common. What a tragedy for a man of beaming presence—bold and agreeable—to be so insanely ignorant of the consequences of the crime he committed, a crime that would make the remotest nations give him up to be hanged.”
Booth’s irrationality allowed Townsend to view the assassin with pity. “Booth was the last genius of the rebellion,” he wrote, “and he committed an imperial crime.” But his act was so heinous and absurd that Townsend wondered if even Lincoln himself would fail to feel a touch of compassion for the fool who did it. The assassination, he concluded, was “the greatest crime in the western world, done by a morbid, revengeful, melodramatic, ambitious and irregular young man of bold and almost insane purpose. It made Mr. Lincoln the most beloved memory in our country, adding to his great services the crown of martyrdom. In Abraham Lincoln’s beautiful and enduring fame, even his assassin seems embraced and forgiven.”81
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
....
Over the quarter century of research that went into making Fortune’s Fool, I accrued a heavy debt to friends and colleagues who advised and assisted me. While many of these individuals are cited in the endnotes, I wish to take special notice here of their contributions—both academic a
nd personal—to my work.
James O. Hall, a retired federal government worker and the most senior of the “Boothies,” as Booth buffs were known, first encouraged me to write a Booth biography. From day one he never wavered in his support of my efforts. While we did not always agree in our interpretations of people or events, he was as supportive of me as if my project were his own. I cannot put into proper words my feelings of gratitude to him. I can only hope that every author may have such a friend. Sincerely thankful, I dedicate this book to his memory.
I take pleasure in also acknowledging:
Laurie Verge, Joan Chaconas, and Sandra Walia (for making the Surratt House a “must” stop for researchers, writers, and thousands of visitors each year);
John Sellers, Clark Evans, and Michelle Krowl (for assistance at the Library of Congress);
Ed Steers, Tom Turner, Bill Hanchett, Blaine Houmes, and Pep Martin (for noteworthy scholarship on the people and events of April 14, 1865);
Michael Burlingame, Joan Cashin, and Ron Soodalter (for generosity and bonhomie);
James Swanson, Michael Kauffman, Steve Miller, Richard Sloan, and John Elliott (for original and stimulating studies of the assassination);
Tom Bogar, Don Wilmeth, and David Grimsted (for exceptional knowledge of the nineteenth-century stage);
Louise Taper, James L. Woods, Susan Lemke, James Cornelius, Tom Schwartz, and Tom and Connie Spande (for love of history);
Douglas L. Wilson, William C. Harris, Don Kennon, and Paul Tetreault (for service to the Abraham Lincoln Institute);
Trevor Plante and Mike Musick (for help at the National Archives);
James McPherson, Mark Neely, Frank Williams, Allen Guelzo, Harold Holzer, and Jason Emerson (for inspirational writing and lecturing);
Andy Waskie, Roger Hunt, Henry Deeks, Lewis Leigh, Jan Wade, Matthew Pinsker, Bob Lucas, and Mike Murtaugh (for devoted study of the Civil War);
John W. Stump, Jim Chrismer, and Tom Fink (for insights into the history of the Booth family in Harford County, Maryland);
Mark Greenough (for knowledge of Virginia militia history), Angela Smythe (for steadfastness in seeking the answers to difficult questions), and Scott S. Taylor (for assistance at Georgetown University’s Lauinger Library);
Wally Hutcheon, Charles Poland, Kathy Lloyd, Bill Fleming, and Bruce Mann (for camaraderie at NOVA);
Bruce Leggat, Bob Lesman, Marion Barnwell, and Nelson Lankford (for careful reading and criticism of the manuscript);
Dan Watermeier, Ray Wemmlinger, Steve Archer, and Jim Wollon (for faithful custody of the Booths and their story);
Susan Ferber, Joellyn M. Ausanka, Andrew Varhol, Lauren Hill, India Cooper, and Owen Keiter (for guidance through the briar patch at Oxford University Press);
And to Jane, David, and Carey Alford and to Suzanne Gilbert (for loving support over the years).
A few friends did not live to see the book published. Their steady interest in my task always encouraged me, and as I completed the work, my thoughts often turned to them. I recall them, with fondness: Bertram Wyatt-Brown, Sheldon Meyer, John K. Lattimer, John C. Brennan, Dinah Faber, Dorothy and Howard Fox, Constance Head, Cameron Moseley, Gordon Samples, and Art Loux. Thank you all, dear comrades.
NOTES
....
