Transcripts For CSPAN3 Lincoln Assassination Conspirators 20

lincoln's view of the world in one word, the word is -- is. he believes the united states is a country not the united states are. in the prior, states were reviewed as part of an overall confederation of states. he believed we were one country. and he wanted to bring the southern states back. second, he wanted to improve the status and the lot of the lives of the americans -- the african-americans living in the united states of the time it. those who were free before, and certainly those who became free. many of them as a result of lincoln's own efforts. when he was killed, everything changed. it sent back relations in this country over 100 years. and it setback the quality of life, and the economy and social development of the southern states to the point where many southern states to this day are lagging behind the rest of the country in education and health care and in so many other criteria. would this have been different if lincoln survived? impossible to know. but he would have tried. he was facing a congress that did not want to go that route. they wanted revenge. and that was racist. lincoln certainly had a lot of racist views. but could he have changed the course of american history if he had survived? i don't know. but i certainly think that the assassination of lincoln change the course of america in a way that, again, we are probably still suffering from. remarkably, a few days after the assassination, jefferson davis the president of the confederacy, made a statement of the saddest thing that happened to the south other than the civil war itself was the murder of abraham lincoln. there is a new book out professor at nyu "morning lincoln," which talked about how different people react to the assassination itself. there are so many mysteries about the lincoln assassination. but one of them that there is no mystery about is who did it. obviously, and the kennedy assassination, did lee harvey also will do it or did someone jump up from behind the car really grassy knoll or what have you. with the lincoln assassination it was almost immediately determined to john wilkes booth did it. people recognized him as he walked down the theater, people knew who he was. booth himself kept a diary in the 12 days after the assassination, before he himself was killed. in which he talked about killing lincoln. he had a band of conspirators, all of whom identified booth as the leader of the conspiracy. there was no doubt the john wilkes booth did it. the question we have to ask was john wilkes booth the head of the conspiracy or was there someone else about him? did someone steer booth to do it? northern abolitionists and what have you, we will go into those. the first part of this talk at and again, there will be two parts. the first part is that what happened. what were the events of the day and days after? in the second, was there a conspiracy involved? this is the last picture taken of president lincoln, the day after the civil war ended on april 10, four days before his assassination. this is the picture you see in the washington post all the time. what you don't see is the glass plate cracked when the photographer took it. and the photographer said this is a bad sign, and lincoln said no, it's a glass plate that cracked. he didn't think this was much he didn't make much of these types of symbolic act. it is important to note, when you think about the lincoln assassination, the john wilkes booth's original desire was not to kill lincoln, it was to kidnap lincoln. and to kidnap lincoln during the course of the civil war, bring him to the south and trade him for confederate soldiers particularly towards the end of the war when the confederacy was running out of soldiers, on at least two occasions -- excuse me, i have a bit of a cold. on at least two occasions, booth went to try and kidnap lincoln. once when lincoln was going to the soldiers home in northwest and lincoln had too many soldiers, so booth stopped and didn't do anything. the second time, lincoln didn't show up where he was expected to come. how do we deal with this assassination? a good place to start is where it started. a rock 'n roll restaurant in chinatown. it's on sixth and 8th street. here it is again. rock 'n roll. -- wok n roll. i'm sure no one will be surprised that it was not a chinese restaurant and 65. in 1855, this is what it looks like. it was a boarding house owned by a woman by the name of mary surratt. today there is a plaque outside of it. if you go there, it says where the conspirators plotted the induction of abraham like in 1865. so before looking at the plot to murder lincoln, let's look at the plot to kidnap lincoln. in doing that, we are going to meet most of the major players in our story. the first one to look at is a woman by the name of mary surratt. who was born either in 1823, she was relatively early in her life, she converted to become a catholic and became very devout catholic, which played a role in her later problems. goes there was huge anti-catholicism sentiment in the country. she got married to a man by the name of john surratt when she was either 17 or 20 years old in 1840. it was in a stream late tumultuous marriage, he drank heavily, he was pretty violent he failed to pay his debts, had a violent temper, despite that somehow they were still able to produce three children. only two of whom are important to our story. the first is their daughter, elizabeth, whom everyone called anna, and so i will call her hannah for the rest of this talk. and a sun, john junior. in 1853, john senior was able to obtain a piece of land in a suburb of washington that today is still called surratt smelled. -- surrattville.that there is a surratt high school, i find it bizarre. that there is traffic onslaught highway, i find a bizarre. the places are named for the people involved in the assassination of lincoln. john senior built a tavern on his land, and that was one of the sources of their income. the tavern still stands, and if you go on the two are -- tour, one of the first stops is the tavern. it's a place where booth stored weapons and binoculars, place where mary surratt went on the day of the assassination. john surratt also bought a townhouse, the address of the time was 541 8th street, it's now 604. they change the numbers. it's still the same house. after his death, the house, mary surratt use it as a boarding house and it became the main source of her income. she was very much a racist, they owned slaves, they had to sell their slaves in order to pay off their debts. both the tavern and the boarding house were used by confederates as places to house spies as places where they could stay and rest for a while. and leave as drop-off points. their sun, john junior, who is one of the more fascinating characters of many fascinating characters we will meet, went to college at central's college in maryland. -- saint charles college in maryland. when the civil war began, he was 17 years old and he decided it would be more exciting to be -- to join the confederate secret service and be a spy and go to class. he probably would've done the same if he had been in one of my classes. now it's time to talk about some of the folks who rented rooms from mrs. iraq. one of them who did was a man by the name of george at saratov. he was born in germany moved to the united states when he was eight years old. in 1843, even though he came as a child, he spent the rest of his life speaking with a heavy german accent. he ran a carriage repair shop, the equivalent of an auto repair dealership. in a town in maryland coal port tobacco. people called him for tobacco. -- port tobacco. he was introduced to john wilkes booth five surratt junior. he stated -- he stayed at the boarding house until he was thrown out for being drunk. they did not like each other this will come back, again we talk about this a little later on. even after he was kicked out of living at the boarding house she had seven rooms and as many as 10 and 12 borders in the seven rooms. george would show up for the meetings in the parlor. this again becomes quite significant. another person who stayed at the boarding house was lewis powell. it was powell was born in alabama in 1844. he lied about his age when the civil war began in 1861. he said he was 19 years old, he was 17 years old in order that he could enlist in the confederate army. he was a very big, very strong human being. some people question whether he was very bright, but that is a different matter. he certainly was an enormous character. probably about 6'3". he kept effecting from the confederate army and then reenlisting when he felt like it. he made his way to baltimore in january of 1855, where he met john surratt junior. who in turn introduced him to john wilkes booth. and later on, as this conspiracy group became more coherence powell became the number three. booth was number one, surratt junior was number two. powell was number three. he moved into this rod boarding house and stayed there most of the time until the events of april. the next person that we will meet is david herold. david herold group in washington, didn't need to stay in this rod boarding house, but did spend some nights there. he was a student at georgetown no he was not my student at georgetown. for very obvious reasons. he studied pharmacy, and i teach history. [laughter] prof. nurnberger: the fact that he died in 1865 was probably contributing factor him napping my student. at 18 years old and 1860, he's received a pharmacies are to forget and then took jobs working for physicians and a drug stores for clerks. he became acquainted with john surratt while he was attending classes at charlotte hall military academy in the late 1850's. in december of 1864 sirota junior introduced him to john wilkes booth. the next person is someone who may or may not come in all likelihood may not have been one of the