The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln By: Arianna Aresco & ellie hiedel

About Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln was the 16th president of the United States. He was the cause of the abolishment of slavery, & also was one of the greatest American presidents. Although very popular, many disagreed with his standpoints & were not in favor of him being our leader. Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth on April 14, 1865.

Lincoln’s Killer John Wilkes Booth was young actor by nature. He first experienced the spotlight at a young age, & came from a family of actors leading to his career as one. Booth was a confederate sympathizer, & strongly opposed to the abolition of slavery. Angered by the finalization to diminish slavery, he conceived that Lincoln needed to be stopped.

The Night of The Assassination As the war began to come to an end, him and some associates came up with a plan to kidnap the president and take him to Richmond, the Confederate capital. They planned the kidnapping to take place on March 20 1865. On the day of the kidnapping him and his six fellows were in place ready, but were shocked when Lincoln failed to appear at the spot that they waited. The search for John Booth was one of the largest manhunts in history, with 10,000 federal troops, detectives, and police tracking down the assassin. When he later learned that Lincoln would be attending Laura Keene’s performance at Ford’s Theatre in Washington D.C. on April 14, he created a new plan, much larger than a kidnapping. There plan was to assassinate not only president Abraham Lincoln, but Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William H. Seward. Lincoln and his wife were late for the comedy and were placed in a private box with his wife, a young army officer named Henry Rathbone and Rathbone’s fiance. The assassination took place at 10:15 p.m. as Booth entered the box he fired a single shot from his .44-caliber single-shot derringer pistol into the back of president Lincoln’s head. Before this he had stabbed Rathbone in the shoulder in order to get past him to get to Abraham. Booth then leapt on stage shouting “Sic semper tyrannis” (“Thus ever to tyrants” the Virginia state motto). Although booth broke his leg in the fall he managed to escape Washington on horseback.

Lincoln’s Death The president was found by a member in the audience Charles Lealer, a 23-year-old doctor. He found the president slumped in his chair paralyzed and struggling to breathe. The news of the president’s death spread fast. Several soldiers then carried Lincoln to a boarding house across the street. A general surgeon arrived later on and come to the conclusion that he couldn’t be saved and would die later on in the night.

The Aftermath After shooting Lincoln, Booth jumped to the stage below Lincoln’s box seat. He landed hard, breaking his leg. Confederate sympathizers swarmed around the countryside looking for Booth, While staying at the farm of Richard Garrett, Federal troops arrived on their search but soon rode on. The unsuspecting Garrett allowed his suspicious guests to sleep in his barn, but he instructed his son to lock the barn from the outside to prevent the strangers from stealing his horses. A tip led the Union soldiers back to the Garrett farm, where they discovered Booth and Herold in the barn. Herold came out, but Booth refused. The building was set on fire to flush Booth, but he was shot while still inside. He lived for three hours before gazing at his hands, muttering “Useless, useless,” as he died.