Booth could not leave Boston without seeing Orlando Tompkins. They had known each other for years, and Booth had often been a guest in the Tompkins home. He stopped there now, unannounced, and asked Orlando to take a walk with him. They went to a jewelry store, where Booth surprised his friend with a bloodstone ring inscribed “JWB to OT, April 6, 1865.” Asked what the occasion was, he said, “I’ll never see you again.” 23
Returning to New York, Booth ran into Sam Chester, and they sat down for a glass of ale. It seemed to Chester that Booth had already had enough to drink. He had spent the past few hours in bars, and was getting hard to control. At one point he spotted actor Harry Wall from across the room, and said, “I always wanted to like Harry Wall, but I don’t like him for one thing.” Wall had once revealed to Booth that he was a government detective, and since then, Booth couldn’t bring himself to like the man, try as he might. Booth’s surly, combative manner was embarrassing, and Chester said that perhaps they ought to go somewhere else. Maybe they should look for John McCullough, who was in town and hoping to meet up with him.
On Booth’s suggestion, they went to the House of Lords instead. But as soon as they sat down, he started up with a man at the next table. Booth thought the man was eavesdropping, and voiced his objection loudly. “If there is one thing I despise more than another,” he bellowed, “it is a damned scoundrel that will listen to what others are saying. Let us go away from him.”
They moved to another table, and Booth calmed down. He brought up the abduction conspiracy, and assured Chester that he had completely abandoned the scheme. He had spent a fortune on the plot, he said, and was now forced to sell off horses to recover some of his losses. Chester tried to steer the conversation elsewhere, but that worked only for a moment. He was trying to say something when suddenly Booth slammed his hand down on the table. “What an excellent chance I had to kill the President, if I had wished, on Inauguration Day!” he said. “I was on the stand, as close to him nearly as I am to you.”
Sam Chester was astonished. “You’re crazy, John. What good would that do?” he asked.
“I could live in history,” Booth replied. Sam said that there was glory enough in a successful stage career, if he would just attend to it.
Booth shook his head, mildly amused. “I could never reason with you. You’re just like my brother Edwin,” he said, which led to more talk of the family split. Chester noticed that as Booth talked, he kept kissing a ring on his little finger. He explained that he was engaged to be married, and despite what Chester thought, this was not just another crazy idea; he was deeply in love with the lady. She came from a good family, and in fact it was she who had given him a ticket to the inauguration. Her only objection to Booth, he said, was that he was an actor; his only objection to her was that she was an abolitionist.
Booth insisted on paying for their supper. He had already forgotten his candid admission, just moments earlier, that he was broke. Now, once again, he was faking success. “Petroleum pays for this,” he said proudly.24
Booth stopped in Philadelphia on his way back to the capital, and dashed off a note to Chester. “Plead my excuses to John McCullough and tell him I am sorry that I could not see him that day. . . . Tell him I am going to Oil City.” He saw William Sinn, an old friend and theater manager, on Chestnut Street, and started up a conversation. “You will hear from me in Washington,” Booth said. “I am going to make a big hit.”25
ON THE NIGHT OF APRIL 9, Booth returned to Washington and checked in to the National Hotel. He really hadn’t given up on his plot, as he had told Chester, but by now only a few of his people were still involved. Time was running out.
The following day, newspapers carried the most sensational news in years.
SURRENDER OF LEE
AND
HIS WHOLE ARMY!
GRANT’S TERMS ACCEPTED!
Robert E. Lee surrendered his troops at Appomattox Court House, and a war that had cost the lives of 623,000 men would almost certainly be over soon. As the Evening Star said, “When Lee, the wisest and bravest of the confederate leaders, sees no ray of hope for the confederate cause, and voluntarily lays down his arms to prevent the further and futile effusion of blood, the most credulous optimist among his followers must accept his judgment as decisive.”26
The city of Washington would fall into one long, loud, drunken jubilee.
