Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever Part 14

Feeling very pleased with himself, Booth pops in T altavul's for a whiskey. He orders a whole bottle, then sits down at the bar. Incredibly, Lincoln's bodyguard is sipping a large tankard of ale just a few feet away.

Booth smiles as he pours water into his whiskey, then raises the gla.s.s in a toast to himself.

What am I about to do? Can I really go through w ith this?

He pushes the doubts from his head. We are at w ar. This is not murder. You w ill become immortal.

At ten P.M. Booth double-checks to make sure John Parker is still drinking at the other end of the bar. Then, leaving the nearly full whiskey bottle on the bar, he softly lowers his gla.s.s and walks back to Ford's.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1865 WASHINGTON, D.C.

10:00 P.M.

The third act is under way. Soon the play will be over, and Lincoln can get back to the White House. Meanwhile, the unheated state box has gotten chilly. Abraham Lincoln drops Mary's hand as he rises to put on his overcoat, tailored in a black wool specially for his oversized frame by Brooks Brothers. The silk lining is decorated with an eagle clutching a banner in its beak. The words on the streamer are Lincoln's unspoken manifesto, and every time he slips on the coat he is reminded of his mission. "One country, one destiny," it reads, quite simply.

Sitting back down in the horsehair rocker, Lincoln shifts his gaze from the performers directly below him. He pushes back the privacy curtain, then leans forward over the railing to look down and to the left, at the audience.

Lincoln lets go of the curtain and returns his attention to Our American Cousin.

I t is seven minutes after ten. At the exact same moment, John Wilkes Booth strolls through the front door of Ford's-heart racing, whiskey on his breath, skin clammy to the touch. He is desperately trying to appear calm and cool. Always a man of manners, Booth takes off his hat and holds it with one hand. When ticket taker John Buckingham makes a joke of letting him in for free, "courtesy of the house," Booth notices the bulge in Buckingham's lip and asks if he has any extra tobacco. Like so many other minor theater employees, Buckingham is in awe of Booth's celebrity.

Not only does he hand over a small plug of tobacco, he also summons the courage to ask if he might introduce Booth to some close friends who happen to be at the show. "Later," Booth promises with a wink.

Buckingham notes the deathly pallor on Booth's face and how incredibly nervous the normally nonchalant actor seems to be. As Booth walks off, Buckingham's fellow Ford's employee John Sessford points out that Booth has been in and out of the theater all day. "Wonder what he's up to?"

Sessford mutters to Buckingham. They watch as Booth climbs the staircase to the dress circle, which accesses the hallway to the state box. But neither man thinks Booth's unusual behavior merits closer scrutiny. They watch him disappear up the stairs and then once again return their attention to the front door and to the patrons late in returning from intermission.

At the top of the stairs, Booth enters the dress circle lobby. He is now inside the darkened theater, standing directly behind the seats of the second- level audience. He hums softly to himself to calm his nerves. In hopes of increasing the theater's capacity for this special performance, Ford's management has placed extra chairs in this corridor, and now Booth walks past two Union officers sitting in those seats. They recognize the famous actor and then turn their focus back to the play. They make no move to stop him, because they have no reason to.

Booth approaches the door leading into the state box. I t is attended by a White House messenger but not a pistol-packing bodyguard. He sees the chair where John Parker should be sitting and breathes a sigh of relief that the bodyguard is still in the saloon. Handing the messenger one of his calling cards, Booth steps through the doorway without a question.

In the theater below, a young girl who came to the theater hoping to see Lincoln has spent the night staring up at the state box, waiting for him to show his face. Now she is awed by the sight of John Wilkes Booth, the famous and dashing actor, standing in the shadows above her. At the same time, her heart leaps as Lincoln moves his gaze from the stage to the audience, once again poking his head out over the railing. Finally, with the play almost over, she has seen the president! She turns to the man next to her, Taltavul's owner, Jim Ferguson, and grins at her good fortune.

She turns to get another glimpse of Booth, but by then he has already pushed through the door and now stands in the darkened hallway leading into the state box. He is completely alone. I f he wants, he can go back out the door and get on with his life as if nothing has happened. The letter boasting of his deed has not yet been sent. Other than the other members of the conspiracy, no one will be the wiser. But if he walks forward down the hallway, then through the rear door of Lincoln's box, his life will change forever.

Booth has a head full of whiskey and a heart full of hate. He thinks of the Confederate cause and Lincoln's promise to give slaves the vote. And then Booth remembers that no one can put a stop to it but him. He is the one man who can, and will, make a difference. There will be no going back.