conspirators. but there are some historians who believe he was. i don't think so. and that is a man by the name of lewis why shouldn't. -- lewis why shouldn't. wightman. at the behest of his mother, he agreed to study to become a roman catholic priest. he was admitted to the seminary at st. charles college in maryland. there he met and befriended a fellow student i the name of john surratt junior. you can see this is sirota junior, he is quite key to the story. as a result of his early friendship with sirota junior when the civil war broke out they parted ways. sirota -- john surratt junior became a career for the confederacy, and he took a job in today's equivalent of the dod. he moved into this to rot -- the su boarding house. rrat. he would become a witness for the prosecution later on. other friends of both who did not stay the boarding house but showed up to the meetings in the parlor -- michaela, a lifelong friend of booth. he joined the confederate army but was discharged in 1862. he agreed to participate in the first kidnap plots, the plot to kidnap lincoln and trade him for soldiers. the plot didn't go anywhere, and he quits. when he heard about the lincoln assassination, and found out who was involved, he turned himself in. even though he had nothing to do with the assassination, he wound up being one of the eight targets who was tried for the assassination. he thought he was going to just be turning himself in to give testimony, the next and he knows he is being tried for murder. and ultimately winds up getting a life sentence. the next person again did not state the boarding house as far as i know, but showed up to the meetings in the parlor, samuel arnold. he dropped out of the conspiracy after the kidnap plot was dropped. so basically, booth relies on john surratt junior, lewis powell, and others. ultimately eight people are tried for the myrtle or -- murder of lincoln. four and up being hanged. as for john surratt, and i would tell you now. but it's one of those where you are going to say you are making it up. that brings us, of course, to the key figure in our story john wilkes booth. john wilkes booth was born in bel air, maryland, in 1838. his parents were the leading shakespearean actors in england, man by the name of junius booth. his mistress, marianne holmes. junius had a different family in england, he came to the united states with his mistress. they came in 1821, they were well-off, they bought a 150 acre farm where john wilkes was born and grew up. his father later built in the state on it, which was called tudor hall, which is still there. the family used it as a summer residence while maintaining a winter residence in baltimore. you can tell these are not poor folks. john was named after a british politician by the name of john wilkes, who is one of my favorite characters in all of history. when i was getting my masters i had a paper from richard hofstetter asked if you could meet any one character and history, who would you like to meet and i said john wilkes. different topic, fascinating guy. wilkes college is named after him. junior's booth, a chronic alcoholic. he constantly was on the road wasn't around very much. wilkes himself suffered from a we would call learning disabilities. he had difficulties learning to read and write. as a child, he was noted mainly for torturing and killing cats. his long-suffering mother doted on him, and felt that her handsome little boy could do no wrong. this gave wilkes the belief that all women thought of him in the same way. and he had tremendous charismatic appeal to women which again, we will talk about a little bit. as an actor, he was certainly not as good an actor as his brothers. were his father. but he was a notorious scene stealer. he would jump around the stage wave weapons, he would scream and yell. he would do gymnastics. in one review, the new york times calls him the handsomest man in america. he stood 5'9" inches, jet black hair, lean and athletic. his stage performances were characterized by acrobatics. he frequently came to believe his roles were real. and sometimes he would have duels with characters in plays and that he would try and kill them. this is not a good thing with your fellow actors. in fact, some of his fellow actors would leave performances bloodied i booth because of their encounters. walt whitman wrote of him, he has flashes of true genius, he may be the finest actor in america. he was certainly a major figure in the american theater. as the 1850's were drawing to a close, he was becoming wealthy as an actor. his annual salary was in excess of $20,000 a year. which translated into today's money is well in excess of half $1 million. he wasted a lot of money, he lived farm of his means. he got very upset because he got involved in a very bad oil speculation and lost a ton of money. but more than that, he was outspoken in his racism. his dislike of african-americans. in his support for slavery. his support for the south. despite that, despite his political views, he kept getting very good job offers. and very good roles. he played romeo and juliet richard the third in new york city and he, again -- to give you an idea of the man's ego, here is his business card. his e-mail address, and phone number on the back. he didn't even put his name down. he was so well known. in 1863, family friend of his by the name of john ford opened a new theater in washington on 10th street. now called ford's theatre, then calls for a year as well. -- then called ford's theater as well. lincoln in particular enjoyed watching booth performed. in fact, he went and watched booth and number of times, on november 9 1863, booth performed to play called the marble heart at ford's theater. and lincoln sat in the same area where he was ultimately killed, in the same seat where he was ultimately killed, and watched booth performed. and was so moved to send booth a note saying would you please come to the white house, i would like to meet you. and booth said absolutely not. i would rather have the applause of a nigger then to me that president. on another occasion, lincoln took his sun tad to perform it. booth was so excited to meet the president's 11-year-old son in he gave him arose. lincoln asked him to meet and booth said no. less than five months before the assassination, the number 25 1864, booth appeared for the only time with his two brothers. edwin, who was probably the greatest shakespearean actor in the united states in the 19th century, and his other brother junius. it was a single engagement of julius caesar, performed at the winter garden theatre in new york. wilkes played with anthony edwin played brutus. the new york times referred to as the greatest theatrical event in new york history. the proceeds for this performance went to charity, to purchase a statue to be built in honor of william shakespeare which to this day still stands in central park. my favorite character in the whole story. lucy. february 1865, wilkes meets the daughter of abraham for senator and they become engaged. i doubt that the senator would have been happy with his son-in-law. he was abolitionist, he felt strongly that african-americans deserve rights and here is this racist proslavery actor. so they didn't tell anyone that they were engaged. she is intriguing. before dating booth, she dated all over wendell holmes junior, and robert todd lincoln. busey on say dated lincoln sun -- i don't make this -- booths fiancé dated lincoln's son. how to why for is this -- she had a freethinking outlook on life. she didn't mind that booth had other mistresses, and she had other friends. they would frequently get together for tryst at a hotel in baltimore where they would sign in as jw booth and lady. if we had more time, or you have questions, we can go into some of those interesting experiences. she had an interesting day on april 14, the day of the assassination. she had breakfast with john wilkes booth that morning at the national hotel which is where he lived. the national hotel is today where the museum is. and later that evening she had dinner with booth, and during the day she went to the white house, because her father have been named ambassador to spain and she decided to study spanish with robert todd lincoln, and john hay, lincoln's special assistance. remember the names because they will appear in our discussions of garfield and mckinley. john wilkes booth, here he is age 26. he made his final acting appearance at ford's theater in march, 1865, less than a month before lincoln's assassination. he is totally different than the other three assassins we will discuss in this series. they were basically socially inept, poor friendless loners who failed at everything until they shot a president. booth was prominent family handsome, wealthy, extremely successful in his dealings with women, in fact, when his body is found, when he was killed, yeah the photos of five women in his pocket. lucy lambert hale which is one of them. he is sort of george clooney tom cruise, and ben affleck rolled into one. again, he hated the abolitionists. so much so that he traveled in 1859 to watch john brown being hanged. and then he changed his story. he had difficulty with reality. he joined a bunch of southern richmond guards to go to the hanging of john brown, and then later on he said he had a role in the hanging, which he didn't. and over exalted ego, a sense of self. he quarreled frequently with his family about the south and secession and slavery. edwin, the older brother, once threw him out of his house and said i never want to see you or speech you again. when booth made disparaging remarks about african-americans. he possibly come in all likelihood probably was a confederate spy and career. -- courior. he made a journey to montréal where he stayed for 10 days. montréal was where a lot of confederate operatives were hanging out. he certainly met with them, but we don't quite know exactly