Mosby’s Rangers were not quite ready to celebrate. Lee had surrendered his regular forces, but the Rangers were not so sure that they were included in the arrangement. They looked to Mosby himself for guidance, and late on April 9, they broke off their forage mission in the Northern Neck and headed north to consult with the colonel. But they left with a drove of cattle and a large number of wagons full of forage. Local farmers were enraged. They insisted the war was over, and they should no longer be forced to provide food to the army.
WHEN THE NEWS of Lee’s surrender reached Washington, Abraham Lincoln was still on the River Queen, steaming back from his trip to Richmond and City Point. On his arrival he went straight to the home of Secretary Seward and talked with him for a while. He did not see Grant’s telegram until after he retired to the White House—and that was two hours after it reached the War Department, right next door.27
Newspapers broke the story on Monday, and that’s when the parties began. Thousands poured into the city, drinking, singing hymns, and setting bonfires. Everywhere the masses gathered, some aspiring orator would offer a few remarks; these words, mixed with alcohol, produced a euphoria unknown in Washington for years. A crowd of two thousand had worked its way from the navy yard to the Executive Mansion, and their cheers and whistles finally coaxed the president into making an appearance. Lincoln said he was “very much rejoiced” that people could finally give vent to their feelings, and he assumed there would be a formal celebration the following night. “Should such a demonstration take place, I of course will be expected to respond, if called upon, and if I permit you to dribble it out of me now, I will have nothing left to say on that occasion.”
The band of the Quartermaster’s Corps had come with the crowd, and they caught the president’s eye. “I observe that you have a band of music with you,” he said. “I have always thought that ‘Dixie’ was one of the best tunes I had ever heard. Our adversaries over the way, I know, have attempted to appropriate it, but I insist that on yesterday we fairly captured it. . . . I referred the question to the Attorney General and he gave it as his legal opinion that it is now our property. I now ask the band to favor us with a performance.” He left the crowd cheering and clapping to the strains of the “captured” anthem.
Meanwhile, hundreds of revelers assembled at the War Department to cheer Secretary Stanton and his staff. Stanton was still preoccupied with the business of war, but a couple of lesser officials stood up to harangue the crowd. Somewhere among the masses were George Atzerodt and Lou Weichmann. Atzerodt seemed elated at the news—cheering wildly, and perhaps going overboard with glee. Weichmann thought he was acting crazy, and he told him so. His remark stopped Atzerodt cold. The smile left his face, and he turned to Weichmann in all seriousness, and said, “You will find out before long that I am not half as crazy as you imagine.”28
A mile to the east, John Wilkes Booth would not even pretend to celebrate. Despondent over the surrender, Booth took out his frustrations at a pistol gallery on Pennsylvania Avenue. After shooting for a while, he walked up to the Surratt boardinghouse, where he encountered Lou Weichmann. They talked of Lee’s surrender, and Weichmann said something about the Confederacy having “gone up.”
“No!” Booth snapped. “It is not gone up yet.” Excitedly, he pulled a map out of his pocket and pointed out how Joe Johnston might still escape from Sherman. He seemed to be getting himself worked up, and Weichmann became uncomfortable. He changed the topic, and asked Booth why he was not still acting. Booth said that he was done with the stage, and the only play he wanted to present now was Venice Preserved. That was a pointed
message, but Weichmann didn’t get it. That eighteenth-century play involved a plot to assassinate the leaders of Venice. The lead conspirator happens to be married to a senator’s daughter.29
Wandering the streets again, Booth ran into Henry B. Phillips, of Ford’s Theatre, who invited him to take a drink with a couple of friends. “Yes,” said Booth, “anything to chase away the blues.” When asked what he meant, Booth said that the news from Appomattox “was enough to give anyone the blues.” Phillips’s friends happened to be government employees, and he did not want to see Booth talk his way into trouble. So he changed the subject and led the way to Birch’s Saloon.30
At eight o’clock, Booth appeared at Pumphrey’s Stable and said he needed a horse he could keep overnight. He wanted to take a trip into the country, and he preferred the sorrel that he had been renting lately. Pumphrey said that that horse was out, and he suggested Booth check again later. Instead, Booth walked over to Ford’s Theatre. There, he told Ned Spangler that he had no further use for his buggy, as he would soon be leaving town. He asked Ned to clean it up and sell it.
