Books: The Life, Crime and Capture of John Wilkes Booth
G >>
George Alfred Townsend >> The Life, Crime and Capture of John Wilkes Booth
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 Produced by Kathy H., David Moynihan, Charles Franks
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
THE LIFE, CRIME, AND CAPTURE
OF
JOHN WILKES BOOTH,
WITH A FULL SKETCH OF THE
Conspiracy of which he was the Leader,
AND THE
PURSUIT, TRIAL AND EXECUTION OF HIS ACCOMPLICES.
BY GEORGE ALFRED TOWNSEND,
A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.
[Illustration: THE LIFE, CRIME, AND CAPTURE OF John Wilkes Booth AND THE
PURSUIT, TRIAL AND EXECUTION OF HIS ACCOMPLICES.]
EXPLANATORY.
One year ago the writer of the letters which follow, visited the Battle
Field of Waterloo. In looking over many relics of the combat preserved
in the Museum there, he was particularly interested in the files of
journals contemporary with the action. These contained the Duke of
Wellington's first despatch announcing the victory, the reports of the
subordinate commanders, and the current gossip as to the episodes and
hazards of the day.
The time will come when remarkable incidents of these our times will be
a staple of as great curiosity as the issue of Waterloo. It is an
incident without a precedent on this side of the globe, and never to be
repeated.
Assassination has made its last effort to become indigenous here. The
public sentiment of Loyalist and Rebel has denounced it: the world has
remarked it with uplifted hands and words of execration. Therefore, as
long as history shall hold good, the murder of the President will be a
theme for poesy, romance and tragedy. We who live in this consecrated
time keep the sacred souvenirs of Mr. Lincoln's death in our possession;
and the best of these are the news letters descriptive of his
apotheosis, and the fate of the conspirators who slew him.
I represented the _World_ newspaper at Washington during the whole of
those exciting weeks, and wrote their occurrences fresh from the mouths
of the actors. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865,
By DICK & FITZGERALD,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the
Southern District of New York.
PREFATORY.
It has seemed fitting to Messrs. DICK & FITZGERALD to reproduce the
_World_ letters, as a keepsake for the many who received them kindly.
The Sketches appended were conscientiously written, and whatever
embellishments they may seem to have grew out of the stirring
events,--not out of my fancy.
Subsequent investigation has confirmed the veracity even of their
speculations. I have arranged them, but have not altered them; if they
represent nothing else, they do carry with them the fever and spirit of
the time. But they do not assume to be literal history: We live too
close to the events related to decide positively upon them. As a
brochure of the day,--nothing more,--I give these Sketches of a
Correspondent to the public.
G. A. T.
THE LIFE, CRIME, AND CAPTURE
OF
JOHN WILKES BOOTH.
LETTER I.
THE MURDER.
Washington, April 17.
Some very deliberate and extraordinary movements were made by a handsome
and extremely well-dressed young man in the city of Washington last
Friday. At about half-past eleven o'clock A. M., this person, whose name
is J. Wilkes Booth, by profession an actor, and recently engaged in oil
speculations, sauntered into Ford's Theater, on Tenth, between E and F
streets, and exchanged greetings with the man at the box-office. In the
conversation which ensued, the ticket agent informed Booth that a box
was taken for Mr. Lincoln and General Grant, who were expected to visit
the theater, and contribute to the benefit of Miss Laura Keene, and
satisfy the curiosity of a large audience. Mr. Booth went away with a
jest, and a lightly-spoken "Good afternoon." Strolling down to
Pumphreys' stable, on C street, in the rear of the National Hotel, he
engaged a saddle horse, a high-strung, fast, beautiful bay mare, telling
Mr. Pumphreys that he should call for her in the middle of the
afternoon.
From here he went to the Kirkwood Hotel, on the corner of Pennsylvania
avenue and Twelfth street, where, calling for a card and a sheet of
notepaper, he sat down and wrote upon the first as follows:
_For Mr. Andrew Johnson_:--
I don't wish to disturb you; are you at home?