Earlier that day Booth spied a wooden music stand in the state box. He now jams it into the side of the door leading to the corridor. The music stand has become a dead bolt, and Booth double-checks to make sure it is lodged firmly against the wooden door frame. This seals the door shut from the inside. When he is done, the door might as well be locked, so perfect is his blockade. I t's impossible to push open from the other side. No one in the theater can get in to stop him.

Booth then creeps down the hallway. Booth's second act of preparation that afternoon was using a pen knife to carve a very small peephole in the back wall of the state box. Now he looks through that hole to get a better view of the president.

As Booth already knows, the state box is shaped like a parallelogram. The walls to the left and right of Lincoln slant inward. Booth sees that Clara Harris and Major Rathbone sit along the wall to his far right, at an angle to the stage, and the Lincolns sit along the railing. The Lincolns look out directly onto the stage, while Clara and her beau must turn their heads slightly to the right to see the show-if they look directly forward they will be gazing at Mary and Abraham Lincoln in profile.

But it is not their view of Lincoln that matters. What matters is that Booth, through the peephole, is staring right at the back of Lincoln's head. He can hear the players down below, knowing that in a few short lines Harry Hawk's character Asa Trenchard will be alone, delivering his "sockdologizing old man-trap" line.

That line is Booth's cue-and just ten seconds away.

Booth presses his black hat back down onto his head, then removes the loaded Deringer from his coat pocket and grasps it in his right fist. With his left hand, he slides the long, razor-sharp Bowie knife from its sheath.

Booth takes a deep breath and softly pushes the door open with his knife hand. The box is dimly lit from the footlights down below. He can see only faces. No one knows he's there. He presses his body against the wall, careful to stay in the shadows while awaiting his cue. Abraham Lincoln's head pokes over the top of his rocking chair, just four short feet in front of Booth; then once again he looks down and to the left, at the audience.

"You sockdologizing old man-trap" booms out through the theater.

The audience explodes in laughter.

CHAPTER FORTY.

FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1865 WASHINGTON, D.C.

10:15 P.M.

A few blocks away, someone knocks hard on the front door of the "Old Clubhouse," the home of Secretary of State William Seward. The three-story brick house facing Lafayette Park, across the street from the White House, took that name from its day as the headquarters of the elite Washington Club. Tragedy paid a visit to the building in 1859, when a congressman shot his mistress's husband on a nearby lawn. The husband, Philip Barton Key, was a United States attorney and the son of Francis Scott Key, who wrote "The Star-Spangled Banner." Key's body was carried inside the club, where he pa.s.sed away in a first-floor parlor.

That tragedy, however, will pale in comparison with what will happen in the next ten minutes.

There is another sharp knock, even though it's been only a few seconds since the first one. This time the pounding is more insistent. Secretary Seward does not hear it, for he is sleeping upstairs, his medication causing him to drift between consciousness and unconsciousness. William Bell, a young black servant in a pressed white coat, hurries to the entryway.

"Yes, sir?" he asks, opening the door and seeing an unfamiliar face.

A handsome young man with long, thick hair stares back from the porch. He wears an expensive slouch hat and stands a couple inches over six feet. His jaw is awry on the left, as if it was badly broken and then healed improperly. "I have medicine from Dr. Verdi," he says in an Alabama drawl, holding up a small vial.

"Yes, sir. I 'll take it to him," Bell says, reaching for the bottle.

"I t has to be delivered personally."

Bell looks at him curiously. Secretary Seward's physician had visited just an hour ago. Before leaving, he'd administered a sedative and insisted that there be no more visitors tonight. "Sir, I can't let you go upstairs. I have strict orders-"

"You're talking to a white man, boy. This medicine is for your master and, by G.o.d, you're going to give it to him."

When Bell protests further, Lewis Powell pushes past him, saying, "Out of my way, n.i.g.g.e.r. I 'm going up."

Bell simply doesn't know how to stop the intruder.

Powell starts climbing the steps from the foyer to the living area. Bell is a step behind at all times, pleading forgiveness and politely asking that Powell tread more softly. The sound of the southerner's heavy work boots on the wooden steps echoes through the house. "I 'm sorry I talked rough to you," Bell says sheepishly.

"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 a.s.sa.s.sin 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."

"Y ou cannot see Mr. Seward. I am his son and the a.s.sistant 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 b.u.t.t 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 f.a.n.n.y 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 a.s.sa.s.sin 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, f.a.n.n.y 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 f.a.n.n.y 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 a.s.sa.s.sin 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 f.a.n.n.y'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.