Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever

by Bill O'Reilly

  “That’s all right,” Powell sighs, pleased that the hardest part of the plot is behind him. He feared he wouldn’t gain access to the Seward home and would botch his part of the plan. The next step is locating Seward’s bedroom.

  Out front, in the shadow of a tree across the street, David Herold holds their horses, prepared for the escape.

  But now the secretary’s son Frederick stands at the top of the stairs in a dressing gown, blocking Powell’s path. He was in bed with his wife, but the sound of Powell’s boots woke him. Young Seward, fresh off a heady day that saw him represent his father at Lincoln’s cabinet meeting, demands to know Powell’s business.

  Politely and deferentially, Powell holds up the medicine vial and swears that Dr. Verdi told him to deliver it to William Seward and William Seward only.

  Seward takes one look at Powell and misjudges him as a simpleton. Rather than argue, he walks into his father’s bedroom to see if he is awake.

  This is the break the assassin is looking for. Now he knows exactly which room belongs to the secretary of state. He grows excited, eager to get the job done as quickly as possible. He can feel the revolver stuffed inside his waistband.

  Frederick Seward returns. “He’s sleeping. Give it to me.”

  “I was ordered to give it to the secretary.”

  “You cannot see Mr. Seward. I am his son and the assistant secretary of state. Go back and tell the doctor that I refused to let you go into the sickroom, because Mr. Seward was sleeping.”

  “Very well, sir,” says Powell, handing Frederick the vial. “I will go.”

  As Frederick Seward accepts the vial, Powell turns and takes three steps down the stairs. Suddenly he turns. He sprints back up to the landing, drawing a navy revolver. He levels the gun, curses, and pulls the trigger.

  But the gun jams. Frederick Seward will later tell police he thought he was a dead man. Frederick cries out in fear and pain, throwing up his arms to defend himself. He has the advantage of standing one step higher than Powell but only for a second. The two men grapple as Powell leaps up onto the landing and then uses the butt of his gun to pistol-whip Frederick. Finally, Frederick Seward is knocked unconscious. His body makes a horrible thud as he collapses to the floor, his skull shattered in two places, gray brain matter trickling out through the gashes, blood streaming down his face.

  “Murder, murder, murder!” cries William Bell from the ground floor. He sprints out the front door and into the night, screaming at the top of his lungs.

  Across the street, David Herold holds the two getaway horses. Bell’s cries are sure to bring soldiers and police to the house within minutes. Suddenly, the long list of reasons why Herold wants to be part of the Lincoln conspiracy are forgotten. He panics. He ties Powell’s horse to a tree, spurs his own mount, and gallops down Fifteenth Street.

  Back inside the Seward home, Lewis Powell isn’t done. He pounds on Frederick’s head without mercy, blood spattering the walls and his own hands and face. The beating is so savage that Powell’s pistol literally falls to pieces in his hands. Only then does he stand up straight and begin walking toward the secretary of state’s bedroom.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1865

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  10:15 P.M.

  The commotion in the hallway and the sound of a body dropping heavily to the hardwood floor have alerted twenty-year-old Fanny Seward to the intrusion. The daughter of the secretary of state is clad only in a nightdress and has been sitting at the foot of her father’s bed, trying to coax him to sleep. Also inside the room is Sergeant George Robinson, sent by the army to watch over Seward. Now Private Robinson pushes his full weight against the door, even as the assassin tries fight his way in. Soon Lewis Powell forces open the door and slashes at Robinson with his Bowie knife, cutting the soldier’s forehead to the bone and almost putting out an eye. As Robinson crumples to the ground, Fanny Seward places herself between Powell and her father. “Please don’t kill him,” she begs, terrified. “Please, please don’t kill him.”

  Secretary Seward then awakens on the bed. Something about the word “kill” jars him from his slumber.

  Powell punches Fanny Seward hard in the face, instantly knocking her unconscious. A split second later he is on the bed, plunging his knife downward into Seward’s neck and shoulders.

  The room is pitch-black, save for the sliver of light from the open door. Powell’s first thrust misses, making a hollow thud as it slams into the headboard. Seward desperately tries to roll away from his attacker and squeeze down into the gap between the mattress and the wall.