J. W. Booth.
To this message, which was sent up by the obliging clerk, Mr. Johnson
responded that he was very busily engaged. Mr. Booth smiled, and turning
to his sheet of note-paper, wrote on it. The fact, if fact it is, that
he had been disappointed in not obtaining an examination of the
Vice-President's apartment and a knowledge of the Vice-President's
probable whereabouts the ensuing evening, in no way affected his
composure. The note, the contents of which are unknown, was signed and
sealed within a few moments. Booth arose, bowed to an acquaintance, and
passed into the street. His elegant person was seen on the avenue a few
minutes, and was withdrawn into the Metropolitan Hotel.
At 4 P. M., he again appeared at Pumphreys' livery stable, mounted the
mare he had engaged, rode leisurely up F street, turned into an alley
between Ninth And Tenth streets, and thence into an alley reloading to
the rear of Ford's Theater, which fronts on Tenth street, between E and
F streets. Here he alighted and deposited the mare in a small stable off
the alley, which he had hired sometime before for the accommodation of a
saddle-horse which he had recently sold. Mr. Booth soon afterward
retired from the stable, and is supposed to have refreshed himself at a
neighboring bar-room.
At 8 o'clock the same evening, President Lincoln and Speaker Colfax sat
together in a private room at the White House, pleasantly conversing.
General Grant, with whom the President had engaged to attend Ford's
Theater that evening, had left with his wife for Burlington, New-Jersey,
in the 6 o'clock train. After this departure Mr. Lincoln rather
reluctantly determined to keep his part of the engagement, rather than
to disappoint his friends and the audience. Mrs. Lincoln, entering the
room and turning to Mr. Colfax, said, in a half laughing, half serious
way, "Well, Mr. Lincoln, are you going to the theater with me or not?"
"I suppose I shall have to go, Colfax," said the President, and the
Speaker took his leave in company with Major Rathbone, of the
Provost-Marshal General's office, who escorted Miss Harris, daughter of
Senator Harris, of New York. Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln reached Ford's Theater
at twenty minutes before 9 o'clock.
The house was filled in every part with a large and brilliantly attired
audience. As the presidential party ascended the stairs, and passed
behind the dress circle to the entrance of the private box reserved for
them, the whole assemblage, having in mind the recent Union victories,
arose, cheered, waving hats and handkerchiefs, and manifesting every
other accustomed sign of enthusiasm. The President, last to enter the
box, turned before doing so, and bowed a courteous acknowledgment of his
reception--At the moment of the President's arrival, Mr. Hawks, one of
the actors, performing the well-known part of Dundreary, had exclaimed:
"This reminds me of a story, as Mr. Lincoln says." The audience forced
him, after the interruption, to tell the story over again. It evidently
pleased Mr. Lincoln, who turned laughingly to his wife and made a remark
which was not overheard.
[Illustration: Scene of the Assassination.
_X_ President's Position. _A_ The course of the Assassin after the
Murder. _BB_ Movable partition not in use on the night of the
Assassination. _D_ Door through which the Assassin looked in taking aim.
_C_ Closed door through which pistol ball was fired.]
The box in which the President sat consisted of two boxes turned into
one, the middle partition being removed, as on all occasions when a
state party visited the theater. The box was on a level with the dress
circle; about twelve feet above the stage. There were two entrances--the
door nearest to the wall having been closed and locked; the door nearest
the balustrades of the dress circle, and at right angles with it, being
open and left open, after the visitors had entered. The interior was
carpeted, lined with crimson paper, and furnished with a sofa covered
with crimson velvet, three arm chairs similarly covered, and six
cane-bottomed chairs. Festoons of flags hung before the front of the box
against a background of lace.
President Lincoln took one of the arm-chairs and seated himself in the
front of the box, in the angle nearest the audience, where, partially
screened from observation, he had the best view of what was transpiring
on the stage. Mrs. Lincoln sat next to him, and Miss Harris in the
opposite angle nearest the stage. Major Rathbone sat just behind Mrs.
