Lincoln's Assassination

It was on this day, April 15, in 1865 that President Lincoln died after being shot by John Wilkes Booth on the night of April 14, Good Friday. Abraham Lincoln is one of the most written about persons in history. Lincoln was shot while attending Ford's Theater in Washington, DC, on what was a pleasant day. After four years of Civil War, and experiencing personal loss, he was finally able to smile.

Ford's Theater, Washington, DC

General Ulysses S Grant, who commanded the forces of the US Military which defeated the states in rebellion attended the scheduled cabinet meeting that day, although without word of Southern General Joseph Johnston's surrender to General Sherman, which would not occur for almost two more weeks.  Yet, historians and others often recognize the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia by General Robert E. Lee to General Grant at Appomattox Courthouse on Sunday the 9th of April as the date the Civil War ended. Fire works would go off in Washington, DC, at the same time Booth and his accomplices were planning their efforts of assassination of the President and other officials.

Lincoln Memorial
Washington, DC

Lincoln was happy to have had time earlier in the day to visit with his oldest son, Robert, 22 years of age and who had been a staff officer to General Grant. He had suggested that Robert complete his education, which was interrupted by the war, and perhaps take up the law. I suppose, the youngest son, Tad, was having fun and running around the White House enjoying himself and perhaps playing pranks on the cabinet secretaries as they arrived for the scheduled cabinet meeting.  

The cabinet members, and General Grant, found Lincoln in good spirits that morning, and why not?  The war was, for all intents and purposes, over.  Congress was not in session, which Lincoln thought was a good thing as he could approach his idea of reconstruction. Walking out of the meeting Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War and the Attorney General James Speed, would comment on how good their "Chief" looked.  Clean shaven, a nice suit and a warm disposition and hearty smile.  This was in strong contrast to the rumbled clothes, the dreary eyes, and the long sad face experienced over four long years of war. The presidency takes a toll on many of the office, one only need to look at before and after photos of Presidents George W Bush and Barack Obama. Lincoln faced perhaps the greatest difficulties of any president, a Civil War, and one can only imagine the heartache he faced. 

Ford's Theater booth where Lincoln was shot

The heartache was not only the personal loss, but the huge loss of men which became evident during the Civil War.  This war was fought with the then conventional tactics, but newer, more advanced weaponry was occurring throughout the war, and the tactics did not have time to adapt to the changing technologies. In addition, medical care had not sufficiently advanced beyond cutting off limbs, not to mention that they really did  not understand sterilization or sterile environments. More soldiers died of disease than they did from wounds of war. Life was different in the 19th century before the sanitary revolution. Thus, the Civil War is known for its death toll due to the lack of proper sanitation, and its advancement of the instruments of war. Many a family lost a loved one, or had a family member maimed.  Whether disease, or the shot from a bullet, neither brought back a husband or son lost to war.  The whole thing is that Lincoln understood what he called the terrible arithmetic, that the north could lose and replace many more soldiers than could the south.  The north's resources were so much greater that what the south had in material, and men. Nonetheless, families would grieve. 

Peterson House, where Lincoln Died
Washington, DC

Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln had four sons, only two of which survived Abraham.  Only one of which, that being Robert, would outlive Mary Todd. Eddie passed away in 1850.  Add to this the death of Willie (William) while they occupied the White House. Willie died of Typhoid fever on 20 February 1862. Mary Todd would never really come to grips with what the death of Willie. Tad (Thomas Lincoln III) died at age 18 in 1870 with causes of death varying from pneumonia to tuberculosis, or heart failure. 

Robert Lincoln would be the only surviving child to Mary Todd Lincoln. Mary Todd Lincoln would have a difficult life, after the death of her husband.  He already fragile mental state, due to the deaths of Eddie and Willie, had reached the breaking point. Back in that time, of course, she was derided for her mental state, and history.com says she became a laughing stock.  Edwin Stanton, ordered her out of the Peterson house, the home across the street from Ford's Theater where Lincoln was taken after being shot and where he died the following morning.  She may have been bi-polar, or some other mental disease, not then recognized.  I know Stanton thought highly of himself, but I often wondered who he thought he was to order Lincoln's wife out of the room?  

The Lincoln Memorial
Washington, DC

The thing is, Mary Todd did love the spotlight and enjoyed being the wife of the President.  This attitude did not help her after her husband's death when people though she was over-extravagant in her grief. History.com provides the following: 

Mary’s servant, dressmaker, and confidante Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley recalled “the wails of a broken heart, the unearthly shrieks, the terrible convulsions” of the bereft widow. Though those reactions might seem appropriate for a woman who witnessed her husband’s traumatic assassination at close range, they were seen as indicative of an unladylike craving for attention at the time.

Frederick Douglass, understood that Lincoln's time had been unfortunately cut short. Douglass in a lengthy eulogy to Lincoln at Cooper's Union in New York, (you can read his address here) made this comment late in the address:

While willing to give, he was equally willing to receive: and so far from feeling ustracised (sic) in his presence, he acted upon me as all truly great men act upon their fellow men, as a Liberator,—He set me at perfect Liberty—to state where I differed from him as freely, as where I agreed with him. From the first five minutes I seemed to myself, to have been acquainted with him during all my life. He was one of the most solid men I ever met, and one of the most transparent.

The assassination of Abraham Lincoln would have a significant effect during the aftermath of the Civil War. If he had lived, his Vice President, Andrew Johnson, would likely never have become President. (Meaning he never would have been impeached.) The President earned political capital from the war, leverage of which he was never to use. Perhaps Mary Todd would have been better too, having her husband at her side and his ability to put up with, but yet manager her. His was a life cut short, and a country to really never know his smile, or to further appreciate his wit. 

Photos by author, April 2007