what happened. booth -- or markable story. attended lincoln's second inaugural address. on march 4, 1865. he was invited, and he got a ticket because his fiancée was the daughter of a senator. so lucy lambert hale gave him a ticket. you can see, here's lincoln and booth. it is harder to see on this picture. that's why i colored it in the other way. lincoln is standing up there the second inaugural address together with the gettysburg address is probably the most famous speech lincoln gives. it's on the lincoln memorial, which i assume all of you have been to. with malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right that god gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation's wounds to care for him who have borne the battle, his widow and his orphan, to do all which we may to achieve and sheriff -- chairs a lasting peace -- cherish a lasting peace. booth writes in his diary what an excellent chance i had if i wished to kill the president. totally different views. there are some historians come out i don't know if this is true, who said that booth or lincoln passed directly next to booth on his way to the podium. and that a policeman blocked booth from doing anything. i don't know if that is true but certainly he was within 40 or 50 feet of him. at this time, he was still committed to the kidnapped lots. but the confederacy was falling apart. on april 3, richmond fell. on april 4, lincoln goes to richmond at the invitation of general grant and said that jefferson davis is task in richmond. on april 9, robert e lee surrenders in appomattox courthouse. robert todd lincoln was present at the surrender. on april 11, lincoln gives what turns out to be his last speech. he stands in the balcony of the white house and says that he wants the southern states to be readmitted into the union african-americans to be part of american life, to improve, to give them suffrage, to improve the quality of their educations they will be equal american citizens. booth is standing directly below the balcony at the time and turns to lewis powell and says that's the last speech he's ever going to give. that means nigger citizenship. by god, i will put him through. we will never hear from him again. it's hard to tell if that's accurate, but it is certainly something he felt that it shows up in a lot of books on the assassination. lincoln began to have provisions of his own death. three days before his assassination he told is very close friend, ward hill lemmond that he had a dream that he walked through the white house and when he was walking to the white house he saw a coffin and he asked a policeman what is this coffin for and the policeman said the president has been shot. killed by an assassin. after the assassination, lincoln said his dream was prophetic, i was upset when he told me about it. here again we find john wilkes booth. time to talk about how lincoln and booth spent the last day. april 14. on that day, booth wrote in his diary -- our cause being almost lost, something decisive and great must be done. he begins by having breakfast with lucy, and then at about noon, he wanders over to force theater to pick up his mail. because that's where his mail was delivered. and john ford tells them something very exciting. the president has changed his plans. he was originally planning to go to another theater, grover theater to see a play called aladdin, because tad wanted to see a play about aladdin and the magic lamp. but mrs. lincoln wanted to see our american cousin, and so tend to 15 minutes -- 10 to 15 minutes before boosters and to pick up his mail, one of lincoln's aides went to buy tickets. had the aid showed up 10 minutes later, had booth come before had he not -- who knows. it was at that moment that booth decides i can kill lincoln here. it was literally at noon on the day of the assassination. booth, after he gets this piece of information, goes into ford's theater. remember, he acts their, they know him. he goes with the president is likely to set and carves a small peephole in the door so we can look in from outside and get a wooden block, which he ultimately puts into the door to prevent the door, which brings in word, from opening. so that once he is in, he blocks it for other people. he then walks five blocks over to wok n roll restaurant to have lunch -- mary surratt's boardinghouse. she says she would -- he says he would like her to deliver a package, and goes on a ride to the tavern accompanied by a border and friend of john surratt who ultimately turned states evidence. this trip does not help her in her defense. he then goes at 6:00 and meets at the herndon hotel with his band of conspirators. he tells them tonight is the night. i'm going to kill lincoln. it was colin, you are going to kill secretary of state william seward. sirotka -- john surratt, you're going to kill someone else. you are going to help powell you're going to be his guide to taking the seward's house and then after he kill seward, to get him out so that he can all means. at this point, the lead role in the drama goes to booth himself. at this point booth tells them you are stuck, you're going to kill the vice president. lee had surrendered five days earlier, and lincoln was in the best movie had been since the civil war. he do we was going to have a tough time pushing his plans for reconstruction, but he figured he had time to do it. he would convince the congress to accept the southern states that, to try and help the status of african-americans, and also be able to relax. friends said they had never seen him so happy. it was a lovely spring day on april 14. the dogwood trees were in bloom the scent of fresh flowers were in the air. the willows along the potomac were green, the parks and gardens were starting to bloom. there were no cherry trees yet. they did not come until the test administration. we didn't have to root for the beaver to get rid of them. for those of you don't like the traffic anyways. before traffic, the 56-year-old -- before breakfast, the 56-year-old president worked for a while. he called for a cabinet meeting to begin at 11:00. at 8:00 he was joined by his sons. robert, as i mentioned, was that appomattox courthouse and lincoln wanted to hear more about the surrender. mary told them they all had tickets to go to the theater to see aladdin and the wonderful lamp. but that she preferred to see our american cousin's. lincoln said ok, let's see if we can get tickets. amazing, the president said let's see if we can get tickets. at 9:00, he began a series of meetings with numbers of congress. the first was color colfax who ends up becoming vice president under ulysses grant. he and colfax have a heated conversation. he tells colfax is time for the war to be over, and that it is time for revenge. lincoln says let's put the war behind us and for the country back on a good footing. the next person he meets with remarkably as a senator from new hampshire by the name of john hale. yes, the father of booth's fiancé. who comes to talk about his soon coming appointment to be ambassador to spain. at 11:00, he calls for a cabinet meeting. at the same time, the secretary of war, a key figure in the story is meeting at the war department. he is meeting with ulysses grant. he is talking about how you get the soldiers out of uniform and back into civilian life? how many soldiers do we still need? what is post-civil war lifelike? grant then tells stanton that lincoln invited him to go to the theater that night, and that he doesn't want to go. his wife despises mrs. lincoln he says i can't stand the thought of those two women being together for an evening. julia won't come, and stanton tells them come up with an excuse grant says i'm visiting my kids, they live in new jersey. he says get on the training get out. they then all go back to the cabinet meeting. grant joins the cabinet meeting i believe is the only lincoln cabinet meeting the grant was there. they discuss how the civil war have ended and what is going to happen next. lincoln that it might stand to go to the theater, and stances he is too busy. again, this is remarkable. lincoln then winds up having lunch with mary, and tells them the grants won't comment. lincoln and mary send out invitations to a number of other couples, inviting them to go to the theater. all turned them down. remarkable when you think about the president of the united states inviting you to come to the theater within that night and i'm too busy? it's remarkable. they then go on a carriage ride through town. they just want to see the flowers and trees in washington. lincoln tells mary that now the war is over and he looks forward to traveling. he particularly wants to see california and he wants to go to jerusalem. he really wanted to go to the holy land. obviously, he never makes it. the first u.s. president to make it to jerusalem was ulysses grant. after he was president. the first american president to make it to jerusalem as president was richard nixon. finally, mary gets an ok. she found someone who will go to the theater with them. a young couple by the name of henry rathbone and his fiancée clara harris. clara harris is the daughter new york senator ira harris. they live across the street from the white house come across the street from lafayette plaza, and the decatur house today. mary likes them, and so she was very happy. besides, they were the old ones willing to go. again, it is remarkable. lincoln personally asked the name -- a man by the name of thomas eckert, and a norm as worked in the telegraph office who had frugally served as lincoln's bodyguard to come, and he said he couldn't make it. he was too busy. had eckert been there that night, it's possible booth would not have been able to get in. so who was there guarding lincoln? a policeman -- and again this was odd. most of the time lincoln was guarded by soldiers. this time he was guarded by a policeman. the washington, d.c. cop by the name of john f parker. during his time as a policeman he is been charged with dereliction of duty, conger -- conduct unbecoming an officer. he was arrested for being drunk on duty, sleeping on streetcars at work, and visiting a profit while in duty -- a brothel while on duty. his excuse was that the matter had sent for him. he was reprimanded but never fired, and that is the man selected to guard lincoln. again, conspiracy theorists point to john parker and say who knew in advance that it would be this guy and why was he ultimately never punished? parker becomes a key figure for conspiracy theorists to look at. ford's theatre in 1865 obviously looks pretty similar today now they have reconstructed it. the lincoln party arrived late in the theater, the play had already started. when they came in to see the theater, and the performance everybody stood up and started to applaud. they played heels of the chief there were 1700 people in the theater that night. 