Lincoln and Miss Harris. These four were the only persons in the box.
The play proceeded, although "Our American Cousin," without Mr. Sothern,
has, since that gentleman's departure from this country, been justly
esteemed a very dull affair. The audience at Ford's, including Mrs.
Lincoln, seemed to enjoy it very much. The worthy wife of the President
leaned forward, her hand upon her husband's knee, watching every scene
in the drama with amused attention. Even across the President's face at
intervals swept a smile, robbing it of its habitual sadness.
About the beginning of the second act, the mare, standing in the stable
in the rear of the theater, was disturbed in the midst of her meal by
the entrance of the young man who had quitted her in the afternoon. It
is presumed that she was saddled and bridled with exquisite care.
Having completed these preparations, Mr. Booth entered the theater by
the stage door; summoned one of the scene shifters, Mr. John Spangler,
emerged through the same door with that individual, leaving the door
open, and left the mare in his hands to be held until he (Booth) should
return. Booth who was even more fashionably and richly dressed than
usual, walked thence around to the front of the theater, and went in.
Ascending to the dress circle, he stood for a little time gazing around
upon the audience and occasionally upon the stage in his usual graceful
manner. He was subsequently observed by Mr. Ford, the proprietor of the
theater, to be slowly elbowing his way through the crowd that packed the
rear of the dress circle toward the right side, at the extremity of
which was the box where Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln and their companions were
seated. Mr. Ford casually noticed this as a slightly extraordinary
symptom of interest on the part of an actor so familiar with the routine
of the theater and the play.
The curtain had arisen on the third act, _Mrs. Mountchessington_ and
_Asa Trenchard_ were exchanging vivacious stupidities, when a young man,
so precisely resembling the one described as J. Wilkes Booth that be is
asserted to be the same, appeared before the open door of the
President's box, and prepared to enter.
The servant who attended Mr. Lincoln said politely, "this is the
President's box, sir, no one is permitted to enter." "I am a senator,"
responded the person, "Mr. Lincoln has sent for me." The attendant gave
way, and the young man passed into the box.
As he appeared at the door, taking a quick, comprehensive glance at the
interior, Major Rathbone arose. "Are you aware, sir," he said,
courteously, "upon whom you are intruding? This is the President's box,
and no one is admitted." The intruder answered not a word. Fastening his
eyes upon Mr. Lincoln, who had half turned his head to ascertain what
caused the disturbance, he stepped quickly back without the door.
Without this door there was an eyehole, bored it is presumed on the
afternoon of the crime, while the theater was deserted by all save a few
mechanics. Glancing through this orifice, John Wilkes Booth espied in a
moment the precise position of the President; he wore upon his wrinkling
face the pleasant embryo of an honest smile, forgetting in the mimic
scene the splendid successes of our arms for which he was responsible,
and the history he had filled so well.
The cheerful interior was lost to J. Wilkes Booth. He did not catch the
spirit of the delighted audience, of the flaming lamps flinging
illumination upon the domestic foreground and the gaily set stage. He
only cast one furtive glance upon the man he was to slay, and thrusting
one hand in his bosom, another in his skirt pocket, drew forth
simultaneously his deadly weapons. His right palm grasped a Derringer
pistol, his left a dirk.
Then, at a stride, he passed the threshold again, levelled his arm at
the President and bent the trigger.
A keen quick report and a puff of white smoke,--a close smell of powder
and the rush of a dark, imperfectly outlined figure,--and the
President's head dropped upon his shoulders: the ball was in his brain.
[Illustration: Map. The Theatre and its Surroundings.
_A_ Public School. _B_ Herndon House. _C_ Only vacant lot communicating
with the Alley. _D_ Only alley outlet to F street. _E_ Bank. _X_
Restaurant. _G_ Newspaper Office. _H_ Model House. _I_ House to which
the President was taken. _K_ Alley through which the Murderer escaped.]