While they were talking, John Mathews walked by. Booth still held a grudge against Mathews for refusing to join his plot. Mathews had done all he could to smooth things over, even presenting Booth with a gift. Booth’s response was cynical to the core. He reciprocated by giving Mathews a long black lacquer box he had once used for his theatrical swords. It seemed a touching gesture, but it came with a hitch: authorities would someday come looking for such a box, since Booth had been using one just like it to transport carbines.31
LOU WEICHMANN TOOK TUESDAY, April 11, off work. The night before, Mrs. Surratt had asked him to drive her to Surrattsville so she could settle some financial matters. An old land transaction had left her late husband indebted to the Calvert family since 1852, and the Calverts had already won two judgments against him in court. Now George H. Calvert was pressuring Mrs. Surratt to pay up so he could close the books on his late father’s estate. But Mary Surratt did not have that kind of money on hand. In order to settle with Calvert, she had to call in a debt from John Nothey, who lived a mile or two from the tavern. Nothey had once bought seventy-five acres from the Surratts, and he still owed $479 on it.
The first thing in the morning, Mrs. Surratt asked Weichmann to go ask Booth if they could borrow his carriage. Booth said that he had sold it, but he gave Weichmann ten dollars to rent one, and by nine o’clock, Weichmann and Mrs. Surratt were on the road. They had just crossed the Navy Yard Bridge when they happened to recognize John M. Lloyd in another carriage, heading toward the city. Lloyd got down out of his carriage to speak with Mrs. Surratt. As he recalled later, she started right off talking about Gus Howell, the spy, who had been arrested a few weeks before in the Surrattsville tavern. She said that, if necessary, she would go personally to General Augur or Judge Levi Turner to secure his release. Then she said something that Lloyd did not quite understand. He asked what she meant, and she came right out with it: Are those firearms still hidden at the tavern? Lloyd said they were; he had shoved them back out of sight, and nobody had ever come to get them. She said he ought to get them ready, as they would be called for soon.32
Mrs. Surratt and Weichmann arrived in Surrattsville at midday, and right away she sent word to Nothey that she wanted to see him. They continued on to the home of Bennett F. Gwynn, a few miles farther south, where they took dinner and talked for a while. Gwynn had been involved in the original transaction with Nothey, and he returned to Surrattsville with Mrs. Surratt, just in case a dispute arose. They found Nothey waiting for them, and after a brief discussion, Mrs. Surratt went home empty-handed.
John Lloyd was on his way home as well. He had run into George Atzerodt in Uniontown, outside Washington, and asked him about those carbines. Lloyd said he was a little confused by Mrs. Surratt’s instructions. What, exactly, should he do with those weapons? Atzerodt didn’t know, but he ad-libbed a response: Bury them.33
Edman Spangler had spent the day at Tattersall’s horse market, trying to sell Booth’s carriage. As of late afternoon, though, nobody was willing to meet the $260 reserve. So Spangler brought it back to Baptist Alley, and he asked Booth what he should do next. Booth said he should try to sell it privately. “You will help me, won’t you?” he asked.
Spangler said, “Of course.”34
THE “GRAND ILLUMINATION” PLANNED for that evening was postponed, but President Lincoln did not put off the speech he had promised the day before. A crowd had gathered outside the White House, and at dusk, Lincoln appeared at a window in the north portico with a written address. His tone was serious. “We meet this evening not in sorrow, but in gladness of heart,” he began. He promised a day of national thanksgiving, then went on to praise General Grant and all those who had contributed to the recent victory. The next great hurdle would be reconstruction. He suggested that the plan he had followed in Louisiana had worked well enough in the past few years, and despite some grumbling, it ought to serve as a benchmark for other states of the South. He acknowledged that everyone would be happier if the new government had a larger constituency of loyal men, but at least the states would have a new cooperative order.