1500 seats, and they added 200 additional shares. ring intermission, the guard left his post. he was sitting outside of lincoln's box and went to a tavern where he drank with lincoln's footman and coachman. he certainly was not had his post when bush was trying to get in, but even if he had been, it's very possible that someone is famous as john wilkes booth coming in, this idiot cop might have let him go through anyways. booth arrives at the theater at 10:00 at night. he walks slowly down the aisle on the right. witnesses see him come identify him, he bumps into an almost knocks off a guy who was sitting in a chair in the aisle that they added the extra chairs. the guy turns to the fellow next to him and says that's john wilkes booth. he was very well known. he enters the door to the right climbs up the stairs leading to the presidential box. when he gets in, he barricades himself, taking the wood bar he put blocking the door so they could no longer open. and looks through the peephole. he can see sitting in the box, the four people who were there. although he had never played in this production of our american cousin, he knew it pretty well by heart. he knew there was a line which was going to be recited by one actor, a man by the name of harry hawk. it would be in the center of the stage. for the funniest line in the show, people would laugh loudly which would muffle the sound of the gun. hysterical laughter comes in booth comes in using this gun, a one-shot derringer. you either do it or you don't. this gun is now on display four blocks from here. he is behind lincoln, shoot them in the back behind the left ear. mary todd lincoln is sitting here, rathbone and clara harris and there's the rest of the stage down below. lincoln immediately loses consciousness upon being hit by the gun, never knows what hit them. never regains consciousness. he slumps over, mary realizes what is happening and begin screaming hysterically. major rathbone jumps up and tries to stop booth, booth has a knife, slashes at rathbone. violently cutting his left forearm, into the bone, including cutting part of the bone and cutting part of the chest. rathbone then tries to grab it again, boost then false over -- remember he is this acrobatic actor. vaults over from here from the box, jumps down onto the stage. rathbone believes that he heard booth yell something like freedom. who feels -- booth runs out on the stage, he's the only one on the stage. there's a lot of question about what he said. people think you said six average around us -- sic semper tyrannus. some people thought he said revenge for the south of the south shall be free, some thought they said he yelled i have done it. in any case, pandemonium comes out. booth rushes out across the stage. the orchestra leader tries to stop him, man by the name of william withers. he slashes at him with his knife trade behind ford's theatre, he asked the stagehand named edmund spangler to hold discourse -- hold his horse. booth then takes the knife and smashes burrows in the head with the back of the knife. and rides off. into the night. a young army physician by the name of charles neil was at the theater that night. he tries to go upstairs and can't open the door. he starts screaming, rathbone sees what is happening in kicks open bar. neil is able to enter into the presidential box. the first thing he sees as rathbone with blood spurting all over him from the arm and his chest. he ignores rathbone looks of the president. the president is paralyzed, he is barely breathing. and a second doctor by the name of charles taft is lifted up from the stage up to the presidential box. we suddenly have two doctors in the president's box. they open up the president's shirt, they rip open his collar and they start feeling around. they first thought he was stabbed in the back, but then they find the wound to the back of the head. neil sticks his finger in to see if they can find the bullet. what that does is relieve the clock and helps lincoln to breathe easier. the lead actress of the play comes up and they put lincoln's head on her lap. and that is how lincoln's blood once up there. neil then issues the statement his wound is mortal, is impossible for him to recover. at this point, another doctor by the name of albert king is raised up to the box. the three doctors and merely decide the president cannot stay here on the floor of this box. we need to get him out of here. they also realize they can't take into the white house, even though it's six blocks, the carriage what would kill him -- the carriage ride would kill him. they carry him downstairs, by now it is pouring rain. they hear a voice from across the street, bring him here bring him here. if the name -- a man at a border owned by mr. peterson. the houses there today, you can easily walk across the street and see the petersen house. they carry him in a put him on a first-floor bedroom. the bed is too small lincoln's 6'4", they have to lean across annually. another one of those i'm not making this up -- i should have brought the teacher that my students gave me. guess you slept in that bed less than a month before? john wilkes booth. john wilkes booth with that ford's theatre, he was tired. another actor was renting the room where lincoln ultimately died. booth said i am not feeling well, i'm tired. booth goes and takes a nap in the bed where lincoln ultimately dies. the vigil begins immediately. obviously, on the night of april 14, april 65 -- 1855, it's a friday. robert todd lincoln is brought to petersen house, ted lincoln --tadd lincoln is at the theater, and an announcement is made that they had shot the president. he later comes up with the equivalent of john john doing the salute to kennedy. he issues a statement and cries out they have killed pop a dead. it's not just that killed his pop up, -- poppa they killed the poppa of the country. the secretary of the navy basically takes over the country and begins try to figure out who did it, how do we do this? mrs. lincoln at this point is completely hysterical. as you can imagine. she was sitting next to her husband when suddenly he had his brains blown out. she wasn't the stable list person to start with anyways. stanton is so upset her behavior he yells out take that woman out of here and don't let her back in here again. she is removed from the room where he dies until after she passes away -- after he passes away. the doctor sits next to lincoln for the rest of the night, holding his hand saying you never know whether he regains any consciousness, if he does come i wanted him to know he had a friend here. lincoln dison; 22 the next morning. -- lincoln dies at 7:22 the next morning. we will meet the man who was at the bedside of lincoln when he dies, as will robert todd lincoln. according to hey, lincoln had a look of unspeakable piece on his warm features. -- waor features. n historians differ with the next words were. it's either angels ranges. -- angels for ages. we are going to talk a lot next week about the medical treatment of president garfield, the medical treatment of lincoln was as good as could have been. that wound was fatal, the doctors did everything they could. they handled it as well as could have been done. the events at ford's theater were not only the only gruesome events of the night. william seward was secretary of state, and lewis powell was assigned to murder him. william seward was a major political figure of his time. he served as governor of new york, and as senator of new york he thought he was going to be the republican nominee for president in 1860. he was very surprised when lincoln got instead of him. in the book "team of rivals," she talks about how lincoln took the top figures who were his rivals and took them into his cabinet. seward was the dominant figure in the republican party, became secretary of state, and he ultimately winds up serving as secretary of state for eight years. lincoln successor kept him in that post. on april 5, nine days before the events of april 14, seward was thrown from his carriage. he suffered a concussion, a broken jaw in two places, and a broken right arm. doctors improvised a jaw splint to try and help his jog it back into place. many historians and people don't know the subject well say he had a neck brace. he did not have a neck brace, he had a jaw splint. on the night of the assassination, he was in bed in his house. his house was across the street from the white house their lafayette plaza. booth had assigned lewis powell to kill him. powell was one of the borders. he was enormously big, enormously strong. powell went to the seward house seward -- booth wanted all the murder should take place at 10:00 at night so they would be a all at the same time. because he was fearful of one happened and then that was elapsed, others -- there would be additional security. seward's butler answered the door. powell says i have medicine for the secretary, i know he was an accident, his doctor