The movements of the assassin were from henceforth quick as the
lightning, he dropped his pistol on the floor, and drawing a
bowie-knife, struck Major Rathbone, who opposed him, ripping through his
coat from the shoulder down, and inflicting a severe flesh wound in his
arm. He leaped then upon the velvet covered balustrade at the front of
the box, between Mrs. Lincoln and Miss Harris, and, parting with both
hands the flags that drooped on either side, dropped to the stage
beneath. Arising and turning full upon the audience, with the knife
lifted in his right hand above his head, he shouted "_Sic, semper
tyrannis_--Virginia is avenged!" Another instant he had fled across the
stage and behind the scenes. Colonel J. B. Stewart, the only person in
the audience who seemed to comprehend the deed he had committed, climbed
from his seat near the orchestra to the stage, and followed close
behind. The assassin was too fleet and too desperate, that fury
incarnate, meeting Mr. Withers, the leader of the orchestra, just behind
the scenes, had stricken him aside with a blow that fortunately was not
a wound; overturning Miss Jenny Gourlay, an actress, who came next in
his path, he gained, without further hindrance, the back door previously
left open at the rear of the theater; rushed through it; leaped upon the
horse held by Mr. Spangler, and without vouchsafing that person a word
of information, rode out through the alley leading into F street, and
thence rapidly away. His horse's hoofs might almost have been heard amid
the silence that for a few seconds dwelt in the interior of the theater.
[Illustration: _A_ Miss Laura Keene's Position. _D_ Movable partition
wall not in place on Friday. _P_ Position of the President. _X_ Flats.
_B_ Dark Passage-way--Position of Sentry. _E_ Exit, or Stage Door. _MM_
Entrance to Box. _CCC_ Entrance to Dress Circle, _H_ Position of Booth's
Horse.]
Then Mrs. Lincoln screamed, Miss Harris cried for water, and the full
ghastly truth broke upon all--"The President is murdered!" The scene
that ensued was as tumultuous and terrible as one of Dante's pictures of
hell. Some women fainted, others uttered piercing shrieks, and cries for
vengeance and unmeaning shouts for help burst from the mouths of men.
Miss Laura Keene, the actress, proved herself in this awful time as
equal to sustain a part in real tragedy as to interpret that of the
stage. Pausing one moment before the footlights to entreat the audience
to be calm, she ascended the stairs in the rear of Mr. Lincoln's box,
entered it, took the dying President's head in her lap, bathed it with
the water she had brought, and endeavoured to force some of the liquid
through the insensible lips. The locality of the wound was at first
supposed to be in the breast. It was not until after the neck and
shoulders had been bared and no mark discovered, that the dress of Miss
Keene, stained with blood, revealed where the ball had penetrated.
This moment gave the most impressive episode in the history of the
Continent.
The Chief Magistrate of thirty, millions of people--beloved, honored,
revered,--lay in the pent up closet of a play-house, dabbling with his
sacred blood the robes of an actress.
As soon as the confusion and crowd was partially overcome, the form of
the President was conveyed from the theater to the residence of Mr.
Peterson, on the opposite side of Tenth street. Here upon a bed, in a
little hastily prepared chamber, it was laid and attended by
Surgeon-General Barnes and other physicians, speedily summoned.
In the meanwhile the news spread through the capital, as if borne on
tongues of flame. Senator Sumner, hearing at his residence, of the
affair took a carriage and drove at a gallop to the White House, when he
heard where it had taken place, to find Robert Lincoln and other members
of the household still unaware of it. Both drove to Ford's Theater, and
were soon at the President's bedside. Secretary Stanton and the other
members of the cabinet were at hand almost as soon. A vast crowd,
surging up Pennsylvania avenue toward Willard's Hotel, cried, "The
President is shot!" "President Lincoln is murdered." Another crowd
sweeping down the avenue met the first with the tidings, "Secretary
Seward has been assassinated in bed." Instantly a wild apprehension of
an organized conspiracy and of other murders took possession of the
people. The shout "to arms!" was mingled with the expressions of sorrow
and rage that everywhere filled the air. "Where is General Grant?" or
"where is Secretary Stanton!" "Where are the rest of the cabinet?" broke
from thousands of lips. A conflagration of fire is not half so terrible
as was the conflagration of passion that rolled through the streets and
houses of Washington on that awful night.
