Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer

by James L. Swanson

  The Cox boy dutifully mentioned the seed corn, but once he saw that Jones was alone, he whispered the true nature of his mission. His father wanted to see Jones at once. “Some strangers were at our house last night,” the boy said. Jones’s eyes lit up—could he mean the heroes who assassinated President Lincoln? The report electrified Jones. The day before, on the evening of Saturday, April 15, around the time that Booth and Herold left the sanctuary of Dr. Mudd’s and undertook the next leg of their escape, Jones happened to be visiting his former farm at Pope’s Creek. Two Union soldiers rode up and asked what appeared to be an innocent question. Who owned that little boat down in the creek? For Jones the war ended when Richmond fell on April 3 and the Army of Northern Virginia surrendered on the ninth. There would be no more secret river crossings, no more thrilling escapes from Union army and navy pursuers, no more mysterious signal lights flashed across the water from one state to another. The war was over, and Jones saw no need for any prolonged cunning. He told the soldiers that the boat was his.

  His response prompted a strange but vaguely worded warning from one of the soldiers. “You had better keep an eye to it. There are suspicious characters somewhere in the neighborhood who will be wanting to cross the river, and if you don’t look sharp you will lose your boat.”

  Since when did Union soldiers care whether a Southern farmer in disloyal territory lost his rowboat? There was more to this.

  “Indeed,” replied Jones. “I will look after it. I would not like to lose it, as it is my fishing boat and the shad are beginning to run.”

  The soldiers whispered to each other, then seemed to nod in agreement. The one who asked about the boat turned to Jones. “Have you heard the news, friend?”

  No, he had not, replied Jones.

  “Then I will tell you. Our President was assassinated at 10 o’clock last night.”

  Jones uttered an ambiguous exclamation. “Is it possible!”

  Yes, the soldier answered, “and the men who did it came this way.”

  Now, a day later, Jones felt it in his bones: Captain Cox wanted to see him about something connected to the assassination.

  Jones saddled up and accompanied young Cox to Rich Hill. Although he had questions, Jones spoke little during the ride. His wartime experiences taught him to never talk about dangerous subjects except when absolutely necessary. Once they got to Rich Hill, Captain Cox could do the talking; Jones would do the listening. Until then, the riders trotted northeast quietly, their silence broken only by harmless remarks about the weather or the condition of the roads. When Jones arrived at Rich Hill at about 9:00 A.M., he saw Captain Cox waiting outside at the front gate. Jones dismounted, and Cox led him to an open place where no one could hide and eavesdrop on their conversation. An experienced secret agent, Jones sensed that Cox wanted to tell him something important. But his experience also counseled him to let his friend tell him in his own way, at his own pace. They spoke in pleasantries for several minutes, until Cox could avoid the subject no more. “Tom, I had visitors about four o’clock this morning.”

  Normally Jones possessed the talent to remain stone silent and let another man talk, but now he could not restrain himself. He blurted out, “Who were they, and what did they want?”

  “They want to get across the river,” Cox explained. He paused, then spoke in a whisper. “Have you heard that Lincoln was killed Friday night?”

  Yes, Jones replied, telling Cox about his encounter with the two soldiers.

  For a full minute Cox did not speak. Then he broke the silence: “Tom, we must get those men who were here this morning across the river.”

  Jones’s intuition was right—not only did Cox want to see him about the assassination, the killers were here! With that, Cox opened the floodgates and told Jones everything about the late-night visit from Booth and Herold. “Tom, you must get him across.”

  Jones was no coward—four years of loyal, dangerous service to the Confederacy had proved that. But the war was over. Jones mulled the situation over: “I knew that to assist in any way the assassin of Mr. Lincoln would be to put my life in jeopardy. I knew that the whole of southern Maryland would soon be—nay, was even then—swarming with soldiers and bloodhounds on the trail, eager to avenge the murder of their beloved president and reap their reward. I hesitated for a moment as I weighed these matters.”

  Cox implored him a third time: “Tom, can’t you put these men across?”

  Jones made up his mind. “I will see what I can do, but the odds are against me. I must see these men; where are they?”