ABBREVIATIONS
HRHRC Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin
HSHC The Historical Society of Harford County Inc., Bel Air, Maryland
HTC Harvard Theatre Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts
JOH James O. Hall Papers, Hall Research Center, Surratt House Museum, Clinton, Maryland
LFFRC Lincoln Financial Foundation Research Collection, Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana
LOC Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
LOV Library of Virginia, Richmond (Archives Division)
MdHS Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore, Maryland
NA National Archives and Records Services, Washington, D.C.
NA M599 “Investigation and Trial Papers Relating to the Assassination of President Lincoln,” a collection of statements of evidence, letters, court records, and related papers from the War Department’s Judge Advocate General’s Office and found in Record Group 153. It is available as Microcopy 599 (16 reels, published in 1965). In the notes, items are cited with reel and page number, e.g., 4/410–11, NA M599 (reel 4, pp. 410–11).
OR U.S. War Department. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. 128 vols. Washington: GPO, 1880–1901.
RG Record Group
VHS Virginia Historical Society
VRHC Valentine Richmond History Center, Richmond, Virginia
INTRODUCTION
1
John E. Washington, They Knew Lincoln (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1942), pp. 28–29, 38–40; Washington Post, Feb. 8, 1942.
2
St. Paul and Minneapolis Pioneer Press, Feb. 20, 1887.
3
“Howard’s Letter,” clipping, n.d. [Oct. 1885], Booth Files, HTC.
4
Gobright, Recollection of Men and Things at Washington during the Third of a Century (Philadelphia: Claxton, Remsen, Haffelfinger, 1869), p. 348.
5
Baltimore American, Dec. 8, 1902.
6
John Wilkes Booth to Mary Ann Booth, n.p., n.d. [1864], Letters Received (1809–1870), Records of the Attorney General’s Office, General Records of the Dept. of Justice, RG 60, NA.
7
William Hanchett, “Booth’s Diary,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, vol. 72 (Feb. 1979), pp. 39–56.
8
Asia Booth Clarke, John Wilkes Booth: A Sister’s Memoir, ed. Terry Alford (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1996), p. x.
9
Denver Post, Jan. 7, 1899.
10
William J. Ferguson, I Saw Booth Shoot Lincoln (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1930), p. 14.
11
Richmond Times Dispatch, June 29, 1924.
12
Philadelphia Press, Sept. 7, 1901.
13
Charlotte M. Martin, ed., The Stage Reminiscences of Mrs. Gilbert (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1901), pp. 57–58.
14
Booth Scrapbook, Fawcett Theatre Collection, Hodges Library, University of Tennessee, Knoxville; Detroit Free Press, Dec. 15, 1901.
CHAPTER 1. BRIGHT BOY ABSALOM
1
HSHC, Ella V. Mahoney Papers, including drafts of an unpublished manuscript that Mrs. Mahoney coauthored with her friend and amanuensis Helen Covey Milius titled “The House That Booth Built: The House That Fell with Lincoln” (ca. 1940–42); Willard H. Wright, “Tudor Hall—House of the Booths,” Mentor, vol. 17 (Feb. 1929), pp. 15–18.
2
Irving Dilliard, “Three to Remember: Archibald MacLeish, Stanley Kimmel, Phillips Bradley,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, vol. 77 (Spring 1984), pp. 50–56; Washington Evening Star, Jan. 9, 1936. Kimmel’s papers at the Macdonald-Kelce Library, University of Tampa, contain his 1934 research notebook (quoted here), among other significant items. Thanks to Art Bagley.
3
George A. Townsend, “A Visit to the Maryland Home of the Booths,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 8, 1880; Michael E. Ruane, ”Birthplace of Infamy,” Washington Post, Feb. 4, 2001; Baltimore Sun, March 6, 1938.
4
Kimmel, notebook, p. 23; Stanley Kimmel, The Mad Booths of Maryland (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1940), p. 67; Mahoney and Milius, “House,” pt. 1, pp. 139–40, and fragments; Bel Air Aegis, Sept. 6, 1935.
5
Asia Booth Clarke, John Wilkes Booth: A Sister’s Memoir, ed. Terry Alford (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1996), p. 33. Written in 1874, this memoir was first published under the title The Unlocked Book: A Memoir of John Wilkes Booth by His Sister Asia Booth Clarke, ed. Eleanor Farjeon (New Yo
rk: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1938). The original manuscript, which I examined courtesy of Arthur and Deirdre L. Kincaid, has no title.
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