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Assassination of President Lincoln
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On the night of April 14, 1865, Lincoln was attending
the play Our American Cousin at Ford’s
Theater, accompanied by his wife and their guests,
Major Henry R. Rathbone and his fiancée,
Clara Harris. That evening the guard assigned to
the President had thought it safe to abandon his
post. As a result, John Wilkes Booth found it a
relatively easy matter to enter Lincoln’s box
and shoot him. As Booth leapt out of the box to
the stage about twelve feet below, he caught the
spur of his boot on a flag and broke his leg when
he landed. Nevertheless, he escaped. It was not
until twelve days later that Union soldiers cornered
him in a barn in Caroline County, Virginia, where
he died of a bullet wound. |
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Joseph Edward Baker (1835–1914)
Color lithograph, circa 1865
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
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