  WHERE WAS JOHN WILKES BOOTH? THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT the entire country—Stanton and his men in Washington, soldiers and detectives in the field, sailors on the rivers and at sea, the American people everywhere, and, of course, the newspapers—wanted to know. And when would he be captured? The daily papers were filled with ridiculous predictions. On April 16, the Chicago Tribune, several hundred miles away from the center of action in Washington, announced that Lincoln’s assassin would be taken momentarily: “The escape of the paracide, Booth, and his confederates can only be for a few days or hours. Millions of eyes are in vigilant search of them, and soon they will be in the hands of justice … no place on this side of perdition can shelter them.” Except for a pine thicket, perhaps. Ignorant of the situation, optimistic editors in faraway Chicago predicted Booth’s “quick capture and hanging.” Then, to hedge their bets, they published an absurd and contradictory headline: “The Assassin Arrested, or Still at Large.” Was he still on the run, the Tribune asked, or was there any truth to the “unconfirmed report that Booth was arrested at 9:00 A.M. near Fort Hastings on the Bladensburg Road,” when the foolish assassin “approached our pickets boldly.”

  The April 16 edition of the New York Herald shared the Chicago Tribune’s optimism: “The most expert detectives in the country are engaged in the investigation, and no pains, labor, skill or expense will be spared in its prosecution.”

  CAPTAIN COX TOLD THOMAS JONES THAT HIS OVERSEER FRANKlin Robey had guided Booth and Herold in the middle of the night to a pine thicket about a mile west of his house. Lincoln’s killer was there now, waiting for someone to come and rescue him. Cox gave Jones the whistle code, a trio of varying notes, and cautioned him to approach the fugitives warily. Heavily armed and skittish, they might kill him. “Take care how you approach them. They are fully armed and might shoot you through mistake.”

  Alone, Jones rode west toward his unsought rendezvous with Lincoln’s assassin. The sun was at his back. That would make him a more difficult target.

  Soon after he entered the pines, Jones saw movement. It was not the fugitives. Instead, he found an unattended bay mare, with black legs, mane, and tail, and a white star on her forehead. The horse, fitted with a saddle and bridle, wandered around and grazed in a small clearing made some time previously for a tobacco bed. Jones tied the animal to a tree and pressed forward. Quietly, he inched deeper into the woods. The pines were thick now, and Jones could not see more than thirty or forty feet in front of him. He’d better give the signal soon, he thought, before he caught the two men by surprise and they shot him. Jones stopped in his tracks and whistled an odd mix of notes, like an intoxicated bluebird.

  David Herold, “scarcely more than a boy,” Jones thought, rose from the brush and aimed his Spencer carbine at him. The weapon was cocked and ready to fire. “Who are you, and what do you want,” demanded Herold. He brandished the weapon menacingly.

  “I come from Cox,” Jones replied. “He told me I would find you here. I am a friend; you have nothing to fear from me.”

  Herold stared at Jones, then, satisfied, relaxed his tense grip on the Spencer and spoke curtly. “Follow me.” He guided Jones thirty yards deeper into the pines, through thick undergrowth, to a man partly concealed by the brush. Jones’s excitement grew. He was about to discover the answer to the question that, for the past thirty-six hours, possessed an entire nation—where was John Wilkes Booth?

  “T
his friend comes from Captain Cox,” said Herold, looking down to a man on the ground.

  Nearly overcome by a mixture of thrill and fear, Jones saw John Wilkes Booth for the first time. “He was lying on the ground with his head supported by his hand. His carbine, pistols and knife were close behind him. A blanket was drawn partly over him. His slouch hat and crutch were lying by him. He was dressed in dark—I think black—clothes … travel-stained … though he was exceedingly pale and his features bore the evident trace of suffering, I have seldom, if ever, seen a more strikingly handsome man.”

  Prior to meeting Booth, Jones had little enthusiasm for this risky scheme. Yes, he had promised Cox that he would help, and he would never go back on his word to his old friend. But he did not relish the duty. Meeting the assassin changed everything.