The attempt on the life of Secretary Seward was perhaps as daring, if
not so dramatic, as the assassination of the President. At 9:20 o'clock
a man, tall, athletic, and dressed in light coloured clothes, alighted
from a horse in front of Mr. Seward's residence in Madison place, where
the secretary was lying, very feeble from his recent injuries. The
house, a solid three-story brick building, was formerly the old
Washington Club-house. Leaving his horse standing, the stranger rang at
the door, and informed the servant who admitted him that he desired to
see Mr. Seward. The servant responded that Mr. Seward was very ill, and
that no visitors were admitted. "But I am a messenger from Dr. Verdi,
Mr. Seward's physician; I have a prescription which I must deliver to
him myself." The servant still demurring, the stranger, without further
parley, pushed him aside and ascended the stairs. Moving to the right,
he proceeded towards Mr. Seward's room, and was about to enter it, when
Mr. Frederick Seward appeared from an opposite doorway and demanded his
business. He responded in the same manner as to the servant below, but
being met with a refusal, suddenly closed the controversy by striking
Mr. Seward a severe and perhaps mortal blow across the forehead with the
butt of a pistol. As the first victim fell, Major Seward, another and
younger son of the secretary, emerged from his father's room. Without a
word the man drew a knife and struck the major several blows with it,
rushing into the chamber as he did so; then, after dealing the nurse a
horrible wound across the bowels, he sprang to the bed upon which the
secretary lay, stabbing him once in the face and neck. Mr. Seward arose
convulsively and fell from the bed to the floor. Turning and brandishing
his knife anew, the assassin fled from the room, cleared the prostrate
form of Frederick Seward in the hall, descended the stairs in three
leaps, and was out of the door and upon his horse in an instant. It is
stated by a person who saw him mount that, although he leaped upon his
horse with most unseemly haste, he trotted away around the corner of the
block with circumspect deliberation.
Around both the house on Tenth street and the residence of Secretary
Seward, as the fact of both tragedies became generally known, crowds
soon gathered so vast and tumultuous that military guards scarcely
sufficed to keep them from the doors.
The room to which the President had been conveyed is on the first floor,
at the end of the hall. It is only fifteen feet square, with a Brussels
carpet, papered with brown, and hung with a lithograph of Rosa Bonheur's
"Horse Fair," an engraved copy of Herring's "Village Blacksmith," and
two smaller ones, of "The Stable" and "The Barn Yard," from the same
artist. A table and bureau, spread with crotchet work, eight chairs and
the bed, were all the furniture. Upon this bed, a low walnut
four-poster, lay the dying President; the blood oozing from the
frightful wound in his head and staining the pillow. All that the
medical skill of half a dozen accomplished surgeons could do had been
done to prolong a life evidently ebbing from a mortal hurt.
Secretary Stanton, just arrived from the bedside of Mr. Seward, asked
Surgeon-General Barnes what was Mr. Lincoln's condition. "I fear, Mr.