  He doesn’t succeed. Powell kneels over him, stabbing Seward again and again and again. The secretary wears a splint on his broken jaw, which, luckily, deflects the knife away from the jugular vein, but it does little to protect the rest of his skull. The right side of his face is sliced away from the bone and now hangs like a flap. Blood jets from three deep punctures in his neck, drenching his now-useless bandages, his nightdress, and the white bedsheets and spattering all over Powell’s torso.

  The assassin is almost finished. Powell brings up his knife for one final killer blow. But at that exact moment, Seward’s son Augustus enters the room. He is thirty-nine, a decorated graduate of West Point and a career army officer. He has fought in the Mexican War, battled the Apache, and seen action in the Civil War. Never once has he been injured. But now, that changes. Powell leaps at August Seward, stabbing him seven times. In the midst of the attack, Private Robinson staggers to his feet and rejoins the fight. For his trouble, Robinson is stabbed four more times.

  Powell is finally exhausted. Lying in front of him are four human beings, all of them still alive. But Powell doesn’t know that. He steps over Fanny’s limp body and races from the room, still clutching his knife. At that very moment, State Department messenger Emerick Hansell arrives at the Seward home on official business. He sees Powell, covered with blood, running down the steps and turns to flee for his life. But Powell catches him, stabbing the courier just above the fourth vertebrae. Powell is in such a hurry, fortunately, that he pulls the knife back out before it can go any deeper, thus sparing Hansell’s life.

  “I’m mad! I’m mad!” Powell screams as he runs into the night, hoping to scare off anyone who might try to stop him.

  He is, however, anything but mad. Powell is as lucid as he is powerful. He now turns all his focus to the getaway. With adrenaline coursing through his veins, his senses heightened, and his broad shoulders aching from fists rained down upon him in the fight, he hurls the blood-covered knife into the gutter. He then looks right and left into the darkness for David Herold and their getaway horses. Seeing nothing, he listens for a telltale clip-clop of approaching horseshoes.

  “Murder! Murder!” William Bell cries from the porch, risking his life by chasing after Powell. Soldiers come running from a nearby sentry box. Powell sees his horse now, tied to the tree where Herold left it. Realizing he has been betrayed, Powell feels his heart sink. He knows that without Herold he will be lost on the streets of Washington. Still, he can’t very well just stand around. He needs to get moving. Powell unties the horse and mounts up. He has the good sense to wipe the blood and sweat from his face with a handkerchief. Then, instead of galloping away, he kicks his heels gently into the horse’s flanks and trots casually down Fifteenth Street, trailed all the while by William Bell and his shouts of “Murder!” But instead of stopping him, the unsuspecting soldiers ignore the black man and run right past Powell.

  After a block and a half, Bell falls behind. He eventually returns to the Seward home, where four gravely injured men and one woman lie. Incredibly, they will all recover. But this horrific night will haunt them for the rest of their lives.

  Lewis Powell trots his horse toward the darkness on the edge of town. There he hides in a field and wonders if he will ever find a way out of Washington. Powell’s thoughts then turn to President Lincoln and Vice President Johnson. They should be dead by n
ow.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1865

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  10:15 P.M.

  As John Wilkes Booth tiptoes into the state box and Lewis Powell knocks on William Seward��s front door, George Atzerodt, the would-be assassin of Vice President Andrew Johnson, is drinking hard, late for his date with destiny.

  If any man in Washington has incurred the wrath of the Confederacy, it is Johnson, the former governor of Tennessee, whom many southerners consider a rank traitor. Johnson’s bitter words are seldom compatible with Lincoln’s. So it is no surprise that his views on punishing the South stand in stark contrast to Lincoln’s lenience. “And what shall be done with the leaders of the rebel host? I know what I would do if I were president. I would arrest them as traitors, I would try them as traitors, and, by the Eternal, I would hang them as traitors,” Johnson shouted from the steps of the War Department as recently as Monday night.