  “His voice was pleasant,” noted Jones. “Though he seemed to be suffering intense pain from his broken leg, his manner was courteous and polite,” he observed with approval. Booth, even in these dire circumstances, remembered how to please an audience, and Jones was smitten. “But sooner had I seen him in his helpless and suffering condition than I gave my whole mind to the problem of how to get him across the river. Murderer though I knew him to be, his condition so enlisted my sympathy in his behalf that my horror of his deed was almost forgotten in my compassion for the man, and I felt it my bounden duty to do all I could to aid him; and I made up my mind, be the consequences to me what they might, from that time forth my every energy should be bent to the accomplishment of what then seemed to be the well-nigh hopeless task of getting him to Virginia.”

  Booth confided what Jones already knew—he had killed Lincoln. The assassin conceded that the odds were against him. “He said he knew the United States Government would use every means in its power to secure his capture.” But, vowed the actor, his aroused black eyes glowing with their signature brightness, “John Wilkes Booth will never be taken alive.” Thomas Jones was sure he meant it.

  Jones proposed a plan. He would do all he could to get Booth and Herold across to Virginia, but they must leave it to him to decide when and how they would make the attempt. Patience was essential. Jones was willing to assume great personal risk, but not to lead a blatantly suicidal mission. “You must stay right here, however long, and wait till I can see some way to get you out; and I do not believe I can get you out until this hue and cry is somewhat over. Meantime, I will see that you are fed.” Jones hoped that the soldiers and detectives scouring the area would give up soon and ride on to new territory once they concluded that Booth was not hiding nearby.

  Until then, Booth and Herold must not leave the pine thicket, make noise, or do anything that might let anyone know they were there. Jones said they had to wait for exactly the right moment to cross the Potomac. They needed a dark night, smooth water, deserted riverbanks, and the departure of many of the soldiers and detectives who had already followed Booth south into Maryland. That might take days. Jones persuaded Booth and Herold to adopt his ingenious, counterintuitive plan. The best way for them to escape, Jones reasoned, was to stop running from their pursuers and to go into hiding. Manhunters were already concentrating south of Washington. Soon federal forces would join David Dana and infest Charles County. It was smarter to try to escape by standing still, letting the manhunters sweep through the region, before they moved on to search elsewhere.

  With his simple plan, Jones confounded the whole manhunt for John Wilkes Booth. A lone Confederate agent, without resources and nearly penniless, had just checkmated the frantic pursuit by thousands of men being orchestrated from Washington by Secretary of War Stan-ton.

  sTANTON MAY HAVE LOST BOOTH’S TRAIL IN THE PINES, BUT he was closing in on the author of the notorious “Sam” letter found in Booth’s room at the National the night of the assassination. On the afternoon of April 16, Charles Dana received a telegram from Provost Marshal James McPhail in Baltimore: “I have traced Samuel Arnold to Fortress Monroe. Will send two men for him who know him personally. Send me a telegraph order to make arrest at fortress. Telegraphing for arrest may flush it.” Dana replied within fifteen minutes: “Arrest Samuel Arnold, suspected of being concerned in the murder of the President.” The hunt for Booth’s old school chum was on.

  The same day, April 16, Confederate Lieutenant General R. S. Ewell sent a remarkable letter to U. S. Grant, signed by him and also on behalf of sixteen other Confederate generals. They didn’t kill Lincoln, Ewell swore. He expressed “unqualified abhorrence and indignation for the assassination of the President of the United States…. No language can adequately express the shock produced upon myself, in common with all the other general officers confined here with me, by the occurrence of this appalling crime, and by the seeming tendency in the public mind to connect the South and Southern men with it…. [W]e are not assassins, not the allies of assassins, be they from the North or from the south.”

  Stanton, along with most government and military officials, as well as the American people, still blamed the Confederacy for Lincoln’s murder. Booth, it was widely believed, acted merely as its agent. But if it was not true, perhaps the resources of the Confederacy could be deployed to assist in the manhunt. In a startling move, Stanton considered enlisting the Confederacy’s legendary “gray ghost” and cavalry genius, John Singelton Mosby, in the manhunt. On April 16 Stanton telegrammed instructions to General Hancock, soon to parley over surrender terms with Mosby at Winchester, Virginia: “In holding an interview with Mosby it may be needless to caution an old soldier like you to guard against surprise or danger to yourself; but the recent murders show such astounding wickedness that too much precaution cannot be taken. If Mosby is sincere he might do much toward detecting and apprehending the murderers of the President.”