gave me the medicine. the butler says the doctor was just here, we don't need additional medicine, please connect tomorrow. i will then smashes at him, knocks him over, and starts running up the stairs. at this point, seward's sun frederick seward, assistant secretary of state -- adjusting the enough, that was easy for secretary to appoint his sun to be assistant secretary, stopped him and says what are you i am bringing medicine. his son says the doctor was just here. we do not need medicine. please leave. powell takes a gun out and points it at the young man and poster. it misfires. he turns the gun around and cracks him in the head. it knocks two or three blows into the skull, breaking it apart. at this point he then starts stabbing at him with a knife and the daughter rushes out, andy seward -- annie seward, what is going on. this tells stewart where the better miss. fanny tries to block him. he begins stabbing at secretary of state seward. the third blow slices open his cheek. the fourth blow, the only thing that prevented him from cutting the jugular was the jaw splint. seward's other son augustus, and a soldier assigned to help them, by the name of sergeant george robertson, start attacking and beating on powell who starts smashing at them with a knife. he realizes this is enough and runs out of the building. david harold runs out of the building with two horses. he hears the screaming and yelling, panics, and takes off. leaving powell's horse, and he does not know the city alone outside. powell comes outside the house and there is a messenger with the secretary of state. powell says i am a messenger. he stabs a man and winds up in the back, -- he stabs the man in the back, leaving the man permanently paralyzed. he yells i'm mad. he jumps on a horse and rides up with nowhere to go. fannie seward yells pap's dead. seward spits blood out and says, i am not dead. call for a doctor. call for the police. close the house. seward never allowed photos of himself to take front forward. that was what he looked like. i will get rid of. vice presidents did not have homes like they do now. the vice president at the time was andrew johnson. andrew johnson had not been not been lincoln's running mate. hannibal hamlin was a wonderful vice president. he and lincoln got along well. he was supportive of emancipation. he was supportive of the civil war. he was a bright lawyer. he wanted to be vice president again. lincoln thought he was going to be defeated for reelection in 1864 and had sherman not marched to the sea and grant had successes, lincoln might have been defeated by george mcclellan. he was advised to take someone from the border states to be vice president. he did not know andrew johnson. they did not get along. johnson on inauguration day -- in those days, vice presidents issued their inaugural address before the president -- johnson either was drunk or was taking medicine for a cold or flu which was his excuse. most historians think he was drunk. i can't tell you whether it was medicine or alcohol. whatever it was, he babbled through his inaugural address which was a disgrace, and lincoln said i never want anything more to do with him. he never saw him again until april 14, 1865. johnson came to see lincoln and said he wanted lincoln to be tougher towards the south and not be as friendly towards african-americans. in johnson's words, i went to induce lincoln not to be lenient with traitors. johnson was staying at the kirkwood hotel and a strange thing happened. a visitor showed up. john wilkes booth. he left a message with the desk clerk for johnson, saying i do not wish to disturb you. historians to this day do not know what that was about. did he think atzedrot would not do it? did he want people to think that johnson was involved? are to know. on april 14, atzedrot rents a room at the kirkwood hotel. he has a gun and a knife with him. he goes into the room, goes down to the bar, and gets rip-s norting drunk. he checks into another hotel and goes to sleep. he makes no effort to see or do anything with the vice president. half an hour after the assassination, booth is fleeing across the navy yard bridge and he is stopped by a sergeant silas cobb, who says, where are you going? no civilians are allowed to cross. booth says i need to go home. the sergeant says in that case, though. -- go. he crosses the river. another rider crosses the bridge. the soldier says i will let you cross on one condition. you can't come back. harold says deal and takes off. they meet at the tavern in surratsville where they pick up the guns of binoculars. booth is in tremendous pain. he broke his leg. there are different stories about how he broke his leg. booth tells us different story. many people think he broke his leg when he landed poorly after jumping from the presidential box. most historians do not think that is it. most historians think he had a horse accident as he ran off that stage too easily if he had a broken leg. he needed a doctor and he decides to go to a doctor by the name of samuel a. mudd. dr. mudd. for those of you who know the expression, his name is mud comes from this gentleman. he lived in randy town maryland, about 20 -- he lived in brandy town, maryland. booth tells him he had a horse accident. he will not tell them, by the way, i just killed the president. telling mudd he had a horse accident may be true or not. there's no way for mudd to know what happened. even if he had been watching cnn, they were covering a malaysian airliner that disappeared and were not focusing on this event. there was no television or radio. mudd couldn't have known. the question is, who is dr. mudd? dr. mudd was a physician, to supplement his medical practice, at a small tobacco farm and he owns five slaves. when lincoln emancipated the slaves in the area controlled by the union, mudd's slaves left and mudd developed an increased hatred for lincoln. he was trying to figure out to do in 1864 when he met a man by the name john wilkes booth. they met in november of 1864 because mudd was thinking of selling his tobacco farm and booth claimed he was looking to buy real estate. they met a number of time mudd had booth stay at his home. booth may have been there to become family with the region. hard to know. they met in november of 1864. they met again on december 23, 1865. when mudd went to washington dc to do christmas shopping. it is nice to tell these stories because we know the neighborhoods. it was a block away from the surratt boardinghouse. he was walking down the street with mudd. who do they bump into? john surratt junior. booth invites them to his hotel room at the national hotel where booth treats them to wine brandy, and cigars. then gets into a heated discussion with mudd and surratt and after that with surratt alone. booth, after his meeting with surratt, shows up at the surratt boarding house a number of times where surratt's daughter falls in love with booth. she is 22, he is 25, 26 at the time, the handsomest man in america. it is like ben affleck and george clooney showing up. you're 22-year-old daughter says well. booth gives her a gift. she was enthralled. he gives her his picture. she does not want mom to know so she hides behind another picture on the wall. this is not going to be a good thing. did mudd know about the assassination? did he know about the kidnap plot? unknown. surratt, who is not a good source said mudd knew. it is hard to know. booth shows up at mudd's house at 4:00 in the morning and says i have a broken leg. mudd sets the leg and creates a cast, a plaster cast for him. the next day, a carpenter to make crutches for him. booth pays mudd $25 and booth and harold spend the night at mudd's house. on the day after the assassination, april 15, mud goes to brian town to run errands where he hears about the assassination. accounts differ about what happened next. mudd comes home in either booth or harold are gone or about to leave or he tells them to leave. he does not tell the soldiers looking for booth that booth was there. he waits another day, giving booth and extra day. he does not tell them directly. he has his cousin, dr. george mudd, tell the police. the police come back to interview mud a couple of days later and ask him, had you ever seen booth before. they say no. they show him my photo. he says i have never seen this man before. all of a sudden it turns out that this is -- that mrs. mudd shows up with booth's boot which has engraved in it j. wilkes. he was obviously there. he said he was wearing a beard. ruth, as an actor, -- booth, as an actor, had disguises. later on, it is said that booth met mudd on december 23, which mudd covered up. mudd wasmudd guilty or innocent -- was mudd guilty or innocent? i don't know. if you go to the mudd house which is a museum, they will give you a view that he was innocent of anything other than trying to help a man with a broken leg. others feel he had a bigger role. booth was able to escape for 12 days with the entire union army looking for him. the search was headed by stanton and his assistant, lafayette baker. he is a key figure in our story. lafayette baker was in charge of the union intelligence service during the civil war after he took over that job from allan pinkerton. he ultimately receives a generous portion of the $100,000 reward for booth, but he felt he should have gotten more and that becomes an issue. we will come back to it. most immediately they are able to put together the first wanted poster in american history using photographs and they call for the capture of booth, surratt jr., and david harold. booth and herold go through the swanson maryland. they crossed the potomac into virginia. if you are interested in this, you cannot get a better feel for it. james swanton's book "manhunt" is brilliant. read it if you do not have time to spend a full day during the smithsonian trip. during his 12 days on the run booth kept a diary. the diary is quintessential