  Like Johnson, Atzerodt the carriage painter is staying at Kirkwood House, on the corner of Pennsylvania Avenue and Twelfth Street, four blocks from the White House and just one block from Ford’s Theatre. He has passed the time aimlessly since his meeting with Booth and the other conspirators, drawing attention to himself through the simple act of trying not to draw attention to himself.

  At nine-thirty he visits Naylor’s stable on E Street to pick up his horse. The owner knows George Atzerodt and his friend David Herold and does not care for either of them. Nevertheless, when a nervous, sweating Atzerodt asks if he’d like to get a drink, Naylor answers with a quick “Don’t mind if I do.” He is concerned about Herold, who rented a horse from him earlier that day and is long overdue. Naylor hopes that Atzerodt will disclose his friend’s location after a drink or two.

  They leave Atzerodt’s mare and walk to the bar of the Union Hotel. Atzerodt, whom Naylor suspects has been drinking for some time, orders a stiff whiskey; Naylor chugs a tankard of ale. Atzerodt pays. They return to the stable after just one round, with Naylor none the wiser about Herold’s location.

  “Your friend is staying out very late with his horse,” Naylor finally prods. Atzerodt has just handed him a five-dollar tip for boarding his horse.

  “He’ll be back after a while,” Atzerodt glibly replies as he mounts the mare.

  But Atzerodt is too wasted on alcohol to ride a straight line. He almost falls out of the saddle when the mare takes a sudden turn. On a hunch, Naylor decides to follow Atzerodt on foot. The trail, however, is only a block long. Atzerodt dismounts and ties the horse at a hitching post in front of Kirkwood House. Naylor waits across the street, just out of sight. When Atzerodt walks back out a few minutes later and trots the mare over toward Ford’s Theatre, Naylor gives up the surveillance and returns to his stable.

  Andrew Johnson, meanwhile, is behaving very much like a man waiting to be summoned. He eats an early dinner alone. He turns down a last-minute invitation to attend Our American Cousin. His assistant is out for the night, and Johnson has no one to talk with. So he goes up to his room and lies down on his bed, fully clothed, as if some great incident is about to occur and he needs to be ready to spring into action on a moment’s notice. Johnson is a boorish man. Largely uneducated, he learned to read and write late in his life. A tailor by trade, he entered politics in his twenties and worked his way up to the Senate. He owes a lot to President Lincoln, who first appointed him the military governor of Tennessee and then chose him to run on the vice presidential ticket after Lincoln asked Hannibal Hamlin of Maine to step down. Hamlin was a hard-core northerner and Lincoln needed a southern presence on the ticket.

  Up until this point, Johnson has had no power at all. He is simply a figurehead.

  At ten-fifteen George Atzerodt is back inside Kirkwood House, getting thoroughly smashed in the bar. Truth be told, even more than when he tried to bow out a few days earlier, the German-born carriage painter wants no part of murder. A few floors above him, Johnson lies alone in his room. In his lifetime he will suffer the ignominy of impeachment and endure the moniker of “worst president in history.” Andrew Johnson will not, however, suffer the far worse fate of death at the hand of an assassin. For that, Johnson can thank the effects of alcohol, as a now very drunk George Atzerodt continues to raise his glass.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1865

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  10:15 P.M.

  John Wilkes Booth takes a bold step out of the shadows, Deringer clutched in his right fist and knife in his left. He extends his arm and aims for the back of Abraham Lincoln’s head. No one sees him. No one knows he is there.

  Booth squeezes the trigger. Unlike the crazed Richard Lawrence, whose pistols misfired when he attempted to assassinate Andrew Jackson, Booth feels his gun kick. The ball launches down the barrel as the audience guffaws at the play. Abraham Lincoln has chosen this precise moment to lean forward and turn his head to the left for another long look down into the audience. A half second later, he would have been leaning so far forward that the ball would have missed his skull completely. But the president is not so lucky. The man who has worried and fretted and bullied America back from the brink of disaster, holding fast to his faith in the Union at a time when lesser men argued that it should be dissolved, feels a split second snap of pain—and then nothing at all.