  Chapter Six

  “That Vile Rabble of Human Bloodhounds”

  NO ONE EXPECTED BOOTH TO STOP RUNNING. SOON THE manhunters would track Booth to the Surrattsville tavern, and then to Doctor Mudd’s. But then the trail went cold. The assassin seemed to simply vanish. Back in Washington, the mood at the War Department turned foul. Had he done it? Had Lincoln’s murderer actually escaped?

  Booth was a man of impulse and action, not patience and inertia, and he knew the river was tantalizingly close. He was eager to cross it, so that he and Davey could be among friends on the Virginia side this very night. And he was convinced he could be, if only Jones agreed to act decisively. Hiding in a pine thicket for days seemed to increase the danger of capture, not reduce it. Still he deferred to the river ghost’s judgment. Booth knew that he still had no choice. Thomas Jones was Booth’s only hope. If he and Herold defied Jones, if they left the pines that night and made a desperate run for the river on their own, they would almost certainly be captured or killed. Even if they made it to the riverbank, where would they find a boat? Jones was the only option. Moreover, something about Jones made Booth trust him. The operative’s laconic, steely, no-nonsense manner appealed to Booth, who fancied himself an astute judge of other men’s hearts. And Jones did know the surrounding terrain and the river as well as Booth knew the streets of Washington and the passageways of Ford’s Theatre. If this cunning, rebel nighthawk could not get Booth across, no one could.

  Jones had spoken emphatically: “You must stay right here, however long, and wait till I can see some way to get you out.” But there would be no doctor. Jones explained that it was too dangerous to bring a local Maryland physician to the pines. Once Booth crossed the river he could seek a rebel doctor in Virginia. Booth and Herold surrendered to Jones’s plan and placed themselves in his hands. But the assassin had a few urgent questions. What did the people think? What could Jones tell him about what people were saying about the assassination? Jones assured him that most men of Southern sympathies were gratified by Booth’s act.

  Booth wanted more. If it was not too much trouble, he asked, could Jones please bring some current Washington newspapers—say, yesterday’s Daily Morning Chronicle, the Evening Star, or the National
Intelligencer—from Saturday, April 15, the day Lincoln died, or from today, the sixteenth, Black Easter? Incredibly, despite his pain, exhaustion, and dire, life-threatening predicament, the actor was eager to read his reviews. Booth was especially keen to pore over the Intelligencer and enjoy a particular article—the contents already quite familiar to him—he expected to find in its pages.

  As Jones prepared to leave the thicket, he offered Davey Herold something of more practical use than newspapers—the location of a freshwater spring thirty to forty yards away. The assassins were thirsty, and the spring would sustain them while they waited to cross the river. Jones warned Herold to approach it cautiously because there was a little footpath near it that was used by the locals. Federal troops would never discover it, but better that no one, not even friendly Southerners, lay eyes on the fugitives.

  Jones mounted his horse. They would go down to the river as soon as it was safe, he reiterated. Until then, he promised, he would not abandon the assassins. He would come to them every morning, carrying food and newspapers—and hope. Jones spurred his horse, navigated slowly through the pine trees, and vanished from sight. For the next twenty-four hours, until—or if—Jones returned on Monday morning, April 17, Booth and Herold were on their own.

  RIDING HOME FROM THE PINE THICKET, THOMAS JONES CONtemplated the predicament he had just gotten himself into. When he awoke on the morning of April 16, he was just another veteran of Confederate service whose war had come to an end. All Jones wanted to do was lick his wounds, recover as best he could from his financial losses, and work his farm. But now, just a few hours later, he placed himself in greater peril than at any time during his years of secret, wartime exploits. Never had he been entrusted with a more dangerous, and as he would soon learn, valuable secret. An entire nation was demanding with one voice, “Where is John Wilkes Booth?” Thomas Jones was one of four men in the country, including the Coxes and their overseer, who knew the answer. Jones also knew something else. If Union troops caught him harboring the murderer of Abraham Lincoln, the best he could hope for was a long return visit to the Old Capitol prison. The more likely punishment was death. Jones had no illusions about how the North would view him: “I would be looked upon as the vile aider and abettor of a wretch stained with as dark a crime as the recording angel ever wrote down in the eternal book of doom.”