booth, defensive egotistic, grossly inflated. he rails against newspaper accounts that called him a coward. he could not understand how the papers called him the most deplorable calamity that has ever fallen upon the people of united says, the murder by the scour. he did not -- by this coward. he did not understand stepping up behind a man and shooting him is the act of a coward. the diary is also on display five blocks from here. let me read some paragraphs. with every man's hand against me, i'm here and despair, and why? for doing what brutus was honored for. yet i come up for striking down a greater tyrant than they ever knew, are looked upon as a common cutthroat. my action was purer than theirs. i knew no private wrong. i struck with my country -- for my country and that alone. i cannot see any wrong serving a generous people. the little i left behind to clear my name the government will not allow to be printed. tonight i will once again try to cross the river. i have a greater desire and almost a mind to return to washington and clear my name, which i know i can do. i do not repent the blow i struck. i kneel before god, not before man. two lines jump out at me. number one, the little i left behind to clear my name the government will not allow to be printed. he can clear his name by something he writes? number two. i have a greater desire and almost a mind to return to washington and in a measure to clear my name, which i feel i can do. wow. think about that for a second. did he think he could go back to washington, the great actor he was, and in his theatrical manner, have the country listen to him, give the greatest performance of his life, and get applause? did he think he would be declared a euro for this? or did he think you would go back to washington and give the names of the higher-ups who put him up to this and get himself off? this is the line that conspiracy terrorists look at -- conspiracy theorists look at and say wow. the diary was picked up from booth's body, taken by the soldiers, and give it to lafayette baker, who gave it to edwin stanton, and then it disappeared. the diary was not talked about in evidence at any of the trials. it did not show up again until 1867 when lafayette baker wrote eight history of the united states secret service and talked about the diary. everyone said, what diary? baker said i give it to stanton. suddenly the diary shows up. they said, look what we found. suddenly there are 18 pages missing. it is like rosemary woods. why 18 minutes? what happened to these pages? did stanton or someone in the war department rip them out because they may have had the names of people behind booth? or did booth rip them out because he needed paper for something else? or were the 18 pages not in the diary when booth used this booklet as a diary because he ripped them out long before the assassination? we don't know. lafayette baker, who was the one who got the diary, gave it to stanton, and then said the diary was complete when he give to stanton suddenly dies. all of a sudden drops dead from meningitis. rumors that he was killed by people in the war department. 1977, a chemistry professor at indiana state by the name of raymond neff announced that he had tested hair and that baker was killed by a arsenic poisoning. i don't know. conspiracy theorists wonder what this was about. they are riding through virginia. here is their escape route. if you right through, it is nicer doing it in a bus that it is the be -- it is being chased by the ewing army. here is the surratt house, the home of dr. mudd, and they go down here. the afternoon of april 24, booth and harold arrived at the home of richard garrett, a local tobacco farmer. here is his farmhouse. then standing. we have no picture of the barn. it burned down. booth says my name is john boyd. he is an actor. he came up with a fake name. he says, here's my brother. garrett lets them stay at the house. the next day garrett is beginning to wonder who are these people and says you cannot stay in the house. move into the barn. shortly after the troops show up and start yelling. they say, come out or we are going to burn the barn down. david herold panics and said i'm getting out. booth says you are a coward. herold says he wants out. the union army says put your hands up. herold is he -- is yanked out. booth says he will not be taken alive. the fire is set to the bar. despite strict orders not to shoot, a shot rings out. we are not 100% certain fire the shot. we are 99% sure. it is likely thomas corbett. if you think we have met bizarre characters in the story, we are now about to meet a bizarre character. he changed his name from thomas to boston. he decided his role model was jesus so he started to wear his hair long to imitate jesus. two years before the civil war in order to avoid temptation by prostitutes he cast rates himself with a pair of services -- para scissors. bizarre characters. he then ate a meal, went to prayer, and seek medical attention. corbett claimed he saw booth inside and shot him severing booth's spinal cord. corporate was immediately arrested for violating his orders, stanton sets them free, and he gets a portion of the reward. he gets $1654. he retires and moves to kansas. in 1877, because of his same as booth's killer, he gets a job as the assistant doorkeeper at the house of representatives in topeka, kansas. one day he hears the representatives mocking the opening prayer and he grabs a revolver, threatening to kill every member of the legislature. no one was hurt but he was sent to the topeka asylum for the insane. he built a log cabin and dice in a fire which he possibly sets himself. we have some weird characters. booth, after he is shot, taken out of the barn, a soldier pours water in his mouth and he spits out he says, i cannot solve this. he yells out, tell mother i die for my country. he dies two hours later. he asked soldiers to hold his arms above his head, because he cannot move them, and he yells useless, useless,. last words. less than six hours after the attack, the secretary of war stanton hones in on wok and roll restaurant. i'm sorry, they home in on the surratt house. they asked mrs. surratt if they knew where her son was. she said she had no idea where her son was. the detectives leave. they come back. they came back on the 17th and pound on the door. by the way after the detectives left on the 18th,weichmann claims he did not help mary surratt at all. this is not a good relationship he claims after the police left, he said -- she said to her daughter, come with wilkes, i am resigned. i think wilkes was a tool in the hand of the a mighty to punish these people. the cops begin questioning mrs. surratt. while there questioning her lewis powell shows up. lewis powell shows up and he knocks on the door and he says i don't know who this is. he says i am here to clean your gutters. i am here to dig a ditch around your house because i understand you are having water problems. she says, i have never seen him before and i did not hire him to dig a ditch. police are looking at him. he has blood on his close. -- on his clothing. they begin wondering around the house and bump into a photograph. it knocks off the wall, and guess what is behind it? the picture of booth at booth had given to anna. they then said, do you know this man powell? she said no. he had been living there. anna, in her testimony to help her mother, said her mother had poor eyesight and did not recognize powell. whatever. they are rested. anne surratt is arrested. they went to his hotel room and found a gun, a knife, and booth's bank book. we now have under arrest david harold anne surratt surratt jr, and mrs. surratt. probably the most interesting one is john surratt, jr. unclear where he was that night. some historians believe he was in washington. most believe he was an ill mira, new york. he flees to canada. he stays there a while in flees to liverpool england, when he finds refuge in a catholic church. he moves around europe for a while before he gets a job as a guard for the pope in the vatican. he is a guard. here he is in papal uniform. guarding the pope. a friend of his turns him in. he is arrested by u.s. consular officials in rome. he escapes and flees to egypt. one of the lincoln assassins was arrested in egypt in 1867. he is brought to trial but is cleared of murder charges by a hung jury and the statue of limitations for kidnapping is over and so he is released. conspiracy theorists believe he is released if you promises not to -- if he promises not to get the names of higher-ups. he spends the rest of his life giving lectures on the lincoln assassination. in 1872 he marries the nice -- the cousin of francis scott key. they wind up having seven children and they live happily ever after. he dies at age 72. the rest of the conspirators are not as fortunate. the war department and the army arrests dozens of people, but ultimately they wind up with only eight were tried for the murder. samuel arnold and michael locklin, who were part of the kidnap plot and was the first to join the kidnap plot, and george atzerodt, david harold, herold edward spangler, and mary surratt. they are tried by military tribunal. conspiracy theorists say they should have been tried in civil court, not military court. there is a nine-member military commission. the most interesting of these is the wallace, who ends up writing "ben hur." has nothing to do with this, just trivia. all of the prisoners with the exception of mrs. surratt and dr. mudd mudd -- dr. mudd have hoods over their head, which drives some of them to near-insanity. they obviously could not interview lee harvey oswald or john wilkes booth because they were dead. they try to interview everyone else. the trial lasted seven weeks. they interviewed 351 witnesses. the people in trial were hoping to uncover a larger conspiracy. they were hoping to prove the confederacy, particularly jefferson