Stanton, that there is no hope." "O, no, general; no, no;" and the man,
of all others, apparently strange to tears, sank down beside the bed,
the hot, bitter evidences of an awful sorrow trickling through his
fingers to the floor. Senator Sumner sat on the opposite side of the
bed, holding one of the President's hands in his own, and sobbing with
kindred grief. Secretary Welles stood at the foot of the bed, his face
hidden, his frame shaken with emotion. General Halleck, Attorney-General
Speed, Postmaster-General Dennison, M. B. Field, Assistant Secretary of
the Treasury, Judge Otto, General Meigs, and others, visited the chamber
at times, and then retired. Mrs. Lincoln--but there is no need to speak
of her. Mrs. Senator Dixon soon arrived, and remained with her through
the night. All through the night, while the horror-stricken crowds
outside swept and gathered along the streets, while the military and
police were patrolling and weaving a cordon around the city; while men
were arming and asking each other, "What victim next?" while the
telegraph was sending the news from city to city over the continent, and
while the two assassins were speeding unharmed upon fleet horses far
away--his chosen friends watched about the death-bed of the highest of
the nation. Occasionally Dr. Gurley, pastor of the church where Mr.
Lincoln habitually attended, knelt down in prayer. Occasionally Mrs.
Lincoln and her sons, entered, to find no hope and to go back to
ceaseless weeping. Members of the cabinet, senators, representatives,
generals, and others, took turns at the bedside. Chief-Justice Chase
remained until a late hour, and returned in the morning. Secretary
McCulloch remained a constant watcher until 5 A. M. Not a gleam of
consciousness shone across the visage of the President up to his
death--a quiet, peaceful death at last--which came at twenty-two minutes
past seven A. M. Around the bedside at this time were Secretaries
Stanton, Welles, Usher, Attorney-General Speed, Postmaster-General
Dennison, M. B. Field, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, Judge Otto,
Assistant Secretary of the Interior, General Halleck, General Meigs,
Senator Sumner, F. R. Andrews, of New-York, General Todd, of Dacotah,
John Hay, private secretary, Governor Oglesby, of Illinois, General
Farnsworth, Mrs. and Miss Kenny, Miss Harris, Captain Robert Lincoln,
son of the President, and Drs. E. W. Abbott, R. K. Stone, C. D. Gatch,
Neal Hall, and Leiberman. Rev. Dr. Gurley, after the event, knelt with
all around in prayer, and then, entering the adjoining room where were
gathered Mrs. Lincoln, Captain Robert Lincoln, Mr. John Hay, and others,
prayed again. Soon after 9 o'clock the remains were placed in a
temporary coffin and conveyed to the White House under a small escort.
In Secretary Seward's chamber, a similar although not so solemn a scene
prevailed; between that chamber and the one occupied by President
Lincoln, visitors alternated to and fro through the night. It had been
early ascertained that the wounds of the secretary were not likely to
prove mortal. A wire instrument, to relieve the pain which he suffered
from previous injuries, prevented the knife of the assassin from
striking too deep. Mr. Frederick Seward's injuries were more serious.
His forehead was broken in by the blow from, the pistol, and up to this
hour he has remained perfectly unconscious. The operation of trepanning
the skull has been performed, but little hope is had of his recovery.
Major Seward will get well. Mr. Hansell's condition is somewhat
doubtful.
Secretary Seward, who cannot speak, was not informed of the
assassination of the President, and the injury of his son, until
yesterday. He had been worrying as to why Mr. Lincoln did not visit him.
"Why does'nt the President come to see me?" he asked with his pencil.
"Where is Frederick--what is the matter with him?" Perceiving the
nervous excitement which these doubts occasioned, a consultation was
had, at which it was finally determined that it would be best to let the
secretary know the worst. Secretary Stanton was chosen to tell him.
Sitting down beside Mr. Seward's bed, yesterday afternoon, he therefore
related to him a full account of the whole affair. Mr. Seward was so
surprised and shocked that he raised one hand involuntarily, and
groaned. Such is the condition of affairs at this stage of the terror.
The pursuit of the assassins has commenced; the town is full of wild and
baseless rumors; much that is said is stirring, little is reliable. I
tell it to you as I get it, but fancy is more prolific than truth: be
patient! [Footnote: The facts above had been collected by Mr. Jerome B.
Stillion, before my arrival in Washington: the arrangement of them is my
own.]
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10