By Al LaFleche
Every school kid knows the story. John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln, escaped Ford’s Theater and was eventually captured. James L. Swanson, a student of Lincoln, fleshes out the basics with a cinematically drawn picture of the events immediately leading up to the murder and the hunt for the killer in the days that followed.
If this were fiction, it would be an exciting tale in itself. The renowned actor and his fanatical devotion to the Confederacy. His plan to kidnap Lincoln and spirit him into the still rebellious Virginia, aborted when Richmond fell. The revised plan, conceived on a moment’s notice, to kill the president, vice president and secretary of state when it was made public that Lincoln would be at Ford’s Theater on Good Friday 1865, just days after Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox Courthouse, essentially ending the Civil War.
The author relies heavily on original transcripts for direct quotes, with which he provides detailed portraits of Booth, his co-conspirators, and helpers along the way.
Booth is portrayed as a flawed individual creating an insane plan. He is vain and impetuous, taken by the Shakespearian roles he has played. His plan begins to crumble as soon as it is executed. Johnson’s assassin backs out, Seward’s fails, Booth breaks his leg jumping to his last scene on stage.
In the telling, we see Booth securing aid from supportive Marylanders, but losing much of his lead when he waits several days in the swamps for an opportune time to cross the Potomac into what he hopes will be a welcoming Virginia.
When he makes it to Virginia, he inexplicably stays a second night at the Garrett farm, even though the family has told him to leave, fearing his behavior and who he might be. Betrayed by a Rebel soldier with whom he briefly travelled, abandoned by his closest accomplice in the final moments, like his victim, he is shot and takes several hours to die.
Despite this having been a horrific moment in our history - the beloved president gunned down just as the nation’s four-year struggle to survive ends successfully - it is mostly glossed over in other histories. The rationale for the killing, the emotional trauma of the people as they learned of the crime, the intense, often misguided, hunt for the killer, get short shrift elsewhere.
This book is a must read for anyone who is interested in the Civil War period, the assassination itself or just looking for an exciting and compelling read.