davis, was behind it. they were unable to do this. they were hoping to find that someone other than a deranged 26-year-old actor did this. when ultimately that did not work, just as after the kennedy assassination, worn commission -- the warren commission was commissioned. in 1867 the house of representatives convened a special assassination committee to see of the assassination trial had been correct, and came to the conclusion it had. when we discuss the kennedy assassination in three weeks, we will find it was the warren commission and in the house commission. same thing here. four people were sentenced to be hanged. mary surratt, george powell david harold, and -- david herold, and atzerodt. . dr. mudd escapes hanging. the hanging took place in the navy yard. i believe it was the first execution in the united states that was photographed. here they are actually hanging. it is a terribly hot day and mary surratt was allowed to have a priest and someone held an umbrella over her beforehand. mary surratt -- robert redford made a very interesting movie called the conspirator, which is worth watching again if you're interested, which portrays are quite fondly. it is hard to know. she owned the boarding house. people living in her house were involved. did she know? i think it's hard to say she did not know. she certainly was sympathetic to them. did she deserved to die? i don't know. it did not help that she was catholic. there was a of anti-catholic sentiment at the time. her former border lewis weichmann did her in. she is the one that -- he is the one that said mary surratt went with the weapons to the tavern on the day of the assassination. he was the one that said when she heard about the assassination, she holds her daughter -- she told her daughter it was a good thing. george atzerodt hated her. lewis powell like her. whatever that was worth. when the verdict came in that she should be executed, the military commission then said that they asked for clemency. president johnson said no. if you go pastwok and roll restaurant, there is a plaque outside that says johnson when he signed the death wornwarrant, it says she kept the nest that hatched the egg. that is an interesting quote. edward spangler, who held the horse and said he had nothing to do with this, was sentenced to six years. samuel mudd was sentenced to life in prison. they were sentenced to 14% in dry tortugas, -- to fort jefferson in dry tortugas. a yellow fever hit and the prison doctor died. mudd became the doctor and saved a number of lives. president johnson eventually set them all free. spangler died in 1875 of tuberculosis. arnold lived until 1906. mudd came back after he had been set free by president johnson dies at age 49 of pneumonia in january 1883. he is buried in st. mary's catholic church, which is exactly where he met booth originally. descendents of mudd have tried very hard to have very successive presidents and congress overturn his guilty verdict. president jimmy carter was sympathetic but said he had no power to do anything. ronald reagan said he came to believe santa mud was innocent but did not overturn the conviction. supreme court justices introduced -- two representatives introduced a bill to overturn the conviction. it did not pass. in 2003 it was heard by the supreme court, which said the statue of limitations has run out. it probably did. lincoln was the first president to be assassinated. the funeral procession. millions of people came to witness it in washington and on the train ride from new york to springfield, illinois. they paid their respects. most of you have been to the lincoln monument and you see this statue. you read the gettysburg address and the second inaugural. it was a loss to the nation. we also tend to forget is a loss to a family. this was a person who died. a man who left behind two sons. tad lincoln, fourth and youngest son of abraham. he got the name tad because lincoln said he was wiggly as a tadpole. he was impulsive and unrestrained. he dies at age 18 at 1871, throwing mary todd into a deeper depression. following the death of her son she becomes even more irrational. she tries to jump out of a building from a nonexistent fire , tries to commit suicide. she is committed to an insane asylum by robert todd in 1875 to his great embarrassment, because some people claimed he did that so he could gain control of her finances. i don't think that was the case, but many blamed him. she was finally released into the custody of her sister in 1886, declared incompetent to do with her own management. she again attempted suicide and then moved to france and wondered around france for four years. develop severe cataract problems, had difficulty seeing, suffered from dizziness, and had susceptibilities to falls. fell off a step ladder and suffered spinal cord injuries. in 1882, collapsed in her sister's home, fell into a coma, and died at age 63. remarkably young. robert todd lincoln, another 1 -- i am not making this up. in 1863 robert todd lincoln was on a train platform in new jersey. trip, fell, and was about to fall in front of a train. a hand reaches out and pulls him, saves his life. the hand was edwin booth, john wilkes's brother. the night of the funeral, he turned down an invitation to go to the theater he was at the vigil at the petersen house. he moved to chicago with his mother, studied law, became a lawyer, and had an interesting and good career. he was secretary of war under garfield and was standing next to garfield when garfield was shot. he then became u.s. ambassador to england and in 1901 at president mckinley's invitation, went to the buffalo expedition and was with mckinley when he was shot. he died at age 82. a few of the others and we will look at conspiracies. andrew johnson became president after lincoln died. he was the only president at that point to be impeached by the house for trying to remove edwin stanton as secretary of war. he runs for senate and is elected to center. he is the only president to be elected to senate after being president, which means he sat with the same people that try to impeach him. he dies in 1875. stanton practices law after his term is over. he is appointed to the supreme court by ulysses grant and dies four james later before he can become a -- four days later before he can become a justice. seward remains secretary of state and is responsible for the purchase of alaska. he dies and 871. harry wrath born in clara harris ultimately get married. he becomes mentally ill. he becomes the u.s. consul to hanover, germany. he shoots klara and stats are trying -- clara and stabs her trying to reenact the assassination of lincoln. i don't make this stuff up. he spends the rest of his life in an institution for the kernel is a. my favorite character in the story, -- for the criminally insane. my fear character is lucy hale. she copies her father to spain. she remains in europe for five years, where she has numerous flirtations and refuses many offers of marriage from many aristocrats. in 1870 she returns to the united states. in 1874 she marries a rich corporation lawyer by the name of william chandler. they have a son. her husband become secretary of the navy and in 1887 he becomes a u.s. senator. she immerses herself in his politics and becomes one of the leading hostesses in washington at social functions and ultimately dies at the age of 74 in 1915. let's look at some conspiracy there is wrote quickly. there is not much time. i will look at seven fast. conspiracy theories take hold because we find it so difficult that a man of the stature of abraham lincoln or john kennedy could be killed by this deranged human being. it makes no sense. jackie kennedy, as i will mention any couple of weeks said my husband cannot be a martyr if this is the man who killed him for no reason. so we look for a reason. first conspiracy theory that people look at is that booth escaped, which is the same as lee harvey oswald was a patsy. the real killer of kennedy escaped. since i believe that lee harvey oswald did it, i don't think the real killer escaped. who was the patsy? john boyd. john boyd went and died on behalf of john wilkes booth. the fact that booth said he was boyd. there were people who believe booth got away. the history channel did a series called decoded in which they said booth got away. a man by the name of david george showed up in texas in 1877, moves to enid, oklahoma, dies in 1903, and on his deathbed continues to say he was john wilkes booth. as a result, a friend modifies the body and the body travels around to sideshows. the last reported sighting of the body was 1976. when booth's body was brought back to washington, lucy hale's diving on the body and saying wilkes, wells, does not convince those who do not think he was not kill. judah p benjamin and benjamin davis. judah p benjamin left the united states, moved to england, and burned his papers. obviously he would not have burned his papers if he didn't have proof he killed lincoln. [laughter] ok. booth met with odd characters in montréal. they were confederate secret service. they put him up to it. the fact that the conspiracy trial and in the congressional investigation all try to prove that jefferson davis and judah p benjamin were behind it and could not probably believes you to -- probably leads you to believe they were not involved. andrew johnson. that he was behind the assassination so he could change lincoln's policies on reconstruction, deal tougher with the south and african-americans, and denied them their independence or real freedom. as proof, the letter that booth left the hotel, i do not wish to distribute, and the person who believed andrew johnson behind it was mary todd lincoln an odd character who wrote, as sure as you and i live, johnson had a hand in this. we all know this. congressional committee, this is at a time when johnson was being impeached, wanted to prove he was behind it and they