  “The ball entered through the occipital bone about one inch to the left of the median line and just above the left lateral sinus, which it opened,” the autopsy will read. “It then penetrated the dura matter, passed through the left posterior lobe of the cerebrum, entered the left lateral ventricle and lodged in the white matter of the cerebrum just above the anterior portion of the left corpus striatum.”

  The president’s calvarium—or skullcap—will be removed with a saw. A surgeon will probe the exposed brain before slicing into it with a scalpel, using the path of coagulated blood to trace the trajectory of the ball. This will show that the ball entered behind the left ear and traveled diagonally across the brain, coming to rest above the right eye.

  Yet the autopsy will be inconclusive. Four different doctors will examine the body. Each will have a different conclusion about what happened once the sphere of Britannia metal poked a neat round hole in Lincoln’s skull and then pushed fragments of that bone deep into Lincoln’s brain as it traveled precisely seven and a half inches before plowing to a stop in the dense gray matter.

  At ten-fifteen on the night of April 14, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln slumps forward in his rocking chair. Mary Lincoln, lost in the play until this very instant, stops laughing. Major Henry Reed Rathbone snaps his head around at the sound of gunfire—a sound he knows all too well from the battlefield. He’s had his back to the door, but in an instant he’s on his feet, striking a defensive pose.

  John Wilkes Booth drops the Deringer and switches the knife to his right hand. Just in time, for Major Rathbone sets aside his own safety and vaults across the small space. Booth raises the knife to shoulder level and brings it down in a hacking motion. Rathbone throws his left arm up in a defensive reflex and instantly feels the knife cut straight down through skin and biceps to the bone.

  Booth moves quickly. He steps to the front of the box, ignoring a stricken Mary Lincoln. “Freedom!” he bellows down to the audience, though in all the laughter and the growing confusion as to why the cast has added the sound of gunfire to the scene, his words are barely heard. Harry Hawk stands alone on stage, staring up at the state box with growing concern.

  Booth hurls his body over the railing. Up until this point, he has performed every single aspect of the assassination perfectly. But now he misjudges the thickness of the massive United States flag decorating the front of the box. He means to hold on to the railing with one hand as he vaults, throwing his feet up and over the edge, then landing on the stage like a conquering hero.

  This sort of leap is actually his specialty. Booth is famous among the theatrical community for his unrehearsed gymnastics, sometime
s inserting jumps and drops into Shakespeare plays on a whim. During one memorable performance of Macbeth, his fall to the stage was several feet longer than the fall from the state box.

  But Booth’s right spur gets tangled in the flag’s folds. Instead of a gallant two-footed landing on the stage, Booth topples heavily from the state box. He drops to the boards awkwardly, left foot and two hands braced in a bumbling attempt to catch his fall.

  The fibula of Booth’s lower left leg, a small bone that bears little weight, snaps two inches above the ankle. The fracture is complete, dividing the bone into two neat pieces. If not for the tightness of Booth’s boot, which forms an immediate splint, the bone would poke through the skin.

  Now Booth lies on the stage in front of a nearly packed house. His leg is broken. He holds a blood-smeared dagger in his right hand. The sound of gunfire has just ricocheted around Ford’s. Major Rathbone is bleeding profusely from a severe stab wound. And just above him, slumped forward as if very drunk or very asleep, the president of the United States is unconscious.

  Yet still nobody knows what happened. James Ford steps out of the box office and thinks Booth is pulling some crazy stunt to get attention. Observers in the audience have heard the pop and are amazed by the sudden appearance of a famous matinee idol making a cameo on the stage right before their very eyes—perhaps adding some comical whimsy to this very special evening. Harry Hawk still holds center stage, his head turned toward Booth, wondering why in the world he would intrude on the performance.

  Time stops for a second—but only one.

  Then the assassin takes charge. “Booth dragged himself up on one knee,” Hawk will later remember, “and was slashing that long knife around him like one who was crazy. It was then, I am sure, I heard him say, ‘The South shall be free!’ I recognized Booth as he regained his feet and came toward me, waving his knife. I did not know what he had done or what his purpose might be. I did simply what any man would have done—I ran.”