Standing just below, at the front of the crowd, were John Wilkes Booth and Dave Herold. As the president delivered his speech, they listened closely for signs that he intended to pursue a radical course against the South. What caught Booth’s attention in particular was Lincoln’s suggestion on a subject that few had dared, so far, to touch: voting rights for African Americans. As the president put it: “It is also satisfactory to some that the elective franchise is not given to the colored man. I would myself prefer that it were now conferred on the very intelligent, and on those who serve our cause as soldiers.”
That was all Booth needed to hear. “That means nigger citizenship,” he fumed. “Now, by God, I’ll put him through.” He turned on his heels and pushed his way out of the crowd.35
NED SPANGLER FINALLY SOLD Booth’s carriage, but he got only $250 for it. The buyer came to Ford’s on Wednesday morning, but Booth wasn’t around, so he asked Jim Gifford to close the deal on Booth’s behalf. If Booth still entertained any notions of capturing the president, the disposal of that carriage would make it almost impossible; after all, an inconspicuous vehicle had always been a necessary component of the escape. Though a rented carriage might have served just as well, he could not count on finding a suitable one on short notice.
In time, Booth did stop at Ford’s, but only to pick up his mail. Tom Raybold, Harry Ford, and Joseph Sessford were sitting in the box office when he came in. Booth greeted them with a sullen announcement: “We are all slaves now.” Four years ago, abolitionists were the outcasts, almost universally condemned for stirring up war. But now the situation was reversed. “If a man were to go out and insult a nigger now,” Booth said, “he would be knocked down by the nigger and nothing would be done to the nigger.”
Tom Raybold replied, “You should not insult a nigger then.”
Harry Ford smirked. Though he and Booth had once been close, politics had come between them. The breaking point had come a few months earlier, in an argument at Mr. Petersen’s house across the street. Booth had launched into one of his tirades and quickly found himself outnumbered. Ford, Charles Warwick, and John Mathews all argued against him, and Ford threw a few jabs that could not be taken back. Since then, a coolness had existed among them. Of the other three, only Mathews felt compelled to make up.36
RICHARD SMOOT AND JAMES BRAWNER had still not received the rest of their money for the boat. Smoot had tried repeatedly to collect the balance, but John Surratt always managed to put him off in one way or another. Now he came looking for his money again. On Wednesday afternoon, he showed up at the H Street boardinghouse in search of John Surratt. The lady of the house, as he later recalled, gave him “a penetrating look” and curtly informed him that she did not know the whereabouts of her son. But when Smoot told her the nature of his business, Mrs. Surrat
t’s demeanor changed. “Her face brightened up, and she extended me a most cordial greeting, and eagerly inquired if the boat was in its place and readily accessible, as it might be called into requisition that night.” Then, as if suddenly reminded of something, she got an anxious expression and told Smoot he must leave at once. He might see her son and “the boys” on Friday night. They planned to be back in Washington by then.37
GENERAL ULYSSES S. GRANT ARRIVED with his wife and staff aboard the steamer Mollie Martin on Thursday morning, April 13. They took rooms at Willard’s Hotel, and the general wasted no time demobilizing the army. He went straight to the War Department and recommended that Secretary Stanton take immediate steps to halt the draft and recruiting; curtail purchases of arms and supplies; reduce the number of officers and government personnel; and lift all trade restrictions with Richmond. The measures should begin saving money almost immediately.
The “grand illumination” had been rescheduled for that night, so Grant could witness the festivities. He had never been one for public appearances and, like the president, was content to keep a low profile that evening. Mrs. Lincoln had invited the general out for a drive around the city; otherwise, they had no plans.38
Not so with Booth. Much had changed since he formed his plot. The Confederate armies had either surrendered or were in full retreat, their capital taken, and all hope of independence lost. The president’s abduction had been of questionable value for months, and it now seemed entirely pointless. Yet Booth had not given up. He continued to skulk around the theater, laying out schemes and keeping in touch with the few conspirators who remained. He was planning something, and very likely, Grant’s arrival would make this a perfect night to strike.
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