could not find any linkage. conspiracy number four. international bankers who were upset that lincoln had been borrowing money at lower rates to funded the civil war and that they would be cut out of the funding for the reconstruction. the fact that there is no money linking booth, and this is something we will look at with the harvey oswald, does not stop people. there is a title of the rothschild plot to killington, showing it was international bankers in new york and london. again, i do not think this is the case. the roman catholic church was behind it. as proof of this, four priests instead simply -- priests of stents of glee four hours before the murder talk about the murder. because we did not have c-span coverage, we are not sure. anex-priest writes a book and says paul piatt ninth -- pope pius the ninth was behind it and that using catholics like mary and john surratt in finding refuge in the pope -- again, i do not find it likely. this brings me to last one and that is secretary of state stanton. i believed it. it came about in the 1930's when an austrian-born chemist otto schimmel, writes a book that called "why was lincoln murdered?" in 1977, a movie comes out called the lincoln conspiracy, which i saw and at the time i was totally convinced this is it. they issued a book. first question is motive. the answer is republicans want to control reconstruction and they are upset at lincoln's idea of letting them off easy. they do not want moderates in the cabinet, which is why they also had to kill seward. schimmel points out that grant did not show up in the theater. if he had, there would have been more soldiers and lincoln would have been protected better. major eckert, who we can use as a bodyguard, did not come. john parker did not question and was let off and should not have been the garden the first place. all of the roots out of the city -- should have been the guard in the first place. all of the routes out of the city, they both say they were close. that was not true. it is hard to know if that happened. the conspirators being coded during the trial -- hooded during the trial, lafayette baker dying prematurely. it does not prove all that much for the conspiracy theorists. it was the movie "the lincoln conspiracy of quote got then-vice president walter mondale very excited. he had the department of interior, which oversees the national park service, requested ford's theater to look at the diary and missing pages and they reviewed the diary and said that there was no hidden message in ink and then there was another piece of evidence i forgot to mention, and that is a journal that lafayette baker own in which dots had been placed under the letters. the journal was dated 1866 by lafayette baker and it said stanton did it. wow. turns out that was a 20th century fraud. people think it is great sport to dr. and come up with new evidence. they created evidence to back there believes. ultimately, civil war times which published this, recanted and apologized and said this is a fraud. after all of this, where do we come down? i'm sorry to say, it's boring, john wilkes booth did it. he had a band of terrorist conspirators who tried to kill seward and may have tried to kill johnson as well and they changed the course of american history, but there was no one behind it that i could find it. i -- we have time for questions and i will be glad to take them. yes, sir. [applause] >> [inaudible] first, i want to thank you for an excellent summary of the assassination. i'm interested in the medical aspects of the assassination. more of this "you can't make this stuff up," when you showed the photo of the three whose voters in new york in the audience -- booth brothers in new york, in the audience was dr. charles leale. that was the same night that dr. leale treated burn victims which is why he became a union army surgeon which is why he went to for theater. when booth made the speech, that led him to make the decision to go to ford's theatre to study the present' feature. that is why he wanted to be there. the other thing he may or may have not have done is administer mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and closed-chest cardiac massage. he did not mention that in his report in 1865. he mentioned it in a speech in 1909, the hundredth anniversary of lincoln's birth. there is more. we do not have time. dr. nurnberger: wow. i'm going to apply view. -- applaud you. i did not know he was there on april 11. >> [inaudible] dr. nurnberger: i will use the wrong word. he is going to be a villain next week. his first name is doctor. his name was dr. doctor bliss. >> dr. richard mott, who was -- richard mudd, who was mudd's grandson, claims the saying did not come from mudd. the mudd papers, which were newspapers pre-civil war, which were like the modern day "national enquirer." if you got your name in the mudd papers, your name was mudd. dr. mudd said it was not from his grandfather, but from the "mudd papers." dr. nurnberger: the call missed mudd was also -- the columnist mudd was also enough family. >> i met dr. mudd's great granddaughter. she said he was one of the california mudd's. he is like a fifth cousin, and he is in the family. the mudd family is having a reunion at fort jefferson to commemorate the anniversary of dr. mudd's imprisonment. dr. nurnberger: thank you. i hope you come next week because we will spend a lot of time talking medical stuff. no one will top this, but any other questions? yes, sir. >> [inaudible] how the country reacted to the assassination? dr. nurnberger: what a great question. there is a great new book. the professor has been on npr. she was on the news program. i cannot give you a short answer. the question is, how did the country react? the answer is differently. african-americans thought this was the end of the world for them. father abraham would set them free. they realized very quickly afterwards that there life would not be as good as it would had he survived. in the south, there were mixed. many viewed him as a tyrant and he is dead, it is great. others realized this is an awfully decent human being and we would be better off if he had stayed. the reaction is mixed. jefferson davis's comment that this was a great tragedy is something many felt at the same time. in the north, the reaction also was mixed. radical republicans who were hoping for revenge realized that their biggest stumbling block was lincoln and how he was removed. overall there was this incredible sense of grief. another factor in terms of the reaction was the day lincoln was shot. he was shot on good friday. churches went into sunday morning sessions on easter sunday and suddenly, he is the first president shot. there were images of martyrdom and comparisons to jesus. it had a religious connotation that would not have happened -- probably would not have happened if lincoln had been a shot a week later. the fact that he was shot good friday and died the day before easter and that pastors are required to give their services on easter had a big role. at the time there was a very small jewish community in the country. he was also shot on passover. suddenly it was the moses could not bring the hebrew people to the promised land and father abraham couldn't finish the work he started. there were a lot of religious connotations, particularly in the protestant world but to a lesser degree because it was smaller, in the jewish world as well and the african-american world was devastated. the result was jim crow and lynchings and the abomination that became reconstruction. the lincoln train. lincoln's body was taken from washington and traveled around the country. it was taken first to new york and then to chicago and springfield. millions of people came out in mourning. thank you. that is an excellent question. yes, sir. why do we take two more? in the back. >> i'm wondering why we did not learn immediately from the lincoln assassination and we suffer the assassination of three more presidents. wasn't one president enough to teach us to protect them? dr. nurnberger: yes. [laughter] lincoln had bodyguards periodically, but not when he did things like going to the theater. garfield went to the train station a rome -- station alone. there were no tubes at all. -- there were no detectives at all. the desire to protect the president and create an organization to do so did not come about until after the assassination of mckinley. then there came a dispute over who should be given this assignment. the dispute came between the treasury department, which is where the secret service was. the secret service job was to try to catch counterfeiters. and the army. there was a huge debate. i believe it was teddy roosevelt who said it is inappropriate to the army to have a civilian role to protect the president, which is why it wound up in the treasury department. certainly. it should have been done sooner. it is astounding. any other? that is a good note to end on. thank you so much. [applause] for those of you who can come the story next week, garfield is even more interesting. [laughter] it's fascinating. you will really enjoy garfield . i will say the same about mckinley and kennedy,too. [laughter] thank you all. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> you're watching american history tv. 48 powers of programming every weekend on c-span3. follow us on twitter for information on upcoming programs and to keep up with the latest history news. >> history bookshelf features popular american history writers and airs on american history tv every weekend at this time. author myra macpherson describes the life of -- among the -- the life of victoria woodhull and tennessee “tennie” claflin. she hosted this book discussion at books and books in all gables florida. this is about 44 minutes. myra macpherson: i used to joke and say, is there any sex in this